The killing of Nasrallah – The US cheered, other countries foamed with anger

Biden said the United States fully supports Israel’s right to defend itself against Iranian-backed groups. The US president also reported that he had instructed Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to further improve the defensive posture of US forces in the Middle East to deter aggression and reduce the risk of a major war.

Ultimately, the United States is seeking to de-escalate the ongoing conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon through diplomatic means, he said.

Hezbollah-allied Iran condemned the Israeli attack on Nasrallah as a war crime. “The Zionist attacks are a clear war crime and the West’s response to them is an indictment,” President Masoud Pezeshkian said, according to the presidential office’s web portal. He accused the US of allowing the attack and thus being complicit in Nasrallah’s death.

Iran supports Hezbollah
“This act of terror by the Zionists has left a deep wound, but has further strengthened the resistance,” the president said. Iran remains on the side of Hezbollah and the “anti-Israel resistance front.” Like Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei before him, Pezeshkian described the terrorist militia Hezbollah as “invincible.”

A state-organized mourning ceremony for Nasrallah took place in the capital Tehran on Saturday afternoon. Khamenei declared five days of national mourning for the slain militia leader.

Sharp criticism from the Kremlin
Russia condemned Israel’s assassination of Nasrallah. The State Department warned of “even more dramatic consequences for Lebanon and the entire Middle East” and called on Israel to stop its attacks on targets in Lebanon. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke of a “political assassination” at the UN General Assembly in New York. “The methods of political assassinations that have become almost routine, as happened again yesterday in Beirut, are extremely alarming,” he said.

Turkey, China and Germany also criticized Israel’s attacks on Lebanon, without mentioning Nasrallah by name. The latest Israeli attacks in Lebanon are part of a policy of “genocide, occupation and invasion,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan wrote on the short message service X. The UN Security Council and other bodies must stop Israel.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi indirectly condemned the escalation between Israel and Hezbollah in his speech at the United Nations General Debate. “Fighting has restarted in Lebanon, but force cannot replace justice,” Wang said in New York, hours after confirming Nasrallah’s death in an Israeli airstrike. He did not explicitly mention Israel.

Reluctance from Berlin
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock described the situation in the Middle East following the death of Hezbollah leader Nasrallah as “extremely dangerous” and voiced clear criticism of Israel’s actions. “It threatens to destabilize the whole of Lebanon. And that is in no way in the interest of Israel’s security,” the Green politician said on Saturday in the ARD program “Report from Berlin”.

There is a risk that the entire region will fall further into the spiral of violence. That is why Germany, together with the US, France and several Arab countries, called for a 21-day ceasefire in the Middle East on Thursday in New York to reach a diplomatic solution to the conflict.

“The opposite has now happened,” Baerbock said. “And now, with the latest reports, we must say clearly: military logic is one thing for the purpose of destroying Hezbollah terrorists. But the security logic is different.”