interview in al-ahram:
On Tuesday, Lebanon commemorated one year after the end of the 33-day US- backed Israeli war last summer that left 2,023 civilians dead and 3,740 wounded, razing to the ground entire villages and towns in south Lebanon. Lebanon's Shia population were made to pay the heaviest price during the war. The ostensible goal was to break its support and sympathy for Hizbullah, destroying the resistance movement's social and political base.
(...) The reverse effect occurred. Qasim says that the party's popularity in the aftermath of the war was never higher. "Sympathy for the party grew during and after the war, and so too our popularity. We have full support from our constituency." Qasim points out that Hizbullah has been inundated with requests, most from Lebanese youth, to join the resistance.
(...) "No one in Hizbullah's leadership made a statement about changing or amending the Taif Agreement," Qasim responds. "Our discourse has always been one of honouring Taif because it is an agreement that Lebanon reached after a period of suffering that lasted for 15 years, and therefore we cannot talk about a new agreement. In Hizbullah we believe that what is needed is to implement Taif and not to amend it."