Lebanon’s foreign minister has publicly demolished France’s long-standing claim that Hezbollah can be divided into separate political and military wings.
Speaking to French television, FM Youssef Raggi declared that it is “not realistic at all” to distinguish between the two. Hezbollah, he said, is one organization — an illegal armed force operating outside the authority of the Lebanese state.
The statement is especially significant because France has spent years blocking the European Union from designating Hezbollah in its entirety as a terrorist organization. Under the compromise promoted by Paris, Europe sanctioned Hezbollah’s so-called military wing while continuing to treat its political representatives as legitimate participants in Lebanese politics.
But the distinction was always artificial. Hezbollah’s politicians defend its weapons, protect its terrorists from accountability and use their influence inside Lebanon’s institutions to preserve an Iranian-controlled army within the country. Its political and military structures answer to the same leadership and serve the same strategic objectives.