Loato
cheese.
Good morning everyone. Thank you so much
for coming.
>> We're going to do this a little
differently. We're going to have the
senator and the congressional delegation
speak first. They will take questions
and then after that we will turn it over
to Ambassador and
So please ask your questions
accordingly. We will start with Senator
Shaheen giving us opening remarks. Thank
you so much.
>> Thank you all for coming.
My name is Jean Shaheen. I am a United
States senator from the state of New
Hampshire. My husband is a Lebanese
American. So I'm very happy to be in
Beirut and to be in Lebanon.
I'm delighted to be here with Senator
Graham. Um he and I serve on several
committees together and with Congressman
Joe Wilson. They are both from South
Carolina.
Um we had a very productive meeting with
President O and are so pleased that he
hosted us today.
I want to start by pointing out that the
United States stands with the people of
Lebanon. A secure, stable, and thriving
Lebanon is in the interest not just of
the United States and the Lebanese
people, but of the entire region.
One of the keys to managing that reality
is the full disarmament of Hezbollah.
And we had a very good discussion with
the president about that.
That is why it's so important to support
the bold decisions that the country is
making right now.
strengthening the Lebanese armed forces
who are essential to securing the
country's future and borders, advancing
financial reforms that will put
Lebanon's economy on a more solid
ground. These are difficult steps. We
understand that and we appreciate the
challenges in getting those things done.
They are critical, however, and in
Congress, back in the United States, we
will continue to press for support
through legislation and through the
appropriations process, support for the
avenue that Lebanon has chosen for your
future.
We will also continue to urge Lebanon's
leaders to follow through on this
progress, and we have meetings later
today with the speaker and with the
prime minister. So thank you. Um we will
now be happy to answer questions.
>> Hello Tony from NBC. I have two
questions please. The first one when
will the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon
begin? And will the Israeli attacks on
Lean soon? My second question please
Senator Senator DC said yesterday that
he envisions a future mutual mutual
defense agreement between the US and
Lebanon. Have you started negotiations
regarding this agreement or still just
an idea? Thank you.
>> Um I have not been part of any of the
discussions with Israel, so I'm not
going to speak to that. Ambassador Bar
um Miss Ortega can speak to those
meetings and I'll ask Senator Graham to
speak to the defense agreement
discussion.
Uh
>> number one um
>> the reason the reason I mentioned that
Lebanon needs to have a vision of where
Lebanon wants to go. U the idea of
disarming Hezbollah
is not coming from me. It's coming from
the Lebanese people. U the Lebanese
military seems to be the one institution
in the country everybody's proud of. So,
what did we learn today? We're
appropriators and Congressman the
funders have to win the money. So,
Congressman Wilson is very involved in
in securing America. And the best way to
secure America is have good partners.
And the best way to have a good partner
is have a military that's loyal to the
people, not to a particular sect within
the people. And Hezbollah is not loyal
to the people. Hezbollah's agenda is not
Lebanon's agenda. He has blah blah blah
has an agenda inconsistent with you
thriving and surviving. So I think you
as a people, the Lebanese people uh
overwhelmingly want a better future.
They want a future where the Palestinian
militias are disarmed. They want a
future where Hezbollah is disarmed and
that the people carrying arms are the
Lebanese army. The Lebanese army is
trusted to take care of everybody's
interest regardless of sex. If you can
pull that off, that would be the biggest
accomplishment. in modern history of
Lebanon. This is a challenge. Iran is
its weakest. Iran is up to no good, but
their capability is uh tremendously
diminished. You have a opening year.
Saudi Arabia is openly talking about
maybe one day having a relationship with
Israel. I hope that day will come. So my
advice uh when Israel leaves the five
points that really the discussion is
what happens when uh Lebanon deter
decides to disarm Hezbollah
then you talk Israel once Hezbollah has
been disarmed by the people of Lebanon
transferring power from militias to
Lebanese military to the people through
the political process then you'll have a
different conversation with Israel.
I'm going to Israel pretty soon. It's
all talk until something changes.
Israel's never going to look at Lebanon
differently until you do something
different. And that is disarm the enemy
of the Israeli people. He has an
American blood on its hands. Has Israeli
blood on its hands, has Lebanese blood
on his hands. So don't ask me any
questions about what Israel is going to
do until you disarm Hezbollah. If you
disarm Hezbollah, we'll have a good
conversation. If you don't, it's a
meaningless conversation.
>> I have a question.
This is Susan from the Washington Post.
So, uh, would you please explain to us,
um, what is the Trump economic zone?
People are wondering, is it an area that
>> what is it? How can you explain it?
>> All of my Republican colleagues answer
that. I'm the Democrat in the group.
She's very valuable. I'll let these two
guys talk about the egg. Now, it's to
make sure that people have the
capability to feed their family and, you
know, secure the area that's in
question. If you take a contested area
and make it stable, that's good for
Lebanon. That's good for Israel. I think
President Trump through uh Tom and
Morgan have a plan to create stability
along the border. I'll let them talk
about that. But the one thing I forgot
to mention is a defense agreement. Do
you have any idea what I'm talking
about? I'm talking about the biggest
change in the history of Western. And
why am I talking about it? How many
nations have a defense agreement with
the United States? Very few. NATO, we
have Article 5 commitment, but the
number of nations that America is
willing to go to war for is very few.
