Nasrallah Says No Deal over Fakhoury, Slams 'Sectarian' Virus Rhetoric
Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Friday stressed that his party had no knowledge of any Lebanese-American deal to release former Khiyam Prison warden Amer Fakhoury from prison.
“We have no knowledge of a deal to release Amer Fakhoury and what we know is that there was no deal,” Nasrallah said in a televised address.
“From the first moment after Fakhoury’s release, a broad campaign was launched against the Shiite duo (Hizbullah and AMAL),” he lamented.
Nasrallah added: “Ever since Fakhoury was arrested six months ago, the U.S. started exerting strong pressures on the Lebanese state to resolve this issue and release this collaborator without any conditions.”
Noting that Hizbullah had rejected Fakhoury’s release when asked about the case by certain political parties, Hizbullah’s leader slammed the move as “a dangerous development that will allow Americans to impose what they want in the future.”
“We thought that no such ruling would be issued and that the court would not convene amid the current circumstances, but we learned of the collaborator's release from media outlets,” he said.
Nasrallah also revealed that “direct threats were made as to placing some individuals on the sanctions list, halting aid to the Lebanese Army, slapping economic sanctions and preventing world nations from offering assistance to the Lebanese state.”
“A lot of pressures were exerted on the judges and there are judges who issued a travel ban and others who submitted and issued a release order,” he said.
“The Lebanese judiciary persevered for six months in the face of U.S. pressures,” Nasrallah pointed out.
He stressed that Hizbullah “did not face any pressure at all from any political party in Lebanon regarding Fakhoury’s case.”
“The government has never been Hizbullah’s government, the state has never been Hizbullah's state and there are parties who have more influence on the domestic political equation,” Nasrallah added.
Addressing critics, he wondered whether Hizbullah was supposed to “set up an ambush against the Lebanese Army and the forces tasked with protecting Fakhoury.”
“Was Hizbullah supposed to shoot down the aircraft that carried Fakhoury? Is this in the interest of the country and the government?” he asked.
“Is it right to topple the government amid these circumstances for the sake of Fakhoury?” Hizbullah’s secretary-general added.
“How can we ask people in the era of coronavirus to demonstrate and storm the U.S. embassy? How can we subject them to dangers?” he went on to say.
Noting that Fakhoury’s arrival in the U.S. should not necessarily stand for the end of the case, Nasrallah said the file should be followed up by the Lebanese judiciary, describing Fakhoury as a “fugitive.”
Addressing some “friends and allies,” Nasrallah added: “We have swallowed the harm and insults but from now on, we in Hizbullah will not allow a friend or ally to accuse, insult or launch treason accusations against it. They better stop being our friends.”
Turning to the coronavirus crisis and Lebanon’s measures to confront it, Nasrallah said it is “shameful” to deal with the issue in a “sectarian” manner.
“The government should isolate any region it wants even if it's a Shiite region,” he suggested.
An uproar had erupted after Health Minister Hamad Hasan revealed that he had asked the government to “isolate two regions” over a rise in coronavirus cases in them.
Nasrallah also noted that all of Hizbullah’s members who go to Syria or Iran are being subjected to “coronavirus tests and home isolation.”
Source: Naharnet
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