The Lebanese president, Joseph Aoun, receives his Palestinian counterpart Mahmoud Abbas in Baabda, on May 21, 2025. Photo: Office of the President.
“The Lebanese state” is giving way to “the Lebanese Authority,” a deliberate reference to the Palestinian Authority (PA), widely seen as toothless in its dealings with Israel. Increasingly, Hezbollah’s spokesmen, both official and unofficial, are using this term to describe the leadership embodied by President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam. As Beirut embarks on historic direct negotiations with Israel, Hezbollah is drawing a parallel with Mahmoud Abbas’ PA, seen as the powerless remnant of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.Created in the wake of the Oslo Accords, and after Fatah renounced armed struggle, as the embryo of an independent Palestinian state, the PA has failed, through the diplomacy it champions, to halt either the Israeli occupation or settlement expansion in the West Bank. Its president, Abbas, who has...
“The Lebanese state” is giving way to “the Lebanese Authority,” a deliberate reference to the Palestinian Authority (PA), widely seen as toothless in its dealings with Israel. Increasingly, Hezbollah’s spokesmen, both official and unofficial, are using this term to describe the leadership embodied by President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam. As Beirut embarks on historic direct negotiations with Israel, Hezbollah is drawing a parallel with Mahmoud Abbas’ PA, seen as the powerless remnant of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.Created in the wake of the Oslo Accords, and after Fatah renounced armed struggle, as the embryo of an independent Palestinian state, the PA has failed, through the diplomacy it champions, to halt either the Israeli occupation or settlement expansion in the West Bank. Its president, Abbas,...
Israeli strikes kill 3 in Nabatieh, clearing operations under Israeli fire in south Lebanon