Head of the Free Patriotic Movement MP Gebran Bassil announced on Tuesday that his party was no longer in alliance with Hezbollah.
In scathing remarks against the Iran-backed party to Al-Arabiya television, he said Hezbollah had relinquished Lebanon’s claim to self-defense when it opened the “support front” for Hamas in Gaza on October 8, 2023.
This weakened the party and exposed its military capabilities and rendered Lebanon completely vulnerable to Israeli assaults, he added.
Bassil’s statements are another in a slew of criticism by Lebanese officials that have blamed Hezbollah for dragging Lebanon to another conflict with Israel. They have slammed the party for taking the unilateral decision to launch the “support front” without informing official authorities.
Bassil held Hezbollah responsible for committing a strategic error when it said it would “unify arenas” in Lebanon and Gaza to champion Hamas, a fellow Iran-backed ally.
He stated that the “unity of arenas” does not benefit Lebanon, rather another – Iran.
Moreover, Bassil said Hezbollah committed another error when it prioritized Shiite interests at the expense of Lebanon’s.
“We are no longer in an alliance with the party,” he declared.
The FPM had struck the alliance with the party in 2006.
Iran is using Hezbollah and the Lebanese people, Bassil went on to say, expressing his fears over internal strife erupting in Lebanon.
“We are facing an existential threat,” he said. He also voiced concern over attemts to divide the country.
Meanwhile, the Kataeb party warned that Lebanon is enduring one of the most dangerous phases in its history that could be a turning point in shaping its future for generations to come.
In a statement after a politburo meeting, it added: “After the end of all conflicts, the Kataeb will not under any circumstances agree for the situation to return to the way it was” before the eruption of the conflict.
It will not agree to the return of the absence of the state and its authority. It will not return to a state that sells its decision-making power to countries near and far.
It will not agree to the spread of weapons outside of state authority, “which the decades have proven is the main reason for undermining the authority of the state and wronging the Lebanese people and exposing them to all forms of occupation,” added the statement.
