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By : Randa Takieddine

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:: Western diplomatic circles close to Israel have been circulating information – supplied by the latter – which stipulates that Iran has stepped up its support and arms’ supplies to Hezbollah in Lebanon, particularly on the Lebanese-Syrian borders. According to these diplomats, Iran provided Hezbollah with a huge supply of missiles and it is training Lebanese fighters, among others, in Lebanon and not in Syria.

Colleague Philip Abi Aql wrote in L’orient Le Jour that President Donald Trump told Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri that Iran supplied Hezbollah with 150,000 missiles and that they only had 10,000 missiles before. The question now is where is Iran taking Lebanon to? Will we again pay the price of the alliance between part of the Lebanese government and Hezbollah?

A lot has been said about the army and its defense of Lebanon and battle against ISIS on the borders. The American administration is supplying the Lebanese army with equipment it needs.

However, unfortunately for Lebanon, Iran has managed to impose its influence on the country through Hezbollah and its Christian allies that represent the Lebanese state. The Lebanese people now wait for Hassan Nasrallah to deliver speeches to know his strategy in the region and inside Lebanon.

The situation in Lebanon will remain dangerous as long as Iran, Hezbollah and Israel control its fate

Randa Takieddine

Funding Hezbollah

Iran has been funding Hezbollah and its allies for years because it wants to maintain the presence of the Shiite crescent on the borders with Syria and seeks to control part of Syria. The last thing Lebanon needs are Hezbollah’s threats that they will defeat Israel.

Lebanon cannot bear more destruction and wars. The Lebanese state is not like it was in 2006 when Israel launched its brutal war on Lebanon. Hezbollah’s influence has expanded now and it’s no secret that Lebanon suffers from this hegemony that no one in the government risks defying.

No one in the government can prevent Hezbollah from fighting in Syria to defend the criminal regime and no one can prevent Hezbollah ministers from visiting Damascus. No one can implement the UN Security Council resolution to disarm Hezbollah as on the contrary, Iran has stepped up its armament of Hezbollah. Meanwhile, Hezbollah claims that it is helping Lebanon avoid a new war with the Israeli enemy.

Destructive powers

Lebanon is located between two regional destructive powers, Israel and Iran. The policy of dissociating the country from the region’s wars is naive because major powers in Lebanon are fighting in Syria and an important part of the state – especially those who aspire to become presidents later – is allied with Hezbollah.

Hezbollah helped the Syrian regime destroy Syria and murder its people, and by fighting this war, it contributed to displacing millions of Syrians. Lebanon alone hosts 1.5 million Syrian refugees and social tensions between them and the Lebanese people have reached a very dangerous level. Hezbollah put Lebanon under Iran’s mercy and impoverished it through the Syrian refugees.

It is killing Shiite youths who are brainwashed into thinking that they will be martyrs if they fight. What martyrdom is that when they are dying so Bashar al-Assad survives and Iran maintains its influence over Lebanon?

The situation in Lebanon will remain dangerous as long as Iran, Hezbollah and Israel control its fate, and especially that everyone in the region has left it on its own in a raging sea contaminated with problems.

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:: Randa Takieddine is a Lebanese writer and the director of Al-Hayat newspaper office in Paris.

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:: Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in the Column section are their own and do not reflect RiyadhVision’s point-of-view.

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