Fadlallah hits out at American interference in political crisis

Source: The Daily Star, 19-04-2008
BEIRUT: Senior Shiite cleric Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah accused the US on Friday of hampering solutions to Lebanon's political crisis. "Lebanon is still moving inside an impasse controlled by the American intelligence services and their political administration in order to keep the current crisis complicated," Fadlallah said in his weekly Friday sermon from the Imam Hassanayn Mosque in Haret Hreik.
"Everybody knows that the issue, with its political complications, is not Lebanese," he added. "It is rather subject to America's playing with the Arab situation."
Sayyed Fadlallah also commented on recent media reports that US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is seeking the extension of the current Lebanese Parliament's term. Addressing the Lebanese and Arabs, Fadlallah asked: "Has the US administration left you anything to hide behind? Does anybody still have any doubts about America's paralyzing role, which wants the Lebanese crisis to continue until next year?"
Fadlallah said the Lebanese people had become the "prey" of politicians and were suffering from poverty, hunger and a high cost of living.
"And the marginalized state only sees people as numbers that can be used in the game of political and sectarian incitement," he added.
Also Thursday, at a meeting with a delegation from the International Committee for the Red Cross - Lebanon, senior Shiite cleric Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah said that "we [the religious establishment] believe in the need for respecting humanity and preserving life even if a religious or political dispute exists."
"We desire a safe and secure existence for humanity, based on the respect for humans within the bounds of justice and responsible freedom, through a commitment to our rights and responsibilities," he added.