BEIRUT (Reuters) -Hezbollah said on Wednesday the Lebanese government was committing a “grave sin” by tasking the army with establishing a state monopoly on arms, sharpening a national divide over calls for the Shi’ite Muslim group to disarm.
The cabinet on Tuesday authorised the Lebanese army to draw up a plan to confine arms across the country to six official security forces by year’s end – a major challenge to the Iran-backed Hezbollah.
The move came after the U.S. and anti-Hezbollah parties in Lebanon ramped up pressure on the cabinet to publicly commit to disarming the party, amid fears that Israel could intensify strikes on Lebanon if they fail to do so.
In a written statement on Wednesday, Hezbollah said the move was a result of U.S. “diktats” and that it would “deal with it as if it does not exist.”
“The government of Prime Minister Nawaf Salam committed a grave sin by taking a decision to strip Lebanon of its weapons to resist the Israeli enemy… This decision fully serves Israel’s interest,” the group said.
The statement said Shi’ite ministers walked out of the cabinet session before the decision was reached as “an expression of the resistance’s (Hezbollah’s) rejection of this decision”.
The group said it remained ready to discuss a broader national security strategy and called on its supporters to remain patient.
The session at Lebanon’s presidential palace was the first time the cabinet addressed Hezbollah’s weapons – unimaginable when the group was at the zenith of its power before a devastating war with Israel last year.
The cabinet is scheduled to meet again on Thursday to continue discussions on U.S. proposals to disarm Hezbollah within a specific time frame.
(Reporting by Maya Gebeily and Laila Bassam; editing by Mark Heinrich)
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