BEIRUT: High-ranking March 8 figures Monday criticized former Prime Minister Saad Hariri, saying the speech he made to mark the 10th anniversary of his father’s assassination was a show of support for the new Saudi leadership.
“This speech does not suggest that it comes at a time of dialogue,” local daily As-Safir quoted one March 8 leading figure as saying.
“Hariri wanted through his speech to achieve two goals: first, pull the crowd toward him and tickle their emotions in the first direct meeting between them for a long time, and second, to affirm his loyalty and allegiance to the new Saudi Arabia leadership,” he added.
The sources said Hariri was clearly expressing the Saudi position, which seems bothered by the course of developments in the region.
“If Hariri believes Hezbollah is interfering in Yemen, Iraq, Syria, and Bahrain ... and if he is accusing Hezbollah of dragging Lebanon in one axis against the other, how does he have the right to drag Lebanon in the Saudi axis?”
Hariri blasted Hezbollah’s role in Syria and rejected entangling Lebanon in regional conflicts, while strongly defending his Future Movement’s ongoing dialogue with the party as “a national necessity” to defuse sectarian tensions.
Speaking at a Future-organized rally in Beirut Saturday evening, Hariri stressed that the Lebanese state should have exclusive jurisdiction over decisions of war and peace, thus denying Hezbollah the freedom to wage a war against Israel.
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