Suleiman on Liberation Day: Concept of Resistance Must Rise above Strife on Local, Regional Scenes

President Michel Suleiman noted on Friday that the Lebanese people are “willingly” turning Lebanon into a battle ground through the unrest in the northern city of Tripoli and through fighting in the Syrian region of al-Qusayr.

He said on the occasion of the Resistance and Liberation Day: “The concept of resistance must rise above strife on the internal scene or in fraternal countries.”

“We must therefore not pay the price of the democracy of others,” he remarked after meeting Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji at the Defense Ministry in Yarze..

“Lebanon has not reaped the rewards of the liberation of southern Lebanon” and its people have not liberated themselves from their allegiances to political powers, he continued on the 13th anniversary of the liberation of southern Lebanon from Israeli occupation.

“How can a country that has provided such a great example of resistance and sacrifice adopt practices that deepen sectarianism?” he wondered.

“Resistance and liberation are high concepts that should recognize the results of democratic, legal, and constitutional practices,” Suleiman said.

“The concept of resistance must rise above strife, whether on the local scene or in neighboring countries, because the resistance has fought for national and popular, not sectarian, causes,” declared the president.

Moreover, Suleiman said: “Elections are a democratic practice that we should not abandon.”

Hizbullah has become involved in fighting in al-Qusayr, with its combatants becoming increasingly involved in Syria's conflict, fighting alongside President Bashar Assad's forces against an insurgency that flared after a brutal regime crackdown on democracy protests.

Initially Hizbullah said it wanted only to defend 13 Syrian villages along the border where Lebanese Shiites live, and the Sayyeda Zeinab shrine, revered by Shiites around the world.

However its elite fighters later encircled the rebel-held central town of al-Qusayr with regime troops before the launch on Sunday of a withering assault on the strategic border town that is home to 25,000 people.

Seventy-five fighters from Hizbullah have been killed in Syria since late last year, a source close to the group said on Thursday.

Suleiman continued: “We will not allow vacuum at the army and we have tasked the Military Council, headed by Qahwaji, to tackle the affairs of the military institution after the formation of a new government.”

In addition, he stated that Lebanon should be protected through the implementation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1701, adherence to the Baabda Declaration, and adoption of a defense strategy that “clearly organizes the relationship between the army and resistance.”

The army, said the president, is Lebanon's salvation and it enjoys the support of all Lebanese.

“It therefore has the mission to protect the people in Tripoli and Sidon and the border against the flow of gunmen,” he added.

Political powers must support the army instead of simply exploiting it to protect themselves, he demanded.

“The government is obligated to implement the will of the people,” he stressed.

The army has been tasked with containing clashes that broke out on Sunday in the northern city of Tripoli.

The clashes erupted between the rival neighborhoods of Bab al-Tabbaneh, which backs the Syrian revolution, and Jabal Mohsen, which supports the Syrian regime.

At least 22 people have been killed in the recent round of clashes.