The empty presidential seat in Baabda Palace. (Credit: Dalati and Nohra)
BEIRUT — Hezbollah has announced that the party is ready to elect a president should an agreement on which candidate to support "is reached tomorrow," deputy leader Sheikh Naim Kassem said Thursday.
"What he means," mocked Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on X, "is that they are ready to elect a president if it’s former Minister Sleiman Franjieh."
“Otherwise, according to Sheikh Naim, neither an agreement nor an election is conceivable. The only possibility seems to be a state of vacancy and obstruction,” Geagea wrote.
قال الشيخ نعيم قاسم "نحن حاضرون غداً الذهاب بالاتفاق إلى إنتخاب رئيس جمهورية، بمعزل عن كل التطوّرات المتواجدة". ما قصده طبعاً الشيخ نعيم، أن حزبه على أتمّ الجهوزية لانتخاب رئيس غدا، في حال حصل الاتفاق حصراً على الوزير السابق سليمان فرنجية، وخلاف ذلك ليس وارداً لدى الشيخ نعيم، لا…
— Samir Geagea (@DrSamirGeagea) February 23, 2024
While giving a speech to a meeting of scholars and preachers in Beirut Thursday, Kassem said that “in Lebanon, the war on Gaza and the aggression on Gaza were not obstacles to electing a president, and their results do not facilitate or hinder this election."
Israel's ongoing war on Gaza, sparked by the Hamas-led Oct. 7 surprise attack on southern Israel, has killed at least 29,514 Palestinians and injured 69,616, the Gaza Health Ministry said in a statement on Friday.
Since Oct. 8, Hezbollah and Israel have been involved in daily cross-border fighting. In Lebanon, 270 people have been killed in the fighting, mostly Hezbollah members, but also including 40 civilians.
However, the deputy Hezbollah leader argued that the presidency problem is an internal Lebanese matter, and is the responsibility of all parliamentary blocs. "We are not the ones blocking it. Each of the parliamentary blocs is blocking the presidency, because they are standing by their convictions ... everyone is the same in not electing [a president], and neither Hezbollah nor Amal or any other party is responsible for this, but everyone is directly involved."
On Oct. 31, 2022, former Lebanese president Michel Aoun’s mandate ended, and no successor has been elected since, although there have been twelve parliamentary sessions convened in an attempt to do so — none of which produced results.
Hezbollah and the Amal Movement back Marada Movement leader Sleiman Frangieh, while the Free Patriotic Movement, the Lebanese Forces, the Kataeb, Forces of Change and independents back International Monetary Fund official Jihad Azour.