German parliament calls for full ban of Hezbollah activities
Hindustan Times
Mathias Middelberg, the spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives in parliament, said the joint resolution was agreed upon with the junior coalition Social Democrats, as well as the opposition Free Democrats.
Germany’s parliament passed a resolution Thursday
calling for a national ban on the activities of Hezbollah and for the Lebanese
militant group to be put on the European Union’s terrorist list.
Mathias Middelberg, the spokesman for Chancellor
Angela Merkel’s conservatives in parliament, said the joint resolution was
agreed upon with the junior coalition Social Democrats, as well as the
opposition Free Democrats.
“It is unacceptable that Hezbollah is waging a
terrorist fight against Israel in the Middle East, which is being financed
through worldwide criminal activities, among other things,” he said in a
statement. “In view of Germany’s special responsibility toward Israel, we call
on the government to ban all activities for Hezbollah in Germany.”
The EU now lists Iran-backed Hezbollah’s military
wing as a banned terrorist group, but not its political wing, which has been
part of Lebanese governments in recent years. “The separation between a political and a
military arm should be abandoned, and Hezbollah as a whole should be placed on
the EU terrorist list,” Middelberg said. “This could freeze Hezbollah’s funds
and assets in Europe more extensively than before.” However, other member nations have opposed
broadening the scope of the EU’s Hezbollah ban.
Israel welcomed the decision by German parliament,
known as the Bundestag, and said it hoped the move would encourage other
European countries to take similar steps.
“The Bundestag’s resolution is an important step
in the international struggle against terrorism, particularly against terrorist
organization Hezbollah and its patron Iran,” said Israeli Foreign Minister
Israel Katz.
The parliamentary resolution in Germany was
approved with a majority show of hands by members of Merkel’s bloc, the Social
Democrats and the Free Democrats. Other parties represented in the German
legislature all abstained.
The Left Party said it could not vote for the
resolution because adding Hezbollah to the EU terrorist list could complicate
relations with Lebanon. Members of the Greens said they agreed with almost all
of the resolution but objected to a point that they said could lead to
“military intervention” in the Mideast.
Johann Wadephul, a lawmaker with Merkel’s
Christian Democrats, offered assurance that the resolution’s call for measures
to reduce the influence of Hezbollah in the region, particularly in Syria, did
not foresee military action.
“But we are all called upon to isolate Hezbollah
internationally,” Wadephul told fellow lawmakers. “They threaten Israel, they
threaten the peace process in the Mideast and therefore we must confront
Hezbollah.”
It was not immediately clear whether the
resolution would prompt the government to pursue the ban of Hezbollah’s
activities. But with the governing parties and most of the opposition on board,
such action seemed likely.
Several lawmakers noted that a ban would allow
authorities to prevent Hezbollah supporters from staging an annual anti-Israel
march in Berlin.
Britain banned Hezbollah in March following moves
of other nations, including the Netherlands, the United States and Canada.
The German resolution comes as the U.S. has been
increasing its pressure on Hezbollah, placing several sets of sanctions on the
group and its regional backer, Iran.
In Berlin, U.S. Ambassador Richard Grenell
applauded the resolution approved Thursday, saying “we stand ready to support
the government’s implementation of a ban.”
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas acknowledged
that with Hezbollah’s ties to Lebanese government “the political reality in
Lebanon is complex,” but he said “this should not prevent us from exhausting
the legal possibilities in Germany to tackle Hezbollah’s criminal and terrorist
activities.”
“Hezbollah denies Israel’s right to exist,
threatens violence and terror, and continues to massively increase its arsenal
of missiles,” Maas said.
In Lebanon, Hezbollah was part of caretaker Prime
Minister Saad Hariri’s unity Cabinet, which resigned Oct. 29 in response to
mass anti-government protests amid a worsening economic crisis.
Israel and Hezbollah fought a month-long war in
2006 that ended in a U.N.-brokered cease-fire. While direct fighting has been
rare since then, there has been occasional violence, most recently on Sept. 1
when Hezbollah fired a barrage of anti-tank missiles into Israel and Israel
responded with artillery fire.
The barrage was fired in retaliation to an
Israeli airstrike inside Syria which Hezbollah said killed two of its members.
It also followed an incident in which two Israeli drones crashed in a Hezbollah
stronghold in south Beirut.
Israel maintains Hezbollah has amassed an arsenal
of some 130,000 rockets and missiles capable of striking virtually anywhere in
Israel. More recently, it has accused the group of trying to import or develop
guided missiles.
Last December, Israel announced that it had
uncovered a network of tunnels that it said Hezbollah was building with the aim
of infiltrating and carrying out attacks. Israel said it systematically
destroyed the structures.
Hezbollah has not commented on the tunnels,
though the U.N. peacekeeping force UNIFIL has said the group violated the 2006
ceasefire.
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