By Tamara Qiblawi, Angela Dewan and Schams Elwazer, CNN – Beirut (CNN)Lebanon’s government believes Saudi Arabia is restricting the movement and communications of its Prime Minister Saad Hariri, a high-level ministerial source told CNN on Friday. The source said Hariri “isn’t expressing himself freely” with the Lebanese government and that his own political bloc […]

by economist.com – Article represents only the opinion of the author   The way the prince is going about enacting change is worrying. One reason is that his ambition too often turns to rashness. He led an Arab coalition into an unwinnable war in Yemen against the Houthis, a Shia militia, creating a humanitarian disaster. He […]

By ZEINA KARAM and BASSEM MROUE, Associated Press BEIRUT (AP) — Saudi Arabia on Thursday ordered its citizens out of Lebanon in its first concrete action against the Mediterranean country, while officials in Beirut demanded the immediate return of Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who abruptly announced his resignation last week in a television appearance from the kingdom, where he has been holed up since. The developments were the latest twist in the saga of Hariri, whose fate increasingly resembled a bizarre mystery-thriller that has gripped his nation and sent tensions soaring with Saudi Arabia. With the Lebanese government in limbo, officials in Beirut said they haven’t heard from Hariri since he departed for Saudi Arabia last week. Hariri’s own Future Movement party called Thursday for his immediate return home for the “dignity of the nation. Beyond a phone call on Saturday informing President Michael Aoun of his resignation, Hariri has not made contact with Lebanese officials. Aoun has said he would not accept the resignation until Hariri returns to the country and explains the circumstances of his decision to step down. Late Wednesday night, Hariri’s private plane took off from Riyadh and flew back to Beirut — and Lebanese breathlessly awaited his arrival, only to discover he wasn’t on board.

“How can they hold a prime minister?” asked a Hariri supporter in Beirut who gave only his first name, Abed, saying he feared retaliation for his comments. He said he was at a loss to know what to think, adding that if it turns out that the Saudis were indeed holding Hariri under house arrest “then they have humiliated the whole country by doing this.” On Thursday, Hariri’s Future Movement party delivered its sharpest rebuke yet over Hariri’s absence, demanding that he be returned home immediately — the clearest sign so far that it believes he is being held by the Saudis against his will. “The return of the Lebanese prime minister, the national leader, Saad Hariri, and the head of the Future Movement, is necessary to restore dignity and respect to Lebanon at home and abroad,” former premier Fouad Saniora said in the statement read on TV. The Riyadh government, meanwhile, after days of leveling threats against Beirut, ordered all Saudis living in or visiting Lebanon to depart “immediately,” and warned against travel to the country. Saudi Arabia sees Hezbollah as a proxy of Iran amid a spiraling rivalry between the two regional Sunni and Shiite heavyweights. Saudi Minister for Gulf Affairs Thamer al-Sabhan warned earlier this month that his government would deal with Lebanon as a hostile state as long as the militant group Hezbollah was in the Lebanese government. The Lebanese unity government that Hariri formed a year ago includes Hezbollah members — the result of an implicit Saudi-Iranian understanding to sideline Lebanon from the other proxy wars in the region. That understanding came to an abrupt end with Hariri’s resignation, throwing the country back into the forefront of the Sunni-Shiite regional conflicts.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who is currently visiting the United Arab Emirates, declined to discuss Hariri’s resignation, saying only that he hopes Lebanon will have a new government soon. He was set to travel to Saudi Arabia later Thursday to discuss the situation in Lebanon and other issues. “We’ve had some contact but there’s no reason to say anything officially regarding this,” Macron said when asked if he had contact with Hariri. “So far, all I can say is we did not receive any requests” from Hariri for asylum, the French leader said.

This article does not represent khazen.org opinion.

by Danielle Pletka – This article first appeared on the American Enterprise Institute site. – By now, the news out of Saudi Arabia has had time to sink in. To review the bidding for those whose eyes are not often drawn to dateline Riyadh: Over the weekend, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman (MBS) launched a new anti-corruption commission, arrested 11 (and probably more) senior government officials and super-rich Saudis, including Prince Alwaleed bin Talal (think Twitter, Citi, Uber), and axed the head of the Saudi Arabian National Guard, and others who may have represented a threat to the young would-be king’s “reform” campaign and bid for absolute power. To make sure private planes would not facilitate an escape, Riyadh’s private airport was shut down. In the same time frame, MBS summoned Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who arrived in Riyadh and promptly resigned his post as Prime Minister in Beirut. From Riyadh.

