by arabnews.com — BARIA ALAMUDDIN — Once upon a time, an incautious word against Hezbollah — whether from lowly journalists or leading politicians — could merit a death sentence. Nowadays, ridiculing the “Axis of Resistance” has become a Lebanese national pastime. In recent days, a flood of videos and articles have boldly questioned how Lebanon benefits from Hassan Nasrallah’s promises of breakfasting in Jerusalem, while penniless citizens struggle to obtain breakfast in Beirut. “The image of the Israelis packing their stuff and getting on planes and ships is in front of my eyes,” Nasrallah blustered in his latest fusillade of lies and obfuscations. Nasrallah nowadays has no stomach for confronting the “Zionist enemy.” He believes that being the most rabidly outspoken anti-Israel voice excuses him from acting on his pronouncements. His nonsensical rhetoric is Hezbollah’s pretext for pointing its weapons at the heads of Lebanese and Syrian citizens. Hezbollah doesn’t stand for “muqawamah” (resistance) against Israel — its real war is against Lebanon’s dignity, identity, prosperity, culture and national pride.

Just as Antoine Lahd and his South Lebanon Army were regarded as traitors for aligning with Israel, social media activists are incessantly denouncing Nasrallah as a traitor for selling out his nation to Iran. Hezbollah’s very existence guarantees that Lebanon will never receive sufficient international financial support, which represents its only possible exit from the current catastrophic impasse. Intellectuals, economists and academics are sounding the alarm bell that the cancerous tumor of Hezbollah is steadily killing the Lebanese state. Can nobody propose a procedure for excizing it before it’s too late?