Hizbullah has denied any links to a ship carrying hundreds of tons of weapons that Israel claims was bound for the Iranian-backed group.
Israel intercepted the ship yesterday and asserted the vessel was carrying weapons from Iran for Hizbullah.
In a statement today, Hizbullah said it "categorically denies" any connection to the weapons. The statement also said Israel's actions amounted to "piracy."
The seizure spotlighted dangerous tensions between Israel and Iran. Israel considers Iran a strategic threat because of its nuclear program and long-range missile development, dismissing Iranian denials that it is building nuclear weapons.
Israeli Commodore Ran Ben-Yehuda, speaking yesterday as the search of the Antigua-flagged
Francopwas under way in Israel's Mediterranean port of Ashdod, said the weapons were found behind civilian goods in at least 40 shipping containers.
The shipment, he said, was enough to keep Hizbullah, which fired some 4,000 rockets into Israel during a 34-day war in 2006, supplied for a month of fighting.
"The weapons came from Iran and were meant for Hizbullah," Commodore Ben-Yehuda claimed after the ship was intercepted in international waters about 160 kilometres from Israel.
He said the crates of bullets, rocket-propelled grenades and rockets were picked up by the
Francopin the Egyptian port of Damietta and were to have reached Hizbullah via Syria.
Syria and Iran have also denied the Israeli allegations.