Kerry’s congratulatory call to a person who is an ally of Syria (whom we are currently trying to overthrow) and an enemy of Israel (who is our closest ally in the Middle East) illustrates the schizophrenic nature of the Obama foreign policy.
Secretary of State John Kerry called Lebanon’s new Hezbollah-aligned president on Tuesday, congratulating a politician whose election has been hailed by Hezbollah’s patron, Iran, as a boost for the U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization and for the Assad regime.
“He did call President [Michel] Aoun this morning to congratulate him,” State Department spokesman John Kirby confirmed, “and to reaffirm our commitment to the future of a bilateral relationship with Lebanon and our desire to see – now that the Lebanese people have a chief executive – to see that Lebanon can move forward.”
Kirby did not say what the two discussed, although the Beirut Daily Star said Aoun urged Kerry “to keep providing Lebanon with military aid.”
U.S. taxpayers have provided around $1.4 billion to the Lebanese army and police since 2005.
In a move that ended a two-and-a-half year impasse in Lebanon’s byzantine and unpredictable political system, lawmakers on Monday voted to install Aoun, a former army chief, as the country’s president.
Although he’s a Maronite – Lebanese presidents are Christians by convention, while prime ministers are Sunni and parliamentary speakers are Shi’a – the octogenarian Aoun has for the last decade been a close political ally of Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Shi’ite terrorist group.
His elevation to the post of president came only after the country’s most prominent Sunni politician, former Prime Minister Saad Hariri, dropped longstanding objections. Hariri is expected to become prime minister again as part of the arrangement.
The Iranian regime celebrated Aoun’s election, with Ali Akbar Velayati, a top foreign affairs advisor to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, calling it a “triumph” for Hezbollah and for Iran’s friends and allies in the region.
Velayati told the Iranian state-owned news agency Tasnim that the election would give a “major boost to the Islamic resistance” – which he characterized as comprising Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and “Palestine.”
It would also bolster the Lebanese nation’s stance against “the Zionists,” and benefit Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, he added.