Michel Moawad from the Grand Serail: “Lebanon has negotiated, and will continue to negotiate, because Lebanon does not accept anyone negotiating on its behalf”

Prime Minister Dr. Nawaf Salam received Independence Movement leader MP Michel Moawad at the head of a delegation from the North that included former MPs Jawad Boulos and Samer Saadeh, as well as Riyad Touq, Nabil Makari, Jihad Farah, Emile Fayyad, Gistal Semaan, and Fawzi Kalash.

After the meeting, MP Moawad said: "We came from the North, with a delegation of comrades, partners, and allies, to convey a clear position to Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, this clean Lebanese patriot whom neither suspicions of corruption nor shady deals have tainted.

We tell him: we are with you because you are sovereignist, because you represent the state project that unites rather than divides, and because you represent the authority of the constitution and the law, which build a homeland. We are with you because we support your government’s decisions to restrict arms to the hands of the Lebanese state, to consider Hezbollah’s military and security activities outside the law, and to take the courageous decision of direct negotiations to protect Lebanon and the Lebanese, put an end to wars, and ensure that we no longer remain victims of other people’s wars on our land, and to protect the Lebanese from destruction, bloodshed, humiliation, emigration, and poverty.

Mr. Prime Minister, we stand by your side in confronting the accusatory voices and campaigns of insults, because the logic of real strength acts, while insults are impotence."

He added: "After the wars you have waged in Lebanon, especially those linked to the Iranian regime, dragging Lebanon and the Lebanese into a futile war that resulted in killing and destruction, you should be ashamed, and those who caused this must bear their responsibilities. We will not allow a minority of insulters and rejectionists to weaken our resolve to build a country called Lebanon, with one state, one decision, and one army.

And we ask clearly: as long as you trust yourselves, let us meet at the ballot boxes to see where the Lebanese people stand. Are they with the state and its institutions, or with the militia? Are they with the army or with illegal weapons? Are we for peace, or for war? Are they for stability or for strife? The answer is known.

As for those who threaten civil peace, our answer is: there is no fear for civil peace as long as the state exists and implements its decisions. The battle today is clear: it is between a state that represents the Lebanese people and a militia outside the constitution and the law, not between Muslims and Christians. It is between a militia outside the law and a state backed by its people. There are always some individuals and environments linked to militias."

"It is said that direct negotiations with Israel violate the constitution and coexistence. First, explain to us how they violate the constitution?

Why were the direct negotiations conducted by Lebanon with Israel at the time of the Madrid Agreement not considered unconstitutional? Or were they acceptable then only because the Assad regime wanted them?

And why did the direct negotiations conducted by the 1984 government with Israel, in which then-minister and current Speaker Nabih Berri was part, not require a constitutional amendment?

It is said that direct negotiations with Israel violate the constitution and coexistence. First, explain to us how they violate the constitution?

Lebanon has negotiated, and will continue to negotiate, because Lebanon does not accept anyone negotiating on its behalf. We decide our own future, and we do not accept anyone negotiating for us, nor anyone negotiating over us.

And to those who cling to, or use, the slogan of coexistence as a shield, just as they use the Lebanese people as a shield and hide behind them, we say: we are the sons of true coexistence.

We are the ones who paid the price of coexistence in blood, and we remain committed to true coexistence: one land, one people, one state, one army, and one decision. Coexistence in Lebanon is between Christians and Muslims; it is not coexistence between the state and the mini-state, nor coexistence between the army and the militia, nor coexistence between the Lebanese state and Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.

This is coexistence: Muslims and Christians, defending great Lebanon under the roof of a constitution and a law that unite us.

To President Nawaf Salam we say: our hand is in yours, and we will continue, and no matter how far the insulters go, we will continue.

So that we may protect Lebanon and the Lebanese from other people’s wars on our land, from more blood, more destruction, more strife, emigration, and poverty, and so that this war may be the last of wars, turning the page on wars and opening a page of peace, prosperity, and stability, as we hope that the history of April 13 will not be repeated once again."