Lebanese officials believe that a US stance to strengthen "moderate elements" within Hezbollah should begin by addressing Israel's policies in the region.
John Brennan, assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism, on Tuesday described the Lebanese resistance movement as a "very interesting organization" which has improved from "purely a terrorist organization" to an entity that now counts members in the Lebanese parliament and even cabinet posts.
Brennan, however, expressed concern about a number of elements within the Lebanese resistance movement. "What we need to do is to find ways to diminish their influence within the organization and to try to build up the more moderate elements," Reuters quoted him as saying.
Analysts say this could be a constructive step on the part of the United States, but may not be realized any time soon.
Michael Bluhm from the Beirut-based English language Daily Star described the US overture to Hezbollah as "a very sensible conclusion for the Americans to finally draw."
"This means that the US recognizes that Hezbollah is not going away, that Hezbollah is the major political representative of the Shia community in Lebanon and will remain so for the decades to come," Bluhm said in an interview with Press TV.
"Something that it tells us is they view Hezbollah as someone that they could potentially in the future work with," he added.
Given the continued US support for Israel, Lebanese officials, however, are skeptic of Washington's toned down stance toward the movement which it has been at odds with for its anti-Tel Aviv's resistance since the Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon.
"The US is looking for ways to penetrate resistance groups. That is an important development but this development should include the US efforts to pressure Israel," Lebanese MP Okab Salur said.
"If the US believes these are extremist groups, the main cause of these groups is Israel and its policies," he argued.
The US comments on Hezbollah come after US and Israeli allegations in April, accusing Syria of providing Hezbollah with Scud missiles, charges strongly dismissed by both Syria and Hezbollah, who said Israel could be using the accusation as an excuse to start another war in the region.
Lebanon's Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri also scoffed at the claims and recalled how the US used weapons of mass destruction as a pretext to invade Iraq in 2003, stressing the US and its European allies have failed to date to discover the alleged arms.
[Source: PressTV]
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