The relationship between Hezbollah and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) range back to the 1980’s Israeli occupation of Lebanon. As a militant anti-imperialist organisation, Hezbollah is feared by the likes of Israel and the US. Now recently, they have fought alongside the Syrian Arab Army against terrorists who have received immense support from the imperialist bloc – US, UK, Israel, Qatar and Saudiarabia in particular. Like the DPRK, Hezbollah have been demonized by the West for its firm stand against imperialism, and for justice. Hezbollah have been accused of anti-semitism because of its anti-zionism that has been growing in relation to Israel’s hold of Lebanon. Worth noting is that the Secretary-General of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, have stated on behalf of his organisation that Hezbollah is not seeking to build an Islamic state in Lebanon due to its multicultural environment and that it is not the wish of the vast majority at the moment, and probably never will. Nasrallah also meant that not only a democratic majority of 51% is enough to build an Islamic state, but the support of the vast majority is needed. Hezbollah representatives in the Lebanese parliament have also stated that “Hezbollah has never been against religions. Hezbollah supports all religions, it supports interfaith dialogue, and it has no problem with any religion. Hezbollah considers Zionism to be the enemy, not the Jews as a people or a religion.” Hezbollah have defended freedoms of minorities, both at home and abroad, like in Syria. To call Hezbollah anti-semite is nothing but vile and vicious lies.

According to a survey released by the “Beirut Center for Research and Information” on July 26 during the 2006 Lebanon War, 87% of Lebanese support Hezbollah’s “retaliatory attacks on northern Israel”, a rise of 29% points from a similar poll conducted in February the same year. Hezbollah have been portrayed as a Shia nationalist organisation, however, the level of support for Hezbollah’s resistance from non-Shiite communities was huge. 80% of Christians polled supported Hezbollah, along with 80% of Druze and 89% of Sunnis. Also from the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories and in Jordan, a vast majority consider Hezbollah a legitimate resistance organisation. This might give an idea why a popular group like Hezbollah is under constant attack by the West.

The relationship between Hezbollah and the DPRK started when Israel invaded Lebanon and with the Israeli occupation of Southern Lebanon when Israel set up a “buffer zone” in the occupied area, and created Israeli loyal militias, made up from segments of the Christian population. The Christian militias – among them the notorious South Lebanon army – carried out ethnic cleansings, mainly against the Druze and Palestinian minorities. The Korean People’s Army (KPA) have provided support to their brothers-in-arms ever since. General-Secretary Nasrallah himself visited the DPRK for training purposes during this time. Among other noted Hezbollah members who underwent training in the DPRK was Mustafa Badreddine, who served as the movement’s counter-espionage chief in 2006, when Israel attacked Lebanon once again, and Ibrahim Akil, head of Hezbollah’s security and intelligence service. It has also been said that about 100 commandos from Hezbollah have received training by the KPA during the same period. It is even claimed that Korean instructors travelled to Lebanon in 2004 and provided Hezbollah with critical assistance in building an extensive and sophisticated fortified tunnel network in the area south of the Litani River and bordering Israel.

After the Israeli aggression of 2006 against Lebanon, the Zionists have started to fear the training of Hezbollah fighters that is taking place in the DPRK with KPA special forces, as well as counter espionage and intelligence training. The post-2006 training of Hezbollah fighters have proven to be very important for the defense of the Lebanese people. The KPA have continuously assisted Hezbollah, and today they are one of the most efficient non-state actors, not only in the Middle East, but in the world. The imperialists just hate it.

