by SEAN MATHEWS
In Riyadh meeting, US and Saudi Arabia agreed they had ‘once in thirty-year opportunity’ to sideline Hezbollah with election of new president
The US has told Lebanese officials that Saudi Arabia is prepared to deploy hundreds of millions of dollars to reconstruct their war-torn country if Lebanese army commander Joseph Aoun is elected president, one senior Arab official and one former senior US official told Middle East Eye.
The carrot of an influx in Saudi cash was dangled by US envoy Amos Hochstein during his trip to Lebanon on Monday, where he lobbied intensely for Aoun, including with Lebanese parliamentary speaker Nabih Berri.
Aoun already has the support of Lebanon’s Sunni Prime Minister Najib Mikati.
“The Americans are dead set. They do not want any other candidate but Aoun,” the senior Arab official told MEE. “Hochstein has tied Aoun’s election to Saudi Arabia bankrolling Lebanon’s reconstruction.”
The Lebanese parliament is slated to hold elections for a president on 9 January, but have been delayed in the past.
The vote comes at a critical time, with negotiations for the renewal of a 60-day ceasefire that ended brutal fighting between Hezbollah and Israel approaching in just three weeks, on 26 January.
It has long been an open secret in Beirut’s political circles that the US wants Aoun to fill the presidential post that has been vacant since 2022. By tradition, the office of president is reserved for a Maronite Christian. Jihad Azour, a senior banker at the International Monetary Fund, is considered a second pro-US candidate.
The US is pushing for Aoun as president because it believes his military credentials will be important to implement the ceasefire, the current and former officials said.
With Hezbollah weakened, Lebanese and American officials believe Israel and Lebanon could officially demarcate their borders after an Israeli withdrawal, the Arab official said.
What makes the US’s push for Aoun more powerful now is that the US has brought Saudi Arabia on board – in an attempt to revive the kingdom’s role as the main Sunni powerbroker in the Mediterranean state.
Reviving Saudi Arabia’s role in Lebanon
Saudi Arabia played an outsized role in Lebanon’s reconstruction after its civil war ended, with a deal brokered about three decades ago in the Saudi city of Taif.
After the 2006 Lebanon war, Saudi Arabia pledged a $500m grant to reconstruct Lebanon and wealthy Saudis scooped up luxury villas and apartments in Beirut.
Middle East Eye for more