Bassil in show of support for the army: ‘Do not let anyone impose more than you can bear’

BEIRUT — Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) leader Gebran Bassil reiterated his support for the Lebanese Army on Friday night, as it prepares a plan to disarm militias in Lebanon, notably Hezbollah.

Bassil, who met the Army Commander Rodolph Haykal on Thursday, said during an FPM dinner in Zahle, in the Bekaa, that the purpose of the meeting was to show that the Aounist party “stands with the army and is behind it.” Addressing the military, he added: “Do not allow anyone to impose on you more than you can bear, nor to lighten your load if you are capable of carrying it.”

His remarks came during the annual dinner of the FPM’s Zahle District Committee, attended by former president Michel Aoun, bishops, FPM lawmakers, former MPs and ministers, as well as mayors, dignitaries, media representatives and party supporters, according to the state-run National News Agency.

‘We turned against Hezbollah’s weapons’

Bassil said that when the FPM signed the Mar Mikhael agreement with Hezbollah in 2006, the party considered that it was “assigning Hezbollah’s weapons one mission only: the defense of Lebanon, within a defensive strategy approved by the Lebanese state, and in which these weapons would be included.”

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“We turned against these weapons when they dragged us into a war and became part of a regional axis that has nothing to do with us,” Bassil continued.

Hezbollah, the FPM’s longtime ally, fought a conflict with Israel from October 2023 until a cease-fire in November 2024. Despite the truce, Israel continues to occupy at least five areas in southern Lebanon and to carry out near-daily strikes. Earlier this month, the Lebanese government, under growing international pressure, tasked the army with drafting a plan to restore the state’s monopoly on arms by year’s end. The army is expected to present its proposal to the cabinet on Sept. 5, as Hezbollah deputy leader Naim Kassem warned of a “confrontation” if disarmament is imposed.

Bassil added that “when these weapons no longer had a deterrent force to prevent Israel from attacking us, we declared that arms must be held exclusively by the state.”

“We demand a price for these weapons … and this price is not for Hezbollah or for the Shiites, but for Lebanon — to protect it, to neutralize it from regional and external conflicts, and to safeguard it by combining the concepts of protection and sovereignty,” he said.

Relations with Syria

On Lebanon’s ties with Damascus, Bassil said: “We want good relations with Syria. We must move beyond the idea of either hostility toward Syria or subservience to it.”

He warned that any partition of Syria would “spill over into Lebanon,” and urged the state to adopt a clear policy toward Damascus, starting with the issue of displacement, which he described as a grave threat to Lebanon and “something the people of Zahle understand better than most.”

Bassil also called for the appointment of a new Syrian ambassador to Beirut as a gesture of recognition of the Lebanese state and “out of our keenness on good relations with the new Syrian state.”

“It is unacceptable that many Lebanese officials go to Syria, while not a single Syrian official comes to Lebanon. We do not want the bad memories we have in this regard to return,” he said.

A Syrian delegation was expected in Lebanon earlier this week but canceled its visit. The trip was meant to finalize an agreement on the transfer of Syrian detainees in Lebanese prisons to Syria and to establish mechanisms regulating the entry and exit of Syrian citizens into Lebanon.