Nasrallah Declares Victory for Hezbollah

A giant billboard of Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, right, is seen on a building as a fire smoulders from Israeli bombardment the night before, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Monday, Aug. 14, 2006. Hours after a U.N.-brokered ceasefire took hold Monday, thousands of Shiite refugees returned to disaster-stricken neighborhoods south of Beirut to check on their homes. (AP Photo/Kevin Frayer) (Kevin Frayer - AP)

BEIRUT, Lebanon -- Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah declared Monday that his guerrillas achieved a "strategic, historic victory" against Israel.

Nasrallah, speaking on the day a cease-fire took effect _ ending 34 days of fighting between Hezbollah and Israel _ called Monday "a great day."

"We are today before a strategic, historic victory, without exaggeration," the leader of the Shiite militant group said in a taped speech on Hezbollah's al-Manar TV.

Nasrallah also promised Hezbollah would help the Lebanese people rebuild.

"The enemy destroyed thousands of houses in the south, the Bekaa and the southern suburbs," he said.