Ght with Israel has left Lebanon in tatters: Christian leader
The leader of a main Christian political party in Lebanon blasted the Shia militant group Hezbollah for opening a front with Israel to back up its ally Hamas, saying it has harmed Lebanon without making a dent in Israel’s crushing oensive in the Gaza Strip.
In an interview on Tuesday night, Samir Geagea of the Lebanese Forces Party said Hezbollah should withdraw from areas along the border with Israel and the Lebanese Army should deploy in all points where militants of the Iranbacked group have taken positions.
His comments came as Western diplomats try to broker a de-escalation in the border conict amid fears of a wider war.
Hezbollah began launching rockets toward Israeli military posts on October 8, the day after Hamas
militants stormed into southern Israel in a surprise attack that sparked the crushing war in Gaza.
The near-daily violence has mostly been conned to the area along the border, and international mediators have been scrambling to prevent an all-out war.
The ghting has killed 12 soldiers and 10 civilians in Israel. More than 350 people have been killed in Lebanon
including 273 Hezbollah ghters and more than 50 civilians.
‘Fate of the country’
“No one has the right to control the fate of a country and people on its own,” Mr. Geagea said in his heavily guarded headquarters in the mountain village of Maarab. “Hezbollah is not the government in Lebanon. There is a government in Lebanon in which
Hezbollah is represented.” In addition to its military arm, Hezbollah is a political party.
Mr. Geagea, whose party has the largest bloc in Lebanon’s 128-member parliament, has angled to position himself as the leader of the opposition against Hezbollah.
Hezbollah o§cials have said that by opening the front along Israel’s northern border, the militant group has reduced the pressure on Gaza by keeping several Israeli army divisions on alert in the north rather than taking part in the months-long offensive in the enclave.
“All the damage that could have happened in Gaza ... happened. What was the benet of military operations that were launched from south Lebanon? Nothing,” Mr. Geagea said, pointing to the the death toll and massive destruction in Lebanon's border villages.