Posters hostile to Samir Geagea and Amine Gemayel appear in Saida

Posters hostile to Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea and former President Amine Gemayel appeared on Monday night in the South Lebanon city of Saida, our correspondent in the area reported.

“Our movement is more dignified than your history,” “Saida does not forget, it demands accountability,” read the posters on which a portrait of Geagea, caricatured, resembles that of the Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.

According to our correspondent, since the beginning of the month, posters demanding the release of nearly 30 residents of Saida who were allegedly kidnapped by the LF during the Israeli invasion of the country in 1982 were pasted on several walls of the town by the Popular Democratic Party. These acts come as a sign of protest against an alliance between two candidates supported by the LF and Youssef Nagib, former head of the Future Movement’s electoral machine, in the legislative elections set to take place on May 15.

Unknown persons also tore down LF electoral signs in the locality of Marjayoun, also in South Lebanon, the state-run National News Agency reported.

The constituency of South Lebanon I comprises Saida, detached from the region of Zahrani, and the caza of Jezzine. It has five seats: two Sunni, two Maronite and one Greek-Catholic. This constituency will see two separate electoral battles in May, as the protagonists on both sides failed to form strong alliances between candidates from the two regions, unlike in the 2018 polls.

In Saida, home of the Hariri family, the battle rages in the absence of the Future Movement and while Osama Saad has consummated the divorce with March 8. In Jezzine, where the Shiite electorate is small but decisive, the traditional Free Patriotic Movement-Amal rivalry persists, despite Hezbollah’'s efforts to arbitrate in the face of the Aounists’ alleged loss of popularity.

This article was originally published in French in L’Orient-Le Jour.

Des affiches hostiles à Samir Geagea et Amine Gemayel à Saïda