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NewsTranscript
00:00And our guest, Olivia Lepoix-de-Vent, head of news at the French-language Lebanese newspaper.
00:03Lauriane Le Jour, hello to you, and thank you for patiently waiting.
00:06Olivia, you have an update on the latest information in Beirut. What more can you tell us?
00:13Yeah, literally just before coming on air, I've just heard an explosion. I'm based here in
00:18central Beirut. I'm not going to the office because our office is
00:21about three kilometres just up the hill from Beirut's southern suburbs.
00:25But I've just heard an explosion here and I've just seen a report from a colleague
00:29who is nearby the area. We understand there's been three more additional strikes on Beirut's
00:34southern suburbs. That is in addition to the continuous strikes that happened overnight,
00:40and of course, the major strike at 6.30 last night, which the Israeli army claim has killed
00:48Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, though, of course, Hezbollah has so far not commented.
00:54Essentially, the situation is incredibly tense. Things are moving hour by hour. And as I said,
01:00even sitting here now, we are constantly looking out into the sky behind us to see
01:07what is happening. Beirut really is – well, parts of Beirut, at least, do feel under siege.
01:14And this news that we're getting about Nasrallah, deeply dangerous, very concerning.
01:20Olivia, on the set with me is also our foreign editor, James Andre. He's the other voice
01:24speaking with me. If Nasrallah's death is confirmed, how big of a blow would that be?
01:32Major blow. I mean, in the past 10 days, we have seen
01:37Hezbollah lose key members of its top military brass. We've seen its communication systems
01:43be completely destroyed in those pager and walkie-talkie attacks attributed to Israel.
01:51Up until now, Hezbollah could – we could almost say Hezbollah was feeling fairly satisfied with
01:58how the conflict was going. It entered this conflict on October 8th to support its ally
02:04Hamas following its assault on Israel back in October. And up until then, Hezbollah had
02:12showed itself to be fairly restrained. This has always been a fairly asymmetrical conflict with
02:18the majority of strikes coming from the Israeli side, though, of course, with forceful replies
02:23as well from Hezbollah. But that has totally changed and been shattered in the past 10 days.
02:28The loss of Nasrallah was unimaginable some days ago. Everybody saw it as a red line.
02:37For 32 years, he's been leading Hezbollah and importantly, has made significant gains,
02:44transforming it into a formidable military force with the aid of Iran, its main backer,
02:52that was fairly confident in terms of its military expertise, having fought in Syria
02:58during the civil war there in support of President Assad. And also, obviously,
03:03previous precedent with the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah where it claimed victory.
03:09Right. And just to cut you off there, you mentioned Iran. Just over 10 minutes ago,
03:14we had a statement from Iran's Supreme Leader who's allegedly been moved to a secure location
03:19following announcement of the alleged death of Hassan Nasrallah. The statement from Iran's
03:26Supreme Leader says, quote, all the forces of resistance in the region stand alongside
03:31and support Hezbollah. A lot of uncertainty, Olivia. Where do we think this is headed?
03:37Yeah, well, I think that's to be expected in terms of obviously Iran taking extra security
03:42measures. Of course, you've got to remember it was in Iran where Hamas political bureau chief
03:47leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed in an assassination carried out by Israel. So,
03:55Iran has also been exposed. Its intelligence has clearly been infiltrated multiple times.
04:01But in terms of where it's headed, I mean, key questions are being posed now. First of all,
04:06who will replace Nasrallah? If it's anything like what we saw in the case of Haniyeh,
04:10we saw Yahya Sinwar come in, who is arguably much more extreme and less moderate and steadfast in
04:18his will to continue the war in Gaza, which will pose multiple problems for the hostage situation
04:25there. Second of all, Hassan Nasrallah was obviously a key interlocutor as well in terms of
04:34the government in Lebanon working with him to try and find a deal on the southern Lebanese border
04:41with Israel. So, again, who's going to come in and be the voice who can actually sell that deal
04:48to Hezbollah supporters? Because anything now is going to make Hezbollah members feel like
04:53the party has imploded and that it's incredibly weak. And of course, its support is based on the
05:02fact that Hezbollah is seen as the main defense to Israel. That is how it came into being. It's
05:08called the resistance for that reason. But at the moment, it seems at every level of leadership,
05:16it is exposed and vulnerable. And we don't know yet how Hezbollah is going to seek to respond.
05:22And you've got to remember Hezbollah is one of the best armed non-state actors
05:26in the world. It has long-range precision missiles, which can do considerable damage
05:31in Israel. And who is going to be the one at the top making those decisions? Of course,
05:36Iran will be having a big say in that. Sorry, just while speaking, I'm just hearing another
05:41explosion happening. So, yeah, sorry, things are quite tense right now. And I think if it's
05:46OK with you, I'm just going to go and check what's happening. All right, Olivia, thank you for your
05:50time. Stay safe, Olivia. Lepore de Vence speaking to us from Beirut. Thank you very much.