Old video comes back to haunt Hezbollah chief Nasrallah

A video in which Hassan Nasrallah spoke about his dream goal in Lebanon before he became Hezbollah leader is being circulated again on social media following a speech on Saturday in which he officially admitted engagement in the Syrian civil war.

The video being circulated online reportedly dates back to 1988 and shows a younger Nasrallah saying: “Our plan, to which we, as faithful believers, have no alternative, is to establish an Islamic state under the rule of Islam.”

“Lebanon should not be an Islamic republic on its own, but rather, part of the Greater Islamic Republic, governed by the Master of Time [the Mahdi], and his rightful deputy, the Jurisprudent Ruler, Imam Khomeini,” he said.

In his speech on Saturday, the guerrilla chief vowed “victory” in Syria and defended his position to side with regime of president Bashar al-Assad and with Iran.

“Syria is the rear guard of the resistance (Hezbollah’s fight with Israel), its backbone, and the resistance cannot stay with its arms folded when its rear guard is exposed,” he said.

“We are idiots if we do not act,” said Nasrallah who avoids appearing in public for security reasons.

“Hezbollah cannot be in the same trench as the United States, Israel, the takfirist (radical Muslims)... who disembowel, behead and desecrate tombs,” he said of reports that rebels had vandalized the shrine of a venerated Shiite saint.