Gemayel to Nasrallah: No One Has Right to Impose a Lifestyle on Us

Kataeb Party chief Sami Gemayel on Wednesday stressed that no one has the right to impose a certain “lifestyle” on the Lebanese, in response to remarks by Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah.

“No one has the right to drag us into the place they want and no one has the right to impose on us a lifestyle that we don’t want,” said Gemayel at a press conference.

“We don’t want to live in isolation and be cut off from the West, Arabs and the entire world,” he added.

Lamenting that Lebanon is “paying the price of Hizbullah’s policy” due to “the force of weapons,” Gemayel warned that Nasrallah is trying to “pull us out of the global economy, deepen our international and Arab isolation and turn us into a country with no ambition or prosperity.”

He added: “Does a Lebanese group have the right to decide on behalf of all Lebanese?”

“We don’t want a defiant society but rather an open one and we don’t want militias but rather a single arsenal of weapons, which is that of the army,” Gemayel went on to say.

Addressing Nasrallah, he added: “We are not collaborators but rather Lebanese and we are asking you to place yourself with us, under the constitution, so that we protect Lebanon together through our heroic army.”

Nasrallah had on Tuesday said his group would propose to the Lebanese government to turn to Iran to secure its basic needs, without needing U.S. dollars. He said China is also ready to invest in Lebanon.