Hezbollah should retaliate from Syria, not Lebanon: PSP, Kataeb

BEIRUT: Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt and Kataeb deputy head Sejaan Azzi have warned Hezbollah that any retaliation for the weekend Israeli airstrike that killed six party members should be carried out from Syria, and not Lebanon.

"Lebanon cannot afford any adventure," Jumblatt said in remarks published Tuesday by local daily Al-Mustaqbal. “What happened in Qunaitra on Sunday was an attack on Syrian territory and not Lebanese territory.”

"We have nothing to do with what is happening in Syria,” he stressed. “We are interested in our occupied lands in Kfar Shouba Hills and the Shebaa Farms.”

Jumblatt warned against being dragged into a new war with Israel, while praising Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah’s situational awareness and good judgment.

Six Hezbollah fighters, including the son of Hezbollah’s late top military commander Imad Mughniyeh were killed in Sunday’s helicopter attack in Qunaitra, in Syria’s Golan Heights. Iran Monday said one of its commanders was also killed in the attack, as well as two Syrian fighters affiliated with Hezbollah, a Lebanese security source had told The Daily Star.

The Kataeb Party deputy chief also shared Jumblatt’s concerns about a possible Hezbollah avenge from Lebanon.

“The Israeli raid took place in Syria, which requires that any response, should Hezbollah decide to respond, be carried out from Syria, not Lebanon, which is committed to resolution 1701,” Azzi, who is also the labor minister, told An-Nahar newspaper in comments published Tuesday.

"There is no need for Lebanon to shoulder the burden of what happened,” he cautioned.

But Future Movement MP Atef Majdalani thought different of Jumblatt and Azzi, warning that any Hezbollah retaliation from Syria would threaten Lebanon.

"If Hezbollah responds from Lebanese territory, Hezbollah would be implicating Lebanon in war,” Majdalani told a local radio station, arguing that Israel needs an excuse to wage war. “Even if Hezbollah carried out an attack from Syrian territory, this action threatens Lebanon and the Lebanese.”