Since 2007, Israel went great lengths to stop the development of nuclear power plants in Iran and Syria and to spread fear among the respective populations. Iranian nuclear engineer Majid Shahriari, was most likely assassinated by Mossad agents… On 29 November 2010, unidentified assailants riding motorcycles launched separate bomb attacks, killing Shahriari and injuring nuclear scientist Fereydoon Abbasi, a professor at Shahid Beheshti University, where Shahriari also taught. Dr. Abbasi’s wife was also wounded. The killers had attached bombs to the professors’ cars and detonated them from a distance. According to The Guardian, Shahriari “had no known links to banned nuclear work” and according to Al Jazeera he “was a quantum physicist and was not a political figure at all” and he “was not involved in Iran’s nuclear programme”. The Zionist regime only objective is to spread terror and fear. Dozens of DPRK citizens have also been killed by the Zionist regime while working on sites in Syria. For example, in March 2007, Mossad agents broke into the Vienna home of Syria’s Atomic Agency director, where they found pictures taken inside a nuclear reactor in Syria. On September 6 the same year, eight Israeli fighter jets dropped 17 tons of explosives on the Syrian site, destroying it. Only some countries are allowed to possess nuclear weapons, while others are not even allowed to have nuclear energy.

More DPRK citizens have also been killed by Israel while working in Syria, like in 1982, during the Lebanese civil war, the DPRK government dispatched special operations forces to Syria to provide training for guerrilla operations, some killed by the Israeli military. It was also claimed by the “moderate” islamist Assad al-Zoubi, that in June 2013, the terrorist held town of Qusair was shelled at dawn with a massive rocket, artillery and mortar fire barrage, and overrun by Syrian armed forces backed by Hezbollah militants. Arab-speaking KPA advisors were integral to the operational planning of the surprise attack and artillery campaign execution during the battle for Qusair, and allied Hezbollah fighters, changing the dynamics of the war in Syria. The victory in Qusair represents a significant military and symbolic victory for the Syrian government and a humiliating defeat for the terrorists.

It is worth mentioning that during the islamist rule of Qusair, that was backed by the West against the legitimate government of Syria, that the military chief of the “armed opposition”, general Abdel Salam Harba, ordered the remaining thousand of the prior ten thousand Christians to leave Qusair after they carried out an ethnic cleansing in the town.

Mother Agnes Miriam of the Cross, Mother Superior of the Monastery of St. James at Qara in the Diocese of Homs, was interviewed on Irish Radio back in June 2012, where she confirmed that the Western backed rebels in Syria were terrorizing Syria’s Christian community. Asked whether it was the Free Syrian Army that was telling Christians to get out, Mother Agnes Miriam answered “yes…it was commander on the ground Abdel Salam Harba who decided that there was to be no more negotiations with Christians.” She said that Christians are being targeted because they are refusing to back the rebels and instead prefer to keep out of either side of the conflict. She said that the rebels are specifically targeting government troops in Christian areas and are taking Christians as human shields. Read the full story

Reactionaries claims that the DPRK is an isolated country and have lost most of its friends since the end of the Cold War, but nothing could be further from the truth. The anti-imperialist connection between the DPRK and other states, and in some cases, like Hezbollah’s, non-state actors, is unbreakable and grow stronger every day. It is not the last time that the US-Israeli pact will try to ruin a peaceful country and encourage sectarian violence in the region. Just like the British imperialists have been using divide and conquer tactics to rule over the people of the occupied six counties, so have Israel done in Lebanon and that is what the imperialists are doing right now in Syria. Today is religion a tool in the hands of the imperialists. We know how the US have been using Christian missionaries in the DPRK to smuggle equipment such as radios, weapons and other illegal things along with their bibles. Religious minorities can live in peace and enjoy religious freedoms and practice their religion in the DPRK as well as Syria, Lebanon and Iran. Civil liberties is something that is unthinkable of though under US-occupation.

Hezbollah is a consequent and advancing organisation that will keep the imperialist hands of the independent states of the Middle East and safeguard the rights of minorities.

In 2012, the Lebanese TV channel Al-Manar aired a television special praising an 8-year-old boy who raised money for Hezbollah and said: “When I grow up, I will be a communist resistance warrior with Hezbollah, fighting the United States and Israel, I will tear them to pieces and drive them out of Lebanon, the Golan and Palestine, which I love very dearly.”

The friendship and solidarity between the DPRK and Hezbollah will forever flourish.