Report: Nasrallah is in Damascus

Al-Qaida's No. 2 threatens Western world over Lebanon, Gaza conflict.

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
hizbullah nasrallah 298 (photo credit: AP [file])
hizbullah nasrallah 298
(photo credit: AP [file])
A top Iranian envoy was in Syria on Thursday for talks on the Israeli-Hizbullah conflict in a meeting that brought together the guerrilla organization's two key sponsors, according to Iranian news reports. A Kuwaiti newspaper reported that Hizbullah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah was taking part in the session. Kuwait's Al-Siyassah newspaper, known for its opposition to the Syrian regime, said the meeting was designed to discuss ways to maintain supplies to Hezbollah fighters with "Iranian arms flowing through Syrian territories." Al-Siyassah said it learned of the meeting from "well-informed Syrian sources" it did not identify. According to the newspaper, Nasrallah was moving through Damascus with Syrian guards in an intelligence agency car. He was dressed in civilian clothes, not his normal clerical garb. The Mehr news agency in Iran said Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, was in Damascus for meetings on the crisis, but gave no other details. Similar reports were carried by the Iranian Labor News Agency and the Fars agency. Al-Siyassah said Larijani would meet Syrian President Hafez Assad and Nasrallah. There was no mention of Larijani's travels in Iranian state-run media. None of the reports could be independently confirmed. Meanwhile, al-Qaida's no. 2 leader on Thursday warned that the terrorist group would not stand idly by while "these (Israeli) shells burn our brothers" in Lebanon and Gaza. In a taped message broadcast by al-Jazeera television, Ayman al-Zawahri, second in command to Osama bin Laden, said al-Qaida now saw "all the world as a battlefield open in front of us." The Egyptian-born physician said Hizbullah and Palestinian fighting against Israel would not be ended with "cease-fires or agreements." "The war with Israel does not depend on cease-fires ... . It is a Jihad for God's sake and will last until (our) religion prevails...from Spain to Iraq," al-Zawahri said. "We will attack everywhere." Al-Zawahri wore a gray robe and white turban. A picture of the burning World Trade Center was on the wall behind him along with pictures of two other terrorists. The Arab satellite broadcaster appeared not to have transmitted the entire tape, using instead selected quotes interspersed with commentary from an anchor. "The shells and rockets ripping apart Muslim bodies in Gaza and Lebanon are not only Israeli (weapons), but are supplied by all the countries of the crusader coalition. Therefore, every participant in the crime will pay the price," al-Zawahri said.