Nasrallah during August 9 video news conference.

BEIRUT— Hizbullah chief Hassan Nasrallah on Monday unveiled footage allegedly intercepted from Israeli surveillance planes of the site of the murder of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri prior to his 2005 assassination.

“Such footage generally comes as the first leg of the execution of an operation,” Nasrallah said in a highly anticipated news conference broadcast via video link.

Several clips, each minutes long and undated, showed aerial views of the coastline off mainly Sunni west Beirut on various dates before the Hariri assassination, some dating back several years before 2005.

Nasrallah, who has accused Israel of the February 14, 2005 bombing which killed Hariri and 22 others, said the footage was intercepted from Israeli MK surveillance aircraft.

The Shi’a leader conceded the images were not conclusive proof but noted that his party had no offices, positions or presence in the areas under surveillance.

The alleged Israeli footage panned across the popular Hamra district, Hariri’s residences in west Beirut and parliament, his last stop before the killing in a seafront bomb blast.

The video clips, aired on Hizbullah’s Al-Manar television, also showed close-up footage of a main highway linking Beirut to Christian cities north of the capital as well as to the southern coastal city of Sidon.

Nasrallah, whose party is close to Iran and Syria, last month revealed he was aware the UN-backed tribunal probing the Hariri murder was likely to indict members of Hizbullah, slamming the court as biased and part of an Israeli plot.

On Monday, he reiterated his lack of trust in the UN investigation but said he was willing to cooperate with the Lebanese government and present the cabinet, which includes two Hizbullah ministers, with his findings.

Nasrallah refused to specify what measures Hizbullah would take should the tribunal, which is expected to issue an indictment by the end of this year, implicate the Shi’a party.

In his two-hour conference, Nasrallah spoke at length of suspected spies in Lebanon, airing detailed profiles of a handful of alleged Israeli agents.

Al-Manar also showed a confession on camera of a Lebanese man who Nasrallah said was involved in the murder of a top Hizbullah official and was now holed up in Israel.

Nasrallah alluded to a link between the “spies” and the Hariri murder without providing concrete evidence.

His allegations have stirred fears of an outbreak of Sunni-Shi’a unrest in already tense Lebanon, prompting a landmark summit in Beirut last month between Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Saudi King Abdullah and Lebanese leaders.

The Hariri assassination triggered an international outcry and led to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon in April 2005 after a deployment of almost three decades.

The murder has been widely blamed on Syria but Damascus has consistently denied involvement.