President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam are not merely contradicting themselves. They are misleading the public while failing to deliver any meaningful results. Negotiations and concessions to the Israeli enemy have yielded little, while compliance with US and Saudi demands at home has failed to strengthen their authority. Meanwhile, the government has virtually ceased functioning as its members have become estranged. The external powers overseeing Lebanon have offered no support to an administration preparing budgets that impose further taxes, while the president shields banking-sector figures seeking to escape accountability. Rather than reassess nearly two years in office, Aoun and Salam are keeping themselves and the country under the external powers’ thumb. Their requests for support have been met with further demands, culminating in extraordinary pressure on the Lebanese army command to take steps that could trigger a confrontation threatening civil peace. The latest episode began after Aoun’s visit to the US, from which he returned with flattering words from President Donald Trump and a promise to open the way for US airlines to operate in Lebanon. However, delivering on that promise requires Lebanon to submit to an apparently endless list of conditions. Aoun gradually realized how complicated matters were. Even his working meeting with Secretary of State Marco Rubio yielded little beyond a lecture on how the Lebanese authorities should meet their commitments. In an attempt to ease what his team described as US frustration, Aoun turned to an article by his adviser Jean Aziz in an obscure US magazine, addressing what he assumed were influential members of Washington’s political establishment. The effort backfired. Washington, unwilling to discuss an Israeli withdrawal, appeared to have one demand for the Lebanese authorities. That is to disarm Hezbollah, by force if necessary. The new head of US military intelligence in Beirut conveyed that message to political and security officials, expressing surprise that the authorities were reluctant to confront Hezbollah, even at the risk of civil war. On the Saudi front, envoy Yazid bin Farhan has repeatedly criticized the Lebanese political leadership’s performance. His demands have gone well beyond appointing a public prosecutor, naming a security chief or filling a ministerial post. They have included blocking the appointment of a director for the National Conservatory because the candidate of the Saudi crown prince’s sister must retain her position. Bin Farhan has also widened his campaign against those he considers political adversaries, demanding the exclusion of senior civil servants perceived as affiliated with the Future Movement and calling for the Grand Serail to be “cleansed” of former Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s followers. At the same time, he and Qatar have pressed Lebanon to take concrete steps to improve relations with Syria. The proposed framework has effectively placed Lebanese security agencies at the service of Syria’s new authorities. These efforts have included pursuing opponents of President Ahmad Al-Sharaa’s administration, abducting Syrians who worked in state institutions before the former regime fell and handing them over to the new authorities, either through a coordination mechanism formalized as a treaty or through fabricated security operations. Washington and Riyadh have demanded the obstruction of executive decisions that could help fund reconstruction, and Aoun and Salam complied. While Aoun and Salam awaited a Saudi or Gulf initiative offering financial assistance to increase electricity production, summer fruit crops piled up with farmers, and Saudi citizens remained barred from visiting Lebanon. Bin Farhan again tied prospective state support to reforms that the International Monetary Fund says Lebanon has yet to implement. There has also been strong pressure to reject initiatives from the United Arab Emirates and prevent Emirati and Qatari businesspeople from investing in Lebanon. Washington and Riyadh have demanded the obstruction of executive decisions that could help fund reconstruction, and Aoun and Salam complied. Finance Minister Yassine Jaber says he is waiting for Aoun and Salam to authorize the release of about $35 million held in the public treasury for reconstruction. Salam has refused to write to the Arab League to secure the transfer of $20 million contributed by Iraq for the same purpose. He has also stalled executive measures needed to use $75 million approved in Paris. The two leaders have further obstructed the use of part of a World Bank loan intended for reconstruction and relief. Suddenly, the two external powers overseeing Lebanon, the US and Saudi Arabia, along with senior officials in Beirut and a group of politicians and lawmakers, appeared to fear that events were slipping beyond their control. Instead of taking practical steps to reverse course, they renewed their attacks on the resistance and Hezbollah. The US administration reacted with something approaching “madness” to reports leaked two weeks earlier that Hezbollah intended to provide financial assistance to displaced people. After the US State Department denied reports of Iranian financial support reaching Lebanon, it went so far as to publish advertisements bearing little relation to reality. Then came a news conference by Sheikh Ali Damoush, head of Hezbollah’s Executive Council, announcing a housing assistance plan. The announcement poured cold water on overheated heads. The State Department itself then led a campaign, contacting Lebanese and Arab media outlets to promote the claim that no money was entering Lebanon. Meanwhile, US embassies in Beirut, Damascus, Baghdad and Ankara investigated measures being taken to prevent funds from reaching the country. During this period, the Central Bank of Lebanon's Governor Karim Souaid informed the political leadership that he had to comply with a US Treasury Department request to revoke the license of Iran’s Export Development Bank, even though the institution had long since ceased operating within Lebanon’s banking system. The subsequent interception of a truck carrying explosives on the Bekaa-Beirut road gave Washington and its allies in Lebanon another opportunity to launch a campaign demonizing the resistance. The intelligence about the truck came from a foreign agency that had obtained it from the Israeli enemy. Yet those who intercepted the vehicle apparently did not realize that a coordinated chorus was ready to accuse the resistance of transporting explosives for assassinations in Beirut and to turn the incident into a broader political case. As usual, the Kataeb Party intervened through Justice Minister Adel Nassar, elevating the incident into a matter of national security and demanding that it be referred to the Judicial Council. He apparently believes this would eventually allow the prosecution of Hezbollah’s entire leadership. Within hours of the truck’s interception, Hezbollah’s security committee had contacted security agencies, military prosecutors and the army. It informed them that the truck belonged to the resistance and was part of its routine preparations to confront the Israeli occupation. The affair nearly escalated into an unprecedented confrontation before Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri called Salam and urged him to disregard the justice minister’s proposal. Salam promised to do so. None of this can be understood outside the region’s broader climate of tension, where everyone remains on edge amid conflicting expectations about what could happen at any moment. Calls are growing within the US, backed overwhelmingly by Israel, for a renewed war against Iran. Meanwhile, Benjamin Netanyahu is preparing for further killings wherever necessary to keep himself in power and his state on a permanent war footing. The Lebanese authorities appear not to have understood a crucial message, or perhaps have deliberately misread it. This conduct does not merely obstruct dialogue. It threatens Lebanon’s stability, and officials should focus not on preserving their weakening grip on power but on preventing the country from being dragged into conflicts its people cannot afford. Yet senior officials and politicians aligned with the powers overseeing Lebanon continue to provoke the resistance, testing its patience while hoping Israel will resume its war. Samir Geagea made that position explicit days ago at a US research forum, continuing to justify Israeli aggression and arguing that negotiations could never lead to an Israeli withdrawal until Hezbollah had been completely dismantled. This is an edited translation for an article published in Arabic.
