By Najia Houssari - arabnews.com -- BEIRUT: Newly elected reformist MPs in Lebanon are planning strategies following election breakthroughs that grant them significant sway in the parliamentary balance of power. Thirteen reformist MPs in Lebanon who entered the legislative race on the values of the 2019 anti-establishment uprising, as well as 21 independent MPs, have entered the newly elected Lebanese Parliament. Analysts have added up MPs to figure out the size of the parliamentary blocs, which are divided between sovereign blocs and pro-Hezbollah groupings. Figures show that elected MPs may be positioned within 13 blocs divided into two opposite larger camps, forming the 128-MP Parliament.

The sovereign MPs can be classified based on their previous positions. A total of 68 MPs are opposed to Hezbollah. They include members from the Lebanese Forces Party, the Progressive Socialist Party, the Islamic Group and the Lebanese Phalanges Party, as well as independents and reformists. Meanwhile, the pro-Hezbollah camp includes the party itself, the Amal Movement, the Free Patriotic Movement, the Marada Movement, the Tashnaq Party and Al-Ahbash, for a total of about 60 MPs. There is much speculation about how the new independent MPs will deal with upcoming events, and how they will position themselves on the parliamentary map.

A political observer told Arab News: “We will see the true colors of every MP when topics related to core issues are discussed.” The observer added: “Will these MPs change their stance regarding Hezbollah’s illegal weapons, although some have avoided addressing this sensitive issue in the past? Will these MPs be able to form a unified bloc that can influence decisions within Parliament, or will they remain independent, each working alone?”

By Dale Gavlak -- VOA News -- AMMAN — Lebanon’s newly elected parliament begins its mandate Sunday, and one of its first acts is to elect a speaker and deputy speaker. The speaker position is held by a Shiite Muslim, and Hezbollah ally Nabih Berri has headed the parliament since 1992. Observers say reformist lawmakers and others in the new legislature see Berri as part of the long-standing problem related to corruption and Iran-backed Hezbollah influence. Observers say that it is not just the more than a dozen independents and reformists along with 19 lawmakers from the Lebanese Forces, a mainly Christian party and critic of Hezbollah and Iran, that do not want long-standing speaker Nabih Berri to keep his post. Even President Michel Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement is against Berri’s nomination.

Habib Malik of the Lebanese American University tells VOA that this new parliament would like to see Berri, who has been around for nearly three decades, replaced by another Shiite leader. “An important milestone now will be the election of the speaker of the chamber. Nabih Berri, who has been there, is posed to want to return. There are mounting calls against him, and a lot of the new MPs will not vote for him. But here’s again where Hezbollah can play tricks and try to bring him,” he said. Dania Koleilat Khatib, with the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, tells VOA that all the Shiite lawmakers are either from Berri’s Amal Movement political party or Hezbollah, so an independent Shiite lawmaker is unlikely. “Will they vote for Berri to become again as speaker of the parliament? They’re saying that Berri might now, just to save face — to say that he was outvoted — he will say that I will retire. He will suggest one of his people to be the speaker of the parliament. Someone, of course, that he can control 100%,” she said.

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NNA – Head of the “Democratic Gathering” parliamentary bloc, MP Taymour Jumblatt, stressed today on “the continued struggle for Lebanon’s sovereignty to …