Nasrallah calls for postponing arms debate, urges fast govt. formation
Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Friday called for postponing the debate over his group’s controversial arsenal of weapons for “two more years,” as he called for a quick formation of a new government.
“I agree that the (parliamentary) majority will be on a file-by-file basis,” Nasrallah said in a televised address marking six years since the death in Syria of Hizbullah’s top military commander Mustafa Badreddine.
“We're heading to a domestic situation that is characterized by a lot of challenges,” Nasrallah said.
“Those who say that they want reform and want to fight corruption are a majority, but there is no majority for one camp over another in this parliament,” Hizbullah’s leader added.
“The elections are over. Let the parliamentary blocs head to parliament to continue the building of the state and the approval of laws and we might agree with them,” Nasrallah went on to say.
He stressed that the impending challenge is the economic and social crisis and the bread, medicine and electricity crises, “not the weapons of the resistance.”
“Let us postpone the issue of the resistance's weapons for two more years, because it is not a pressing issue and you have coexisted with them since 2005,” Nasrallah added, addressing political and parliamentary rivals.
Warning that in Lebanon we do not have “the luxury of time,” Hizbullah’s leader said this requires “emergency efforts in parliament and in the cabinet formation process.”
“We have major and dangerous challenges before us and the economic and social situation is getting tense and is escalating in a dangerous manner,” he cautioned.
“We are in an extraordinary situation and everyone must shoulder responsibility,” Nasrallah urged.
He also said that extracting offshore oil is “the main hope for exiting our crisis, not begging or the World Bank loans.”
Moreover, Nasrallah said that the country that would benefit the most from restoring ties with Syria would be Lebanon.
“Showing openness towards the East and the West would allow us to prevent (social and economic) explosion and restoring ties with Syria would allow us to address the refugee crisis,” Nasrallah added.
As for the conflict with Israel, Nasrallah said: “Let no one have the illusion that the Arab world can protect Lebanon.”
“Only our people, will and resistance can protect Lebanon,” Nasrallah emphasized.
“The relation with the Arab world can help psychologically, economically and in tourism, but it can't protect Lebanon,” he said.
Nasrallah added: “They always propose that the alternative in the face of Israel is the (Lebanese) state... What did that state do to liberate Lebanon (in 1982)? They resorted to the worst option, which was negotiations with the enemy, after which they signed a treaty that humiliated Lebanon.”
“The same camp that signed the May 17 Treaty is nowadays calling for sovereignty,” Nasrallah pointed out, in an apparent jab at the Kataeb Party and the Lebanese Forces.
“Since 1982, the choices of our political camp have always been the right ones and they are what triumphed,” Nasrallah boasted.
Source: Naharnet
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