Alwaght- Lebanese officials have rejected attempts by the US to promote Israeli regime’s interests at the expense of Lebanon’s natural resources.
US Acting Assistant Secretary of State David Satterfield arrived in Beirut on Wednesday coming from Tel Aviv, and held talks with the Lebanese army commander General Joseph Aoun and the General Security Chief Maj. General Abbas Ibrahim.
The US officials encountered a steadfast official stance which underscores Lebanon’s right to utilize all its offshore oil resources, including block 9.
Maj. General Ibrahim visited the House Speaker Nabih Berri to inform him about Satterfield’s latest proposals. Berri stressed that Lebanon rejects all the Israeli attempts to grab its offshore oil resources.
Satterfield also met with the Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil and left the meeting at the foreign ministry without issuing statement as expected. “Lebanon's stance is unified and coherent in terms of defending our sovereignty, oil resources and maritime and territorial borders,” Berri said during his weekly Ain el-Tineh meeting with lawmakers.
“The Israeli equation 'What's ours is ours and what's yours is ours and yours' is categorically rejected and shall not pass,” the Speaker underlined.
Lebanese media outlets noted that Satterfield’s mission, aimed at promoting the Israeli aggression on the Lebanese national right to preserve all its territories and regional waters with all the natural resources, would fail because of the steadfastness of the stance made by Lebanon’s senior officials against US bias approach.
Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah vowed that the Resistance would confront any Israeli aggression on Lebanon and its resources, stressing that the party has the ability to disable all the Zionist offshore installations within hours.
In December, the cabinet of Prime Minister Saad Hariri granted licenses to a consortium of three international companies -- Italy’s Eni, France’s Total and Russia’s Novatek -- to carry out exploratory drilling in Lebanon’s Block 4 and Block 9 territorial waters and determine whether they contain oil and gas reserves.
The announcement infuriated the Israeli entity, which claims sovereignty over Block 9.
Lebanese officials have united in vowing to protect the country’s natural resources.
