When Lebanese Promise to End Hezbollah, Say Israelis Friendly!

Local Editor

More scandals continue to be uncovered by the WikiLeaks documents of the July 2006 war, published by Lebanese daily Al-Akhbar.

HARIRI WANTS A CHANCE

On Friday, the daily published a cable about a meeting that joined the head of the caretaker government Saad Hariri and US ambassador in Lebanon Jeffrey Feltman in Qoreitem on August 20, 2006. According to the cable, Hariri promised Feltman that he would "abolish" Hezbollah once the Lebanese army is consolidated. He claimed that that as long as the army is weaker than Hezbollah, then it should be in a less threatening position. The US administration should consolidate Lebanese state institutions, particularly the army, he added.

SANIORA WORRIED

In another cable, WikiLeaks quoted the head of the Lebanese government at the time of the war Fouad Saniora as assuring the Americans, who had a major role in the war, that what he called claims of victory by Hezbollah were "empty words" given the large number of casualties in Lebanon. He expressed fears that Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah would seek to topple his cabinet.

In the cable dated August 16, 2006, Saniora told then US Ambassador Jeffrey Feltman that he was making every effort to deploy the Lebanese army as quick as possible in the south.

MURR: ISRAELIS FRIENDLY!

Then Defense Minister Elias Murr was not in a better situation.

According to a cable dated August 15, 2006, Murr told Feltman that the army's position in the South should be bolstered "as soon as possible" in order to destroy Sayyed Nasrallah's "rude and arrogant" rhetoric displayed during his August 14, 2006 speech.

Murr told the ambassador that the Israelis were "friendly, asking if the Lebanese army would deploy in the South" as soon as possible.

"The Israeli army's performance during the war was weak, especially during the past two days when tens of Israeli soldiers were killed, which left Hezbollah with a sense of victory," he noted. "The Israeli army has left us in a difficult position … They are the worst army in the world," he went on to say, with a regret sense.

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