Geagea Backs Anti-IS Coalition, Slams Hizbullah for Criticizing it
Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea backed a decision by Lebanon to enter a U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State and criticized Hizbullah for rejecting the country's support of the efforts to destroy jihadists.
“I am totally with Lebanon becoming part of this Western-Arab coalition against IS … because Lebanon is one of the parties that would benefit from the destruction of this organization,” Geagea said in an interview with al-Akhbar newspaper published on Tuesday.
Ten Arab states including Saudi Arabia and Lebanon announced their backing for the strategy to "destroy" the group "wherever it is, including in both Iraq and Syria," following a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in the Saudi city of Jeddah last week.
The announcement drew the criticism of Hizbullah officials, who said in remarks to al-Akhbar that the party rejected the coalition.
Jihadists from the IS and al-Nusra Front overran the northeastern border town of Arsal last month, killing Lebanese soldiers and taking many of them hostages.
They later beheaded two of them.
“I hope that Hizbullah would make its stance clear … because it was the first to raise its voice against the IS and to call for the cooperation of the Lebanese (people) against it,” said Geagea.
The LF chief stressed that the Shiite party's rejection came over the failure to include the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad in the coalition.
Assad is a staunch supporter of Hizbullah, which has sent its fighters to Syria to help his troops in the fight against the rebels trying to topple him.
Asked if he backed the arming of Christians across Lebanon to confront terrorists, Geagea said: “ I reject personal arms because I still believe there is no direct threat on Lebanon, particularly after the establishment of the Western-Arab coalition to confront the IS.”
“As long as the (Lebanese) state still exists, our role should be limited to increase its existence and strength,” he said. “Self-security and personal arms paralyze it (the country) and make its existence smaller.”
Geagea said he would back the arming of Christians if the state was “fully disintegrated.”
But he stressed that the first essential step towards the protection of the Christians lies in holding the presidential elections.
“The army, security forces and the Lebanese state would get stronger when we elect a president, regulate political life, form a government and hold the parliamentary elections,” the LF leader told al-Akhbar.
Geagea, a presidential candidate, reiterated that the March 8 alliance was paralyzing the elections to find a successor to President Michel Suleiman, whose term expired in May.
He lamented that the elections were not looming in the horizon.
The rival MPs have failed in several rounds of elections to choose a head of state over their differences on a compromise candidate.
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