Lebanon's cabinet took a landmark step Thursday, formally tasking the army and security forces with establishing a monopoly on weapons in Beirut, with the explicit goal of declaring the capital a "Hezbollah-free weapons zone."
Nawaf Salam © KBS
Lebanon's cabinet took a landmark step Thursday, formally tasking the army and security forces with establishing a monopoly on weapons in Beirut, with the explicit goal of declaring the capital a "Hezbollah-free weapons zone."
The decision, announced by Prime Minister Nawaf Salam following the Council of Ministers meeting, marks a direct challenge to Hezbollah's decades-long grip on the Lebanese capital. Salam said he had ordered security forces to intensify their deployment across Beirut and extend state control throughout the city.
The government also sent an unambiguous message to Tehran, echoing statements from both President Joseph Aoun and the Prime Minister: "Nobody negotiates in Lebanon's place, or in its name." The declaration was a pointed rebuke of Iranian pressure to include Lebanon in the US-Iran ceasefire framework, a move Beirut has firmly rejected as an infringement on its sovereignty.
The decision did not pass without resistance. The two Hezbollah ministers in the cabinet, Mohammad Haïdar (Labour) and Rakan Nassereddine (Health), voted against the measure, according to government spokesman Paul Morcos.
Their opposition was expected, but its public nature signals a government willing to put the confrontation on record.
For a Lebanese state that has spent forty years watching Hezbollah operate as a parallel authority within its own borders, Thursday's decision is either the beginning of a historic reckoning, or a declaration that will require considerable force to back up.
Iran has warned the United States that it would respond forcefully to an Israeli offensive on a mountainous ridge in southern Lebanon where Iranian military personnel are holed up alongside Hezbollah fighters, three officials briefed on the message told Reuters.
President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that the renewed U.S. campaign against Iran would not continue for "too long" after the biggest exchange of fire between Tehran and Washington since July.
Top aides to President Donald Trump are pushing to keep the Iran war from escalating before November's midterm elections to staunch Republican electoral losses, four people familiar with the discussions said, a strategy already under strain as the U.S. and Iran exchanged back-and-forth attacks overnight.
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