Lebanon vowed on Tuesday to confront Israeli threats against it in wake of the recent heated rhetoric of its officials.
Meeting at the Baabda presidential palace, President Michel Aoun, Speaker Nabih Berri and Prime Minister Saad Hariri agreed to exert efforts on the regional and international levels to prevent Israel from building a cement wall on its border with Lebanon.
Efforts will also be exerted to prevent it from violating Lebanon’s offshore oil and gas wealth, they added in a statement.
Last week, Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman described as "very provocative" Lebanon's offshore oil and gas exploration tender on the countries' maritime border and suggested that Lebanon had put out a tender to international groups for a gas field known as Block 9, "which is by all accounts ours."
Aoun, Berri and Aoun deemed the Israeli threats as a violation of regional border security, as well as a violation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1701.
The resolution had helped end the 33-day July 2006 war that Israel waged against Lebanon.
The agreements reached during Tuesday’s meeting will be presented at the Higher Defense Council, which will hold an extraordinary meeting on Wednesday.
It will be chaired by Aoun and attended by Hariri, concerned ministers and a number of heads of security agencies.
The meeting will be aimed at tacking the necessary measures to prevent Israeli violations and avert any security escalation on the southern border.
Addressing recent local tensions, Aoun, Berri and Hariri agreed to tackle them through constitutional institutions.
They stressed the need to commit to the National Pact that the Lebanese people agree is aimed at preserving their national unity and unique coexistence and preventing any political dispute from threatening civil peace and stability.
Tensions reached a boiling point in Lebanon last week when a video emerged showing Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil, Aoun’s son-in-law, describing Berri as a “thug.”
The speaker’s supporters reacted angrily, taking to the streets to vent their anger against the minister and the president.
