Report: Lebanon Cautions Against Street Protests to 'Pressure' Govt. Lineup

Lebanese officials and security leaders “agree to disagree” with resorting to street protests in a bid to solve the hurdle hampering the formation of the government out of “fear things spin out of control,” the Saudi Asharq al-Awsat daily reported on Monday.

The fact that security forces are frequently “uncovering sleeper terror cells raises concerns that such groups may take advantage of street mobility, in addition to the fact that more than one million Syrian refugees are present on Lebanese soil and distributed in different regions,” said the daily.

The first to call for street protests a few days ago was Free Patriotic Movement leader, Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil.

His threat called for angry reactions with some accusing him of pressuring Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri into forming a Cabinet that meets “Bassil’s approval” and that of “President Michel Aoun’s team” (founder of the FPM) or into “forcing Hariri to apologize from his mission to lineup the government,” added the daily.

Security sources warned against any street motion, saying “Lebanon is not enjoying security calm and the state is unable to protect any protest in the presence of sleeper terrorist cells.”

“Terrorists on the move inside lebanon are arrested on a daily basis,” they said.

Meanwhile, FPM sources have downplayed Bassil’s remarks viewing it as a mere “warning of popular reactions against the delay.”

Heading a meeting of his Strong Lebanon parliamentary bloc earlier, Bassil had said that people will protest in the streets to “save Lebanon from political detention.”

Hariri was tasked with forming a new government on May 24, but his mission has since been delayed because of wrangling between political parties over shares and ministerial portfolios.