Former PM Saad Hariri arrived in Beirut to mark the 20th anniversary of the assassination of his father, former PM Rafic Hariri.
Hariri will visit his father’s tomb in downtown Beirut at 12pm Monday, his press office said.
Former slain Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri, father of ex-PM Saad Hariri was assassinated in downtown Beirut on February 14, 2005. Three Hezbollah operatives Habib Merhi, Hussein Oneissi, and Salim Ayyash were sentenced to life imprisonment for the killing of Hariri by a UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) but Hezbollah refused to hand them over to the court.
On January 24,2022 Former PM Saad Hariri announced that he was leaving politics for now and would not run in upcoming parliamentary elections.
Hariri, a three-time prime minister inherited the political leadership from his late father, billionaire businessman Rafik Hariri, who was one of Lebanon’s most powerful and influential politicians after the end of the 1975-90 civil war.
On February 14, 2005, former Prime Minister of Lebanon Rafic Hariri was killed along with 21 others in an explosion in Beirut, Lebanon. Explosives equivalent to around 1,000 kilograms (2,200 pounds) of TNT were detonated as his motorcade drove near the St. George Hotel. Among the dead were several of Hariri’s bodyguards and former Minister of the Economy, Bassel Fleihan.
EX PM Saad Hariri said he is convinced there is “no room for any positive opportunity for Lebanon” in light of Tehran’s growing influence, internal divisions, rising sectarian sentiments and the dysfunction of the state.
In man emotional televised speech Hariri said that he did all he can to prevent civil war in Lebanon by compromising, an apparent reference to forming governments that included Hezbollah.
Hariri has been the most powerful Sunni Muslim politician in Lebanon since 2005. He served as a prime minister three times until he resigned in October 2019 following mass protests against the country’s ruling class. He was appointed to the position a fourth time, but was unable to form a government.
“Saad Hariri remains the primary Sunni leader in Lebanon,” Randa Slim, a political analyst with the Washington-based Middle East Institute said in a Twitter post. “His political exit created a vacuum ,” she said, adding that the scramble for the Sunni community leadership mantle will now intensify.
His relations with Hezbollah worsened in 2020 when a U.N.-backed tribunal sentenced Hezbollah member Salim Ayyash to life imprisonment for his involvement in his dad’s assassination.
” I cannot prevent anyone from running in the upcoming election , but my “advice as a brother and friend is not to run”, he told his parliamentary bloc when he decided to quit politics.
he told the that he decided to quit politics because of his conviction that the country is on the verge of further deterioration, and that there is no solution in sight” , a possible reference to the fact that Lebanon has become a colony of Iran that is administered by its heavily armed proxy Hezbollah
Hezbollah, which is listed as a terrorist organization by several Western and Arab countries and which claimed to have over 100, 000 fighters and hundreds of thousands of various types of rockets and missiles was drastically weakened in its last war with Israel and lost all its top leaders including Hassan nasrallha and his heir apparent Hashem Safieddine. its military wing is reportedly being directly managed by the Quds force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard IRGCV