Well-informed Lebanese sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that the head of the Free Patriotic Movement, Gebran Bassil, is forced to reformulate his movement’s understanding with Hezbollah with a new political flavour.
The sources say: “During the evaluation of relations between (Hezbollah) and (Free Patriotic Movement), it is necessary to dwell on the contact made by the party’s official (Liaison and Coordination Unit), Wafiq Safa, with the former president Lebanese Michel Aoun and his political heir Basil; To congratulate them on behalf of the party leadership on Christmas and New Year, unlike previous occasions when the party used to send a leadership delegation on behalf of its secretary general Hassan Nasrallah to extend congratulations to its allies.
Asharq Al-Awsat learned that Bassil asked Safa whether the party adheres to support the appointment of the head of the “Marada Movement” Suleiman Franjieh, while the “Free Patriotic Movement” refused to support him, and Safa was content to tell Nasrallah. Because only he has the answer to his question.
The source adds that President Aoun is currently calling for a reformulation of his understanding with “Hezbollah” with a new political flavor, under the pretext that what is currently in place is no longer suitable to keep pace with the current political phase, otherwise they would not have agreed to form a joint commission charged with revising it in the interest of developing it and purifying it of impurities.
Moreover, while the Maronite patriarch Beshara Al-Rai has asked Parliament to stop the “sitcom” to elect a president for the republic. He said that the election of the president “is not achieved with the heresy of the prior agreement on it – this is the opposite of our democratic system – but rather with the vote associated with consultation and dialogue”.
He added: “We sincerely hope that there will be no one who intends to amputate the head of the republic and destroy the institutions so that Lebanon looks like a failed state.”
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