Oh, and there was a Yemeni rocket attack on Riyadh aimed for the international airport. And a Saudi helicopter carrying Prince Mansour bin Muqrin, son of a former crown prince and deputy governor of Asir province, crashed near the Yemeni border, killing all on board. A busy weekend indeed, and the Middle East and its watchers worldwide, always prone to wild gossip and conspiracy theories, gossiped wildly. Wait, I forgot to add: Jared Kushner was in Saudi Arabia last week and met with MBS. (Nudge nudge wink wink.) So what does it all mean? The honest answer from anyone but MBS should be, er, not sure. But we can speculate. Let’s dispense with the simple parts first.

• The helicopter crash was probably a coincidence and bad luck for those on board.

• The missile attack was also likely a coincidence of timing, though it should be seen as a sign that Iran, which arms the Houthi rebels now leading Yemen, is willing to expand the conflict and arm its proxies with increasingly potent weapons.

Why did Hariri resign?

• Let’s first answer the question, “Why was Hariri prime minister in the first place?” Lebanon went for two years without a government as Hezbollah refused to allow anyone not under their thumb to form a government.

Finally, Sunni political parties acquiesced in the appointment of the perennially-for-rent Michel Aoun for the reserved-for-Christians role of Lebanese president. And suddenly, Saad Hariri, son of the late Rafiq, also PM and assassinated by Syria for working with Hezbollah, was up for PM. Why? Sifting fact and fiction, the most plausible answer is that Hariri-fils was running out of cash. His company employees hadn’t been paid in almost a year. His own personal employees same. Saudi Arabia, which had bankrolled him once, was out of the game, having officially given up on Lebanon as a loss leader. So Hariri made peace with Hezbollah (i.e., with Iran) and was made PM. Being PM is key to having one’s hands on lots of money, and perhaps, for Hariri, it was the only way to replenish his coffers. This, at least, is the prevailing theory.

• But Hezbollah has the whip hand in Lebanon (and now in Syria, thanks to a supine White House and Russian-Iranian determination). So Hariri ended up doing a lot of business with Hezbollah.

That he didn’t like it he made perfectly clear, but needs must. And Saudi, which early in 2016 seemed to simply think washing its hands of Lebanon was enough, appears to have changed its mind. On this one, I agree with MBS. Lebanon is the key to the legitimization of Hezbollah. If you’re going to take a pass, you are giving Iran carte blanche in the Levant.

• Back to Hariri: He was in Saudi last week, returned to Beirut, and promptly received a delegation from Iran including Ali Akbar Velayati, an adviser to the Supreme Leader. “Terrorists and extremist and Takfiri movements are backed by the US, the Zionists and some regional countries that do not want stability, security, independence and unity among regional countries,” Velayati helpfully explained.

MBS, not being a twit, read “some regional countries” as Saudi Arabia, and decided the time had come to end Hariri’s charade. A plane was sent to Beirut to pick up Hariri, who was told to resign, and did. Is this how it happened? Feels like it, but then again, I wasn’t in the room. And neither MBS nor Hariri have called me to explain.

• Now Lebanon has no prime minister, but at least the mask is off, and Hezbollah no longer owns a legitimate government for itself.

What is MBS up to? Three alternate theories and One Big Thing:

• He is cracking down on genuine corruption in Saudi Arabia. OK, but for a guy who did this, getting religion on massive corruption and louche overspending feels a little, I dunno, fake.

• He wants the money. MBS could rake in hundreds of millions by expropriating corrupt assets. The reforms MBS has in mind will be costly, and Saudi Arabia is not as rich as many believe. In addition, the message has been sent: Do business with ME and no one else. That means more money.

