Hassan Nasrallah. Photo: Wiki Commons

Admitting to a move aimed at provoking Israel, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah claimed responsibility for his group launching the drone aircraft that was recently shot down in Israeli airspace, the Associated Press reported.

Hezbollah had been the leading suspect behind the drone, which was unarmed and brought down by an Israeli warplane jet in the Hebron Hills, not far from Israel’s nuclear reactor site at Dimona.

“It is our natural right to send other reconnaissance flights inside occupied Palestine … This is not the first time and will not be the last. We can reach any place we want,” Nasrallah said in a televised address.

The drone incident has generated a war of words between Iran, its proxy Hezbollah and Israel. Earlier in the week, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corp claimed that the drone successfully photographed the Dimona reactor. Another report from the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth said that the Israeli F-16 missed the drone on its first missile attempt.