Hezbollah’s Response to Gaza Crisis Not Reassuring
Tripoli MP Misbah Ahdab said he refused to allow Lebanon to be used as a base from which to launch rockets into Israel and hailed the Lebanese cabinet’s decisions in this regard.
Ahdab told reporters on Sunday that when he heard Khaled Meshaal, the Damascus-based head of Hamas’ political bureau, speak yesterday he remembered the letter Meshaal had sent French President Nicolas Sarkozy on the eve of the Israeli attack on Gaza. Ahdab said that Meshaal’s letter had said that Hamas was ready to negotiate and return to the 1967 borders, on the condition that negotiations were only undertaken with Hamas on behalf of the Palestinians.
“Yesterday, we heard that Hamas is ready to concede anything, except the resistance. The question today is whether it is important if this armed organization is the only party possessing negotiating power, whether the Palestinian population’s different components should be preserved, or whether the current losses should be limited in order to reach an appropriate solution for these people?” he asked.
Ahdab questioned why Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal and the Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahamd Abu al-Gheit were being accused of treachery while they were making efforts to end Palestinian bloodshed. Ahdab also said, in an implicit reference to Syria, that some called for fronts to be opened against Israel while refusing to open them in their own country, as well as accusing others of treachery for not opening new fronts.
Ahdab also said that he was not relieved by Hezbollah’s performance in Lebanon; particularly following the latest statements issued by Hezbollah’s leadership that he said accused others of treachery and involved threats. Ahdab asked whether it was an appropriate time to hold Arab regimes accountable. The time, he said, was for unity and assisting the exceptional Arab efforts deployed by al-Faisal and Abu al-Gheit to stop Palestinian bloodshed.
Ahdab rejected Hezbollah’s statements that claimed there was reconciliation between Lebanese factions, while it continued training and financing armed organizations. “Whoever wants names, I tell him to look at the reports issued by the security services,” he said. “It is illogical to establish armed organizations to destroy one particular situation while at the same time calling for unity, over what? Unity, over changing Lebanon’s situation or with Gaza? We are with Gaza and let no one outdo each other in defending the Lebanese people,” he said.
He also called for setting free the soldiers arrested during the Mar Mikhael incident in January 2008, during which the Lebanese army clashed with opposition demonstrators.