Is Hezbollah Behind Effort to Hijack Lebanese Protests?

Hezbollah has sought to take advantage of the Lebanese protests against the government, though it does not currently seek to topple the existing political order, experts told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday. 

The “You Stink” campaign in Lebanon has mobilized against the failure to solve a garbage disposal crisis, bringing thousands of people onto the streets in protests that have threatened the survival of the government.

The campaign, which has mobilized independently of the big sectarian parties that dominate Lebanese politics, blames political feuding and corruption for the failure to resolve the crisis that has left piles of uncollected garbage stinking in the scorching sun in recent weeks. 

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Tony Badran, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and a columnist for the Beirut-based website NOW Lebanon, told the Post on Wednesday that what started as rage against the political class immediately was exploited by all parties to suit their own interests.

Badran is skeptical of the narrative that some in the media have been touting, that Hezbollah is trying to hijack the protests in order to topple the government.

“Hezbollah is not at all displeased with where things currently stand in Lebanon,” he said.

The Shi’ite Hezbollah has “the army and security forces in hand, the representative of the Sunnis sits with them in government, and they have cover for their fight in Syria,” argued Badran, adding that the army is acting as an auxiliary force for Hezbollah operations on the Syrian border while also arresting lots of Sunni men, both Lebanese and Syrians, regardless of whether or not they are guilty of what they are being charged with.

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