TruthNews

Hizbullah: We Will "Soon Liberate" Ghajar, Shaba Farms

International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, 3 Oct 2008

According to Lebanon’s Daily Star on Friday, Hizbullah has threatened it will "soon liberate" the disputed Shaba Farms area and the divided village of Ghajar nearby.

While speaking to supporters in the border town of Abbasieh, Hizbullah leader in southern Lebanon, Sheikh Nabil Qaouk, said diplomacy has been a failure and that force is the only means of getting back control of the areas.

"Betting on liberating land via diplomacy and politics is a sterile bet," said Qaouk, according to the report. "The only guaranteed way to recover the remaining occupied land is the [armed] resistance and nothing else... The resistance's strategy is Lebanon's main source of power, enabling it to recover the remaining occupied lands," said Qaouk.

"We, as Lebanese, are here to confirm that we cling to freeing every grain of our soil. We will not abandon the great national cause, which is the continuation of the liberation of our land," Qaouk added.

Meanwhile, Israel told Washington on Sunday that it was ready to exit the northern area of Ghajar on the Lebanese border. The decision comes after Lebanon’s government issued written promises that UNIFIL would be given authority over the Lebanese side in the northern half of the village, said a government source in Jerusalem.

"The Americans have been asking us for a long time to move ahead on the Lebanon issue and after receiving the letter, it was decided to show a more positive stance," said the source, according to The Jerusalem Post.

Ghajar and Shaba Farms are located on the northwest slopes of Mt. Hermon and the dispute over whether the area is Lebanese or Syrian terroritory occupied by Israel has been used as a pretext for Hizbullah to justify its continuing military threat against Israel. When the IDF unilaterally exited Lebanon in 2000, the UN delineated the international border and certified that Israel had completely left Lebanese territory, determining that the dispute over Ghajar and Shaba Farms was an issue to be decided in talks between Damascus and Jerusalem.