Hezbollah attacks Lebanon president

Hezbollah on Saturday slammed President Michel Suleiman over his recent comments during a speech at the University of Kaslik in which he insisted on making the Baabda Declaration the basis of the new cabinet’s policy statement and equated the (Baabda) Declaration to the National Pact.

Suleiman said at the conference titled My Land: A Promising Future , that Lebanon’s land, people, and common values constitute the country’s “permanent equation.”

This was understood to be a response to Hezbollah’s demand that the so called resistance formula should be the basis for the new government policy

( people + army + resistance )

“With all our due respect to the presidency and what it represents, the latest speech delivered Friday makes us believe that the Baabda Palace has recently been in need of special care, since its occupier cannot differentiate anymore between gold and wood,” the Hezbollah statement said.

This was in direct response to Suleiman’s advise against” clinging to wooden formulas that hinder the drafting of the ministerial statement.”

In a quick reaction via Twitter to Hezbollah’s attack, President Suleiman stated on Saturday that what Baabda Palace needs is acknowledging the unanimous consensus over the Baabda Declaration that was reached inside its premises.

The National Pact is an unwritten agreement that laid the foundation of Lebanon as a multi-confessional state, and has shaped the country to this day. Following negotiations between the Shi’ite, Sunni, and Maronite leaderships, the National Pact was born in the summer of 1943, allowing Lebanon to be independent.

The Baabda Declaration was adopted in June 2012 during a national dialogue session headed by Suleiman and attended by the rival March 8 and 14 camps. All agreed to distance Lebanon from regional and international conflicts. The participants also all agreed to back the Lebanese army both financially and morally as the guarantor of civil peace and national unity.

One analyst told Ya Libnan: “Where is the gold ?”, adding ” Hezbollah has been misusing the term resistance since 2006.”

Hezbollah, which was credited with the liberation of Lebanese territories from Israel in 2000 was a very popular organization in Lebanon and throughout the Arab world. Back then pictures of the Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah were posted everywhere here in Lebanon and the Arab and Muslim countries.

But according to analysts ever since its 2006 war with Israel, Hezbollah has become a huge liability for Lebanon.

Despite the destruction of Lebanon’s infrastructure and the great loss of lives during that war Hezbollah claimed victory and used its arms to try and bring down the democratically elected government of former PM Fouad Siniora, who helped in ending that war which ended up costing Lebanon in excess of $15 billion.

In 2008 Hezbollah pointed its guns against the Lebanese people when it occupied more than half of Beirut and tried but failed with a great loss of lives to occupy Mt Lebanon .

In 2011 Hezbollah brought down the democratically elected government of former PM Saad Hariri and reportedly used its arms to force progressive socialist party leader MP Walid Jumblatt and his parliamentary bloc to vote for its candidate Nagib Mikati as the new premier .

Hezbollah which was established by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards in 1982 was also accused of being behind the attack against the Baabda presidential palace last August following president Suleiman’s speech on Army day in which he criticized Hezbollah’s role in Syrian civil war .

“The army’s mission would be impossible if a party or more from Lebanese people get involved in wars outside Lebanon ”, Suleiman stressed in another reference to the tens of thousands of Hezbollah fighters who have been trying to prevent the collapse of Syrian regime .

Tens of thousands of Hezbollah fighters are reportedly fighting alongside the forces loyal to president Assad against the Syrian rebels who are seeking to overthrow the 40 year old dictatorship despite the Baabda agreement that calls for distancing Lebanon from regional and international conflicts.

According to a lebanese analyst: “The party is willing to risk the foundations on which the entire Lebanese political system was built in order to prevent the collapse of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime and impede the work of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon that is probing the assassination of former premier Rafik Hariri.”

Five members of Hezbollah have been indicted by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) in the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Hariri , but Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah refused to hand them over to the international court.

The trial of the Hezbollah suspects started last January near The Hague.

Phalange Party MP Sami Gemayel slammed last Thursday the Hezbollah led March 8 politicians who are calling for preserving the Lebanese’s “right to resistance” in the ministerial statement.

“Does that mean that we will live in a jungle and give weapon licenses to all Lebanese?” Gemayel said in a statement on Thursday following his meeting with Speaker Nabih Berri, a close ally of Hezbollah.

“There is no consensus on the concept of resistance,” he added.

Gemayel went on to stress the importance of the Baabda Declaration, and said that “Hezbollah alone has its reservations against this Declaration.”