After the maritime boundary deal between Israel and Lebanon was signed on Thursday, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah stated that his movement now considers the issue completed and would be ending the "exceptional measures and mobilizations" it had implemented in relation to the negotiations on the deal.
Nasrallah had threatened in recent months to strike Israeli natural gas infrastructure if a deal was not reached.
"We in Hezbollah consider what happened from the beginning to the end to the results as a great and very big victory for the Lebanese for the state, the people and the resistance, and what happened has very important results and implications," said Nasrallah on Thursday.
Nasrallah additionally rejected criticism of the agreement by some Lebanese people, saying that "their hatred blinded them." The Hezbollah leader stressed that Lebanese officials did not take any step that would lead to a "suspicion of normalization" and claimed that Israeli and Lebanese delegations did not meet under the same roof.
"The demarcation file is not an international treaty and does not imply normalization with Israel, which admits that it has not obtained any security guarantees," said the Hezbollah leader.
Nasrallah will speak in more depth about the deal on Saturday.
Nasrallah's threats against the Karish field
In recent months, Nasrallah had issued threats to attack Israeli targets if Israel began pumping gas from the Karish rig off the coast of northern Israel before a deal was signed with Lebanon. In a speech earlier this month, Nasrallah stressed that this ultimatum was still in effect until a deal was signed in Naqoura, but added that he was not using the speech to issue threats.
Energean announced on Wednesday, a day before the deal was signed, that it had begun extracting gas from the Karish field.