Beirut: Continuing his vocal opposition to any accommodation with Hezbollah, Ashraf Rifi — Lebanon’s former head of the Internal Security Forces (ISF) and former Minister of Justice — told Kuwait’s Al Qabas daily that his former allies in the Future Movement and the moribund March 14 coalition “bowed to Hezbollah.”
In what was a dramatic accusation, Rifi declared “the party has 17 [out of 30] ministers in this government [led by Prime Minister Saad Hariri] and this is a major national crime against the cause,” which implied that except for Future (7), Lebanese Forces (3), Progressive Socialist Party (2) and a sole independent minister, all of the others — those that belonged to the Free Patriotic Movement (8), Amal (3), Hezbollah (2), and one each for the Tashnag Party, the Marada Movement, the Lebanese Democratic Party and the Syrian National Socialist Party — were beholden to Hezbollah.
Rifi accused his erstwhile Future allies, declaring: “Corrupts cannot build a state and those who surrender cannot build a state. We are against corruption and surrender,” adding that it was better to remain principled than to kowtow to pragmatism.
In what was a direct attack against Hariri, a potential rival in the upcoming parliamentary elections, Rifi stated that pragmatists “might cooperate with the occupier in a certain period while principled individuals shun any post or personal gains,” concluding with an open declaration of war: “the approach of pragmatism sometimes leads to high treason.”
The increasingly popular Rifi announced that he would be a candidate in the next elections as he anticipated to field candidates in Tripoli, Minieh, Dinniyeh, Akkar, central and western Bekaa, Iqlim Al Kharroub and Beirut’s second and third electoral regions. These are all Future strongholds where Sunni constituents lead.
“We will not engage in Sidon’s electoral battle out of respect for Bahia Hariri and Fouad Saniora,” two leading Sunni parliamentarians, Rifi added, but vowed to fight for all other seats.
Unabashed, he affirmed that his contenders “will not allow a win for any of Hezbollah’s candidates in [these] electoral strongholds,” underscoring that the party’s military might did not scare him. “Hezbollah cannot overlook or eliminate me, even if it possesses 200,000 rockets,” he hammered, because he insisted that he was “not engaged in a military confrontation.”
Far more important, and perhaps for the first time uttered by a leading Sunni figure, Rifi clarified that Sunnis and Shiites “are equal demographically and ... present on the same land.”