Why did I mention Lebanon being in that
group? You have one thing going for you
that is very valuable to me. Religious
diversity. Christianity is under siege
in the Middle East. Christians are being
slaughtered and run out of all over all
over the region except here. And so what
I am going to tell my colleagues and
Jean has been great. Why don't we invest
in defending religious diversity in the
Middle East? Why don't we have a
relationship with Lebanon where we would
actually defend what you're doing? I
think it's in America's interest to
defend religious diversity. Whether
you're Drews or Alawite or a Christian
or whatever, the idea that America may
one day have a defense agreement with
Lebanon
changes Lebanon unlike any single thing
I could think of. And why am I pushing
this idea? Because I want to defend
religious diversity. I want those who
want to destroy religious diversity to
understand your days are numbered.
>> Thank you so much. Next question,
please.
Welcome to Lebanon.
>> Have you been informed by President D
about the military plan that the
government will approve to desire?
>> Um,
>> what we discussed is that there will be
a plan forthcoming. Um, in the next week
or so is the proposed date and we look
forward to seeing that. Next question.
>> Mr. Graham.
>> Yes.
In which way you believe that the prime
minister, Israeli prime minister
Netanyahu will help Lebanon with his
armed if Lebanon had to do all the
steps. Sir,
>> well, if I were the Israeli prime
minister, I would be looking at Lebanon
differently after Hezbollah was disarmed
by the Lebanese people. That's your
decision. Why do you need Israel to tell
you to disarm Hezbollah? That's not
Israel's decision. That's your decision.
Whether they withdraw or not is it
depends on what you do. So don't don't
tell me anymore. We're not going to
disarm Hezbollah until Israel does
something. If that's the model, you're
going to fail. The reason you disarm
Hezbollah because it's best for you.
This country is going backward, not
forward if you don't follow through with
disarming the Palestinians and Hezbollah
and making the Lebanese army the central
repository of arms for the nation. If
you don't do that, you're going nowhere.
Saudi Arabia is not coming here unless
you do that.
>> Okay, thank you so much. Our next
question is going to go here.
Hello. In parallel with the military and
political pressures on Lebanon, what has
Isra implemented from the ceasefire
agreement?
>> Again, we're not going to address
questions about what Israel's doing
because I haven't been part of those
discussions.
>> Isra implemented from the dasis fire
agreement. The senator has already
responded to that question. We'll do one
more question for this delegation and
then we'll move on. I'm not part of
those discussions so I'm not speak
army have the will to disarm at least
they are putting a plan on the table but
they need support financially and
logistics. Did you talk about this
today?
>> Um we did talk about that. We talked
about the the importance of equipment
and training for the LAF. We talked
about the budget process. As Senator
Graham said, he and I are both
appropriators. In fact, Senator Graham
chairs the committee in the Senate that
provides the funding for foreign
assistance and foreign affairs. Um, I'm
also on the Armed Services Committee.
Um, we talked about the importance of
continuing to support the LAF in this
effort and what the United States can
help to do.
>> Yeah.
>> Yeah. I didn't come here for my health.
I came here because there's an
opportunity I've been told about through
Morgan and Tom.
They're here because the president wants
them here. We all see Lebanon is a an
important change. We're here to tell you
that we're buying into that change that
we support what you're trying to do.
That if you do make an effort to disarm,
we'll be there trying to help. We'll try
to help your military. We'll try to help
your economy. We think that's the right
thing for you to do and it benefits the
entire region. If you're able to pull
this off, Saudi Arabia will look at you
differently. If you're able to pull it
off, Israel will look at you
differently. If you're able to pull this
off, there'll be a ground swell of
support in Washington to help your
economy and to help your military. The
biggest challenge you have is what we're
talking about here. I came here because
people who've been working this file
tell me that Lebanon is moving in the
right direction. The statement the
government made a couple of weeks ago
about disarming Hezbollah was great. The
statement Israel made yesterday about
what they see in Lebanon is great. I'm
here to build on the success of others.
I'm coming here with Jean. She's a great
partner in the Senate to tell you that
the Congress is looking at Lebanon
differently because you're behaving
differently. If you continue to go down
this road, I think you have a wonderful
opportunity to secure your nation
economically and military militarily
like anything I've seen since I've been
coming to the region with John McCain.
It all depends on what happens with the
Hezbollah file and the Palestinian file.
Let me just add one thing to that
because much of the discussion has been
about Hezbollah and one of the other
things that I know you're working very
hard on here is banking reform, but
that's been a huge issue for people in
the country and for um building on
economic um initiatives and progress.
And so we are also um supporting those
efforts of banking reform because we
know how critical they are to people
throughout the country. and hope that
parliament will be successful in getting
that done.
>> Thank you so much, Senator.
>> And ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to
both a member of the house, the lower
house, the people's house in in the
United States. I'm very grateful to be
here with uh we can tell you that
there's support for the people of the
region, but you can see it and it's
live. It's by camera, uh Senate and
House, uh Republican and Democrat. Uh
and then what an exciting time. And then
for the people of Lebanon, you need to
be aