The person who was prime minister of Lebanon over the past Israeli invasion of the nation in 2006 has each Israel and Hezbollah in his sights.
Speaking to me within the hills above Beirut, Fouad Siniora says the Israeli forces are killing too many civilians in Gaza and in Lebanon.
He says the focusing on of peacekeeping troopers in southern Lebanon is only one instance of what he described as conflict crimes.
He mentioned: “This is something very bad what Israel has done and I hope it will awaken the attention of the whole world.”
However his anger was aimed additionally at Hezbollah, who he says have hijacked the nation and the federal government.
He tells me he sees an ideal probability to scale back the affect of Hezbollah, given the weakened state through which they discover themselves.
He says Lebanon should “turn a problem into an opportunity”.
“You cannot rule the country when you have two states… the state of Hezbollah… and the proper state that has been diminishing in authority,” he mentioned.
Mr Siniora additionally insisted that Iran needed to keep out of Lebanese affairs.
He mentioned: “Lebanon cannot afford that Iran continues to mess around not only directly but also through its tentacles”.
Picture:
Beirut, seen from the place Fouad Siniora and Mark Austin spoke
He informed me he believes Lebanon is already a failed state and will collapse fully until there’s a ceasefire and a full implementation of the UN decision bolstered again in 2006.
If not, he predicts a really dire future for Lebanon.
Israel mentioned on Saturday that dozens of rockets had been fired from Lebanon into northern Israel because the nation marked Yom Kippur, the holiest day within the Jewish calendar.
In the meantime, the Israeli army ordered residents of twenty-two southern Lebanese villages to evacuate instantly, and a UN peacekeeper was shot in Lebanon, the United Nations drive within the nation mentioned.
The unnamed man is the fifth peacekeeper to be injured in three days.
“Conflict is like a virus and if you don’t deal with it quickly, it spreads,” says Mr Siniora.
However searching from his terrace over Beirut, the palls of smoke from explosions nonetheless rise into the blue sky and it’s clear a ceasefire is nowhere in sight.