• He is preparing to take over the crown when his father abdicates (and by abdicate, I mean the end to the quasi-“Weekend at Bernie’s” setup now extant in Riyadh) and wants to lay the groundwork for massive reforms and Saudi modernization.

That MBS is a modernizer should not be disputed. But his efforts heretofore — ending subsidies, intervening in Yemen, getting into a major fight with his neighbor Qatar — don’t suggest he is either terribly determined or a brilliant executor. Still, MBS is very clearly focused on ensuring his pathway to the throne is unimpeded. And over the last two years, he has done one thing very effectively: remove rivals.  Think of this as the Xi Jinping anti-corruption model.

• The One Big Thing: Everything is about Iran and the coming battle. That means anyone who has other ideas about how Saudi Arabia should position itself in the region (e.g. former crown prince Mohammad bin Nayef), anyone who does not want Saudi Arabia to leap into the 21st century (clerics, conservatives, etc), and anyone who believes accommodations should be made with Iran is out the door.

The anti-corruption campaign, ensuing purges, forced Hariri resignation, et cetera all fit into that overarching narrative.

Finally, here’s the problem:

MBS is 32. He has a lot of ideas, and while many of them are good, many of them are less good. He is also naïve, young, and being encouraged — make no mistake here — by the Trump administration. Iran is a dangerous force in the region, and it is in our and our allies’ interests to see that force rolled back. But I’m not certain that placing Saudi Arabia at the tip of the spear is the right or the most likely to succeed strategy.  And failure will come at a very, very high price. Something to consider.

by egyptindependent.com The European Union on Wednesday affirmed support for Lebanon following the resignation of Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri, echoing US backing for the Beirut government which Saudi Arabia has accused of declaring war. Statements of support from EU ambassadors to Lebanon and the US State Department on Tuesday struck a sharply different tone to […]

By Marc Jones and Davide Barbuscia LONDON/DUBAI  (Reuters) – A sell-off in Middle Eastern bond markets escalated on Wednesday with debt prices in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Lebanon all touching long-term lows following Saudi Arabia’s anti-graft purge and government turmoil in Lebanon. Some of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain’s dollar-denominated bonds fell to their lowest since […]

Article represents views of only the author

by James M. Dorsey, Contributor S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Senior fellow – Huffington Post

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has won the first round of what could prove to be an unprecedented power grab that comes to haunt him. The prince’s frontal assault on significant segments of the kingdom’s elite; assertions of unrest in the military and the national guard, and a flood of rumours, including allegations that a prominent member of the ruling family, Prince Abdul Aziz bin Fahd, died under mysterious circumstances suggest however that the struggle may be far from over. There is little doubt that Prince Mohammed is in firm control for now. However, there is also little doubt that many in the kingdom’s elite are licking their wounds and that the crown prince believes that bold action, crackdowns and repression is his best way of ensuring that he retains increasingly absolute power. Criticism and potential opposition ranges from those that feel shut out of the corridors of power to those who see their vested interests threatened by Prince Mohammed’s reforms and actions and/or are critical of the war in Yemen, his putting limits on ultra-conservative social codes, and his power-hungry, autocratic style. As a result, the rumours about Prince Abdul Aziz, even if they may well prove to be incorrect, take on added significance. Prince Abdul Aziz is a son of late King Fahd, a major shareholder in Middle East Broadcasting Company (MBC) that operates the Al Arabiya television network, whose other major shareholder, Waleed bin Ibrahim al-Ibrahim, a brother-in-law of the king, was among those detained this weekend.

