BEIRUT — Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem reiterated Sunday the militant group’s refusal to lay down its weapons before Israel withdraws from all of southern Lebanon and stops its airstrikes. He spoke in a video address as thousands gathered in Beirut’s southern suburbs to mark the Shiite holy day of Ashoura.

This year’s commemoration comes in the wake of a bruising war between Israel and Hezbollah, which nominally ended with a U.S.-brokered ceasefire in late November. Since the ceasefire, Israel has continued to occupy five strategic border points in southern Lebanon and to carry out near-daily airstrikes. Those strikes have killed some 250 people since November, in addition to more than 4,000 killed during the war, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry. There has been increasing international and domestic pressure for Hezbollah to give up its remaining arsenal.

“How can you expect us not to stand firm while the Israeli enemy continues its aggression, continues to occupy the five points, and continues to enter our territories and kill?” Kassem said in his video address.

— The Associated Press