Peloni: Unfortunately, the Lebanese Shia community has acted Hezbollah’s greatest allies rather than victims over the years, and even today, as Trump acts to preempt the targeted assassinations in Shia strongholds in Beirut and elsewhere in Lebanon, he is in fact supporting the Shia communities perception that Hezbollah’s days are not yet likely numbered due to the protection being afforded to Hezbollah by the US. So, whether the Shia recognize themselves to be victims or allies of Hezbollah, the effort to preserve this terror entity in Lebanon with only the laughable efforts of the Hezbollah infiltrated LAF to act as the heavy against these Iranian satraps will in no way lead to a surging revolt by the Lebanese Shia against Hezbollah, no matter if these Iranian brigands are recognized by the local Shia community as being their masters or collogues. American sentiments in preventing the uprooting of terrorists wherever they reside is having an effect, and that effect is not diminishing the power and influence of the relative terrorists in their terror enclaves, but rather it is enhancing it. Hence, so long as the threat of foreign intervention against Hezbollah fails to seriously materialize, don’t look for any intifada rising against Hezbollah from the Lebanese Shia community.
By | Aug 11, 2026
Sami Gemayal, European People’s Party, Creative Commons Attribution 2.0
The Christians and the Sunni Muslims in Lebanon have for decades been the sworn enemies of the Shi’ite terror group Hezbollah, which is a tool of the Islamic Republic. Now Sami Gemayel, the leader of the Christian Kataeb Party, has called on the Lebanese Shi’a to rise up and wage an “Intifada” against Hezbollah.
More on his call for the Shi’a to turn on the terrorist group, that has brought nothing but woe to Lebanon by its attacks on Israel that then lead to the devastating IDF responses that have destroyed so much infrastructure in the Hezbollah strongholds in southern Beirut and the Bekaa Valley, can be found here: “Lebanese politician says Shi’ite community is victim of Hezbollah, calls for ‘intifada’ – report,” by Danielle Greyman-Kennard, Jerusalem Post, August 8, 2026:
Lebanon’s Shi’ite population should carry out an “intifada” against Hezbollah, Kataeb Party (Lebanese Social Democratic Party) leader Sami Gemayel told a delegation from Lebanese Press Editors’ Syndicate, according to Lebanese media reports. Gemayel told the delegation that there was no solution to the conflict that Lebanon could alone solve.
Sami Gemayel knows that even with the deliveries of American weapons over the past year, the Lebanese National Army is still no match for Hezbollah. Hezbollah fighters are battle-hardened; the Lebanese Army recruits are not. And Hezbollah’s members are fanatical in their faith; many in the Lebanese Army joined the force not out of deep conviction, but only for the salary it provides.
The only way to curb the power of Hezbollah is if the Shi’a themselves, or a great many of them, turn on the terror group that has, in effect, been holding them hostage. While both the Christian President Joseph Aoun and the Sunni Prime Minister Nawaz Sharaf have made clear their opposition to Hezbollah, no Lebanese leader has called for the Lebanese Shia to rise up against their fellow Shia in Hezbollah — until just now.
Though a supporter of the US-backed peace framework for Beirut and Jerusalem, he [Gemayel] acknowledged that the situation was also dependent on wider regional developments, namely Iran….
Hezbollah has been greatly weakened since October 8, 2023, when it joined Hamas’ fight against Israel. The IDF has since dealt a series of heavy blows to Hezbollah, killing close to 6,000 of its fighters, seriously wounding and rendering unable to fight many more, including 3,800 men wounded as a result of the “exploding pagers” caper, and destroying an estimated 80% of Hezbollah’s prewar arsenal of 150,000 rockets and missiles.
To make Hezbollah’s situation still worse, the Iranian weapons that used to be sent from Iran through Syria to Lebanon can no longer be delivered. The new Sunni regime in Syria is the archenemy of Iran, that supported Bashar Assad in the Syrian civil war, and has blocked most Iranian weapons from being delivered to Hezbollah. The new Syrian government has not entirely stopped every single attempt, but it has aggressively cracked down on and intercepted multiple major Iranian arms shipments intended for Hezbollah. Following the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, the new leadership in Damascus has fundamentally shifted policy, and actively worked to sever the historic land supply line from Iran and Iraq through Syria into Lebanon. Syrian security forces have repeatedly seized advanced weapons, long-range missiles, and drones hidden in trucks and oil tankers at border crossings such as Al-Tanf along the Iraqi frontier.
Gemayel made clear that he viewed the Shi’ite community as victims of Hezbollah and said he had approached Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri to discuss how to engage with the community about creating a separation between it and Hezbollah, a discussion that Berri was quick to shut down.
Berri, though the leader of the Amal Movement, is closely allied with Hezbollah, and a number of researchers, including Lebanese researcher Hanin Ghaddar, have written extensively about how Hezbollah has bolstered his political position.
Berri is wrongly perceived in the West as a “moderate” who rejects the terrorism of Hezbollah. It isn’t true. He’s been a steadfast defender of Hezbollah in the Lebanese Parliament.
L’Orient Today reported that Gemayel suggested the Shi’ite population was being held hostage to Hezbollah and there should, therefore, be an “intifada” (uprising) against the group.
Will the Shia, or many of them, now declare an “intifada” against Hezbollah? Once unthinkable, it is now a real possibility. Many Shi’a have seen their neighborhoods destroyed as a result of Hezbollah’s attacks on Israel, and want those attacks to stop. They are also keenly aware of Hezbollah’s losses of men and, especially, of weapons, including 80% of its prewar store of missiles and rockets. And they know, too that the Syrians have been seizing almost all of the weapons that Iran keeps trying to smuggle to Hezbollah.
Cometh the hour, cometh the man. Sami Gemayel has shown the way. Will the Lebanese Shia now turn on Hezbollah, as they should, or continue to be the terror group’s greatest victims?
It seems that the division among the Lebanese would make it difficult to reach any kind of agreement of substance. When the Shias and Sunnis are about 1:1 and both groups are larger than the Christian community, it is a wonder that the government can be set up as it is with leaders from the various groups being assigned to specific tasks. I doubt if any kind of political solution is within reach for anyone. Their president is a Maronite Christian, their PM is a Sunni Muslim and the speaker of parliament is a Shia Muslim. Getting them to work together to reach an agreement with Israel is probably impossible.