Prince Abdul Aziz was known to be a supporter of the former crown prince, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, who was forced out of office earlier this year after rumours were floated that he had a drug addiction. Prince Mohammed is believed to have been under house arrest since. Prince Abdul Aziz was also a partner in Saudi Oger, the troubled company of the family of former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who resigned this weekend in a seemingly Saudi-engineered move to destabilize Lebanon and confront Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Lebanese Shiite Muslim militia. Prince Abdul Aziz has an alleged track record of going to the extreme in confronting his opponents. In an unprecedented move, Prince Turki bin Sultan, another member of the ruling family, filed a court case in Geneva in 2015 accusing Prince Abdul Aziz of orchestrating his abduction, sedation and forcible repatriation from Switzerland in 2003. A reformist, Prince Turki said he was kidnapped after he had accused the defence and interior ministries of corruption and planned to organize a seminar to detail the misconduct. Sifting through the rumours and assessing the balance of power in Saudi Arabia amounts to the equivalent of Kremlinology, the phrase used at the time of the Soviet Union to try to decipher the inner workings of the Kremlin. Nonetheless, what is confirmed as fact as well as the rumours appear to bolster suggestions that Prince Mohammed’s crackdown and power grab targeted among others factions of the ruling family related to late kings Abdullah and Fahd as well as the family of the powerful late interior minister and crown prince Nayef bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef’s father. What is certainly also true is that Prince Mohamed bin Salman’s crackdown on corruption strikes a popular cord among many in the kingdom who have long resented the awarding of often inflated mega contracts to members of the family as well as alleged land grabs by princes. Countering corruption beyond targeting potential critics and opponents has however a darker side in a country in which until the late 1950s members of the ruling families could access public funds for private use.

This week’s publication by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) of the Paradise Papers, exposing the secret dealings and offshore interests of the global elite, potentially puts another member of ruling family in Prince Mohammed’s firing line. Former deputy defense minister Prince Khalid bin Sultan bin Abdulaziz, known as the father of Saudi missiles for his secret procurement in the late 1980s of Chinese missiles for the kingdom, and command alongside US General Norman Schwarzkopf of the US-led alliance that forced Iraq in 1991 to retreat from its occupation of Kuwait, was the only Saudi whose offshore dealings were revealed by the massive leak of documents of the Bermudan branch of offshore law firm Appleby. The documents showed that Prince Khalid was a beneficiary of two trusts and registered at least eight companies in Bermuda between 1989 and 2014, some of which were used to own yachts and aircraft. Several of those dismissed or detained in Prince Mohammed’s most recent crackdown were last year named in a similar leak known as the Panama Papers because they came from a law firm in the country. They include former Riyadh governor Prince Turki bin Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, whose oil-services company PetroSaudi was linked to Malaysia’s multi-billion dollar 1MDB scandal; Prince Turki bin Nasser bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, a former military commander and head of the kingdom’s meteorological and environmental authority; former deputy defense minister Prince Fahad bin Abdullah bin Mohammed; and former Saudi Telecom chief Saoud al-Daweesh.

The Panama Papers identified tens of Saudi nationals, including several members of the Bin Salman branch of the ruling family. The leaks included wealthy persons from across the globe with offshore assets, a legal practice that implies no wrongdoing. The military and the national guard, a 100,000-man praetorian guard that was the long-standing preserve of King Abdullah and his closest associates, have remained silent in the wake of this weekend’s arrest of guard commander Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, a son of King Abdullah, and dismissal of navy commander Vice Admiral Abdullah bin Sultan bin Mohammed Al-Sultan, believed to be a son the late former defense minister and crown prince, Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz Al Saud. The changes in command nonetheless have reverberated through the ranks. “Things may well quiet down but many in the guard and the navy don’t like the way things were managed,” said a well-placed source. The source’s assessment was echoed by former CIA official and Saudi expert Bruce Riedel. Following a tweet by US President Donald J. Trump in support of Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s crackdown, Mr. Riedel noted that “the Trump administration has tied the United States to the impetuous young crown prince of Saudi Arabia and seems to be quite oblivious to the dangers. But they are growing every day.”

