Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of a ceremony held in honor of Nasrallah on Sunday, Zarif said he personally knew the martyred Hezbollah chief for over three decades, and described him as a symbol of “bravery, honesty and tactfulness”.
The former foreign minister noted that Nasrallah, along with other senior Hezbollah leaders, delivered the first significant defeat to Israel in 2000, compelling them to withdraw from southern Lebanon in humiliation and without conditions.
Zarif added that withdrawal was a huge embarrassment for the Israeli regime and it has been looking to assassinate Nasrallah ever since.
Nasrallah was martyred in a massive wave of Israeli airstrikes on a group of residential buildings in southern Beirut on Friday amid heightened tensions between the Lebanese resistance movement and the Israeli regime over the war on the Gaza Strip.
