Shiite ministers walk out as Lebanon’s cabinet debates army plan to disarm Hezbollah
BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s Cabinet convened Friday to discuss a plan drawn up by the Lebanese army to disarm the Hezbollah militant group and consolidate weapons in the hands of the state.
Upon the arrival of the army chief, Gen. Rudolph Haikal, ministers from Hezbollah’s political bloc as well as the allied Shiite Amal party and independent Shiite minister Fadi Makki withdrew from the meeting room. The Hezbollah and Amal ministers then left the government palace.
The Shiite ministers had also walked out in protest from the meeting last month in which the Cabinet commissioned the army with drawing up a disarmament plan.
Since a U.S.-brokered ceasefire halted the latest Israel-Hezbollah war in November, Hezbollah has been under increasing domestic and international pressure to give up its remaining arsenal.
Hezbollah officials have said that the group will not consider disarmament until Israel withdraws its forces from five strategic hills they are occupying inside Lebanese territory and halts its near-daily airstrikes. Israel’s military says it is striking to prevent the group from rearming and to protect residents of its northern border area.
After last month’s decision to pursue a disarmament plan, Hezbollah accused the government of caving to United States and Israeli pressure and said it would “treat this decision as if it does not exist.”
A Hezbollah official who spoke on condition of anonymity, in accordance with the group’s procedures, said Friday that the ministers had agreed to withdraw when the army commander arrived “because we consider that this plan comes out of an illegal decision… and we will not debate a matter that is built on a basis that we do not recognize as legal.”
Lebanese officials have so far proceeded with caution on disarmament, fearing that an attempt to take Hezbollah’s remaining weapons by force could trigger civil conflict.
Since the ceasefire, the Lebanese army has regularly collected caches of weapons and ammunition from the area south of the Litani River, from which Hezbollah has largely withdrawn, but the group’s heavier missiles and drones have remained hidden.
The Israel-Hezbollah war started when Hezbollah began firing rockets across the border on Oct. 8, 2023, one day after a deadly Hamas-led incursion into southern Israel that sparked the war in Gaza. Israel responded with shelling and airstrikes in Lebanon, and the two sides became locked in an escalating conflict that became a full-blown war in late September last year.
The Israel-Hezbollah war killed over 4,000 people in Lebanon, including hundreds of civilians, and caused destruction worth $11 billion, according to the World Bank. Much-needed international funding for reconstruction is likely to be contingent on Hezbollah’s disarmament.
In the days ahead of Friday’s cabinet session, Israel intensified its strikes in southern Lebanon. Lebanese health officials said Thursday that a series of Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon the day before killed four people and injured 17, including four children.
Lebanon’s foreign ministry in a statement condemned the strikes and called on “the international community to pressure Israel to halt its ongoing attacks and respect Lebanon’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, and the safety of its people.”
The Israeli army said in statements that it had targeted Hezbollah military sites and a facility in the village of Ansariyeh that it said was storing “engineering equipment designated for the organization’s reconstruction and to advance terrorist plans.” An Associated Press photographer who visited the site afterwards found a lot storing bulldozers.
On Wednesday the U.N. peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, UNIFIL, said Israeli drones dropped four grenades close to its peacekeepers as they were working to clear roadblocks near the border. The Israeli army said that it didn’t intentionally target the peacekeepers, but dropped several sonic bombs near a suspect in the border area.
By ABBY SEWELL
Associated Press
