Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem said in a televised speech that Lebanon ‘will have no life’ if it tries to eliminate the group.

Hezbollah raised the spectre of civil war with a warning on Friday there would be “no life” in Lebanon if the government sought to confront or eliminate the Iran-backed group.

The government wants to control arms in line with a U.S.-backed plan following Israel ’s military campaign against Hezbollah, which was founded four decades ago with the backing of Tehran’s Revolutionary Guards.

But the group is resisting pressure to disarm, saying that cannot happen until Israel ends its strikes and occupation of a southern strip of Lebanon that had been a Hezbollah stronghold.

“This is our nation together. We live in dignity together, and we build its sovereignty to

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