Articles represent opinion of the author

by alaraby.co.uk Egypt’s president has urged for calm in the region as tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran flare, saying it is not the right time to challenge Lebanese Shia group Hizballah. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi made the appeal in an interview with CNBC over the weekend that aired on Tuesday morning. “The stability of the region is very important and we all have to protect it… I am talking to all the parties in the region to preserve it,” Sisi said. When asked whether it was time to challenge Hizballah, Sisi said: “It’s not about taking on or not taking on, it’s about the status of the fragile stability in the region in light of the unrest.” The Egyptian president’s remarks come as Saudi Arabia said that Lebanon had declared war against the kingdom. “We will treat the government of Lebanon as a government declaring war on Saudi Arabia due to the aggression of Hizballah,” Saudi Gulf affairs minister Thamer al-Sabhan told Al Arabiya TV on Monday He added that Saad al-Hariri, who announced his resignation as Lebanon’s prime minister on Saturday from Riyadh, would not accept the positions of Iran-backed Hizballah. Saudi Arabia and Iran traded fierce accusations over Yemen on Monday as Riyadh said a rebel missile attack “may amount to an act of war” and Tehran accused its rival of war crimes. Tensions have been rising between Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia and predominantly Shia Iran, which back opposing sides in wars and power struggles from Yemen to Syria. Relations between Cairo and Riyadh – traditional allies – have warmed recently following a notable downturn last year when Saudi Arabia abruptly suspended oil aid to Egypt just days after Cairo backed a UN Security Council resolution on Syria drafted by Bashar al-Assad’s ally Russia. Egypt is a key member of the Saudi-led bloc that in June severed diplomatic and economic ties with Qatar, accusing it of supporting “terrorists” and being too close to Iran. However, Egypt has been reluctant to contribute militarily to the Saudi-led coalition in the war in Yemen and take sides in the civil war in Syria.

Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud meets with former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia November 6, 2017. (Reuters Photo)

Riyadh to treat Lebanese government as declaring war on Saudi Arabia

by By Habib Toumi, Bureau Chief – Gulfnews.com/Manama: Riyadh will never accept to see Lebanon involved in a war on Saudi Arabia, the Saudi State Minister for Arabian Gulf Affairs has said. “We will treat the government of Lebanon as a government declaring war because of Hezbollah militias,” Thamer Al Sabhan said. “The Hezbollah militias affect all decisions taken by the Lebanese government,” he told Al Arabiya Television late on Monday. Al Sabhan added that King Salman Bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud had informed Lebanon’s outgoing Prime Minister Saad Hariri of the details of Hezbollah’s aggression against Saudi Arabia, pointing out that the Lebanese government should be aware of the dangers of these militias against his country. “Hezbollah militias are involved in every terrorist act threatening Saudi Arabia,” Al Sabhan said.

“Saudi Arabia will use all political and other means to confront the ‘Party of Satan’.” The Lebanese must choose either peace or inclusion under Hezbollah, he added. “We expected the Lebanese government to act and deter Hezbollah,” he said, noting that it was up to the Lebanese to determine what would happen with Saudi Arabia. In his statement to the pan-Arab station, Al Sabhan accused Hezbollah of smuggling drugs into Saudi Arabia and of training Saudi youth on terrorism. “Hariri and noble Lebanese will not accept the stances of Hezbollah,” he said, stressing that claims that Hariri was forced to resign were mere lies distract the attention of the Lebanese people. “Lebanon had been hijacked by Iran-backed Hezbollah militias,” Al Sabhan said, On his Twitter account, the Saudi minister posted that “Lebanon following the resignation will never be the same as it was before,” “We will not accept that Lebanon is in any way a platform for the launching of terrorism towards our countries. It is up to its leaders to choose whether it is a state of terrorism or a state of peace,” he said to his 410,000 followers on the microblogging site. Hariri resigned on Saturday.

Lebanese PM Hariri visits UAE from Saudi Arabia

By Bassem Mroue | AP BEIRUT — In a new twist in the saga of Lebanon’s prime minister who resigned over the weekend from Saudi Arabia, Saad Hariri’s office said he visited the United Arab Emirates briefly on Tuesday for a meeting with a top official before returning to the kingdom. Much is unknown about Hariri’s unexpected resignation, which stunned the Lebanese, threw its government into disarray and prompted a frenzy of speculation. One of the rumors is that Hariri has been under house arrest in Saudi Arabia, or in some way forced to do the Saudis’ bidding. His brief visit to the UAE could appear to dispel that, except that the Gulf federation is a close Saudi ally — the two countries have been spearheading a war in Yemen since 2015 against the country’s Shiite rebels who are backed by Iran. Abu Dhabi’s powerful Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nayhan met Hariri and tweeted a photo, saying they discussed “brotherly ties” and the situation in Lebanon, without elaborating. Hariri’s office also said the two discussed the situation in Lebanon.

Articles represent opinion of the author

by Patrick Wintour Diplomatic editor – The guardian – No one doubted that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was a man in a hurry. But the Saudi royal’s decision to arrest 11 princes, four ministers and dozens of former ministers shows he is a risk-taker on a scale the Middle East has rarely seen. The fact that the billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, who owns the investment firm Kingdom Holding, was among the wave of late-night arrests (and is thought to be held in the luxurious confines of Riyadh’s Ritz Carlton hotel) suggests MBS, as Salman is known colloquially, is willing to take on the kingdom’s most powerful figures to implement his reforms and consolidate power. In theory, MBS could be in power for a half a century. The question is whether he is showing the maturity and steadiness to use such a lengthy reign to create a viable, modern Saudi Arabia.

The crown prince will say the arrests show his determination to root out corruption, a precondition of a more open economy. But few think the arrests, and related ministerial sackings, are the independent decision of a new corruption body, established just hours before to replace an existing one, rather than part of a wider reshuffle to centralise all security authority under MBS. The speed and unpredictability with which the crown prince acts – the purge was undertaken in great secrecy in the early hours of Sunday morning – is part of a pattern of behaviour unlikely to reassure international investors and interlocutors. After all, MBS effectively seized power in a palace coup in June, ousting his elder cousin Mohammad bin Nayef as heir to the throne and interior minister. Since then, the pace of reform has been breathtaking, and contradictory.

 Women are to be given the right to drive next year, cinemas are to be opened, tourists welcomed and the role of clerics driven back as part of a cultural and social revolution designed to make the secretive kingdom closer to the model of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and tprepare the economy for life after oil. The prince is launching a huge sale of state assets, and the UK and US are falling over each other to handle the $2tn (£1.52tn) float of Saudi Aramco, which could raise as much as $100bn for Saudi Arabia. This cash is to be used to build a new capitalist megacity, the extraordinary plans for which were unveiled last week. Many of the Saudi businessmen present at the unveiling are now locked up in the Ritz Carlton, with their phones cut off not just from room service, but their lawyers.

MBS has been equally bold in his foreign policy, determined to curb Shia Iran and marginalise Saudi’s Sunni rival Qatar. Saudi has launched an unending and brutal war in Yemen designed to quell the Iranian-backed Houthis. A missile was launched towards Riyadh this weekend in a sign of how the Saudis are struggling to secure a military victory. In June, MBS imposed a politically costly economic boycott on Qatar that has lost it allies in Europe and Washington. This weekend, the Sunni leader in Lebanon, Saad Hariri, under pressure from MBS, quit as prime minister in order to isolate Hezbollah and deepen the conflict with Iran. In addition, the Saudis are trying to force the weakened Syrian opposition to rein back its demands to end the civil war, in what looks like an uneasy alliance with Russia. It is a programme of social, economic and political reform, largely backed by the UAE, that amounts to a revolution in one of the most conservative countries in the world. The test is whether MBS has taken on too much at once. His latest purge is a sign that he knows opposition is gathering, and believes the educated population, liberated by social media, want reforms to go faster, and those holding back change must be ruthlesslyset aside.

 The list of the latest detainees is breathtaking – the equivalent of Theresa May sacking half her cabinet. As well as Prince al-Waleed, the roll call includes the former finance minister Ibrahim al-Assaf, a board member of national oil giant Saudi Aramco; the economy minister Adel Fakieh, who once played a major role in drafting reforms; the former Riyadh governor Prince Turki bin Abdullah; and Khalid al-Tuwaijiri, who headed the royal court under the late King Abdullah. Bakr bin Laden, chairman of the Saudi Binladin construction group, and Alwaleed al-Ibrahim, owner of the MBC television network, were also detained. Stock markets have recovered from the shock of the arrests, and MBS is the last man standing. But the reverberations of Saturday’s night of the long knives may just be starting.

These articles represent opinions of only the author   by saudigazette.com.sa BEIRUT — Lebanon’s president stressed that stability is “a red line” after Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s shock resignation, Justice Minister Salim Jreissati said on Monday after meeting the president. In a televised speech, Saad Hariri had said he feared an assassination plot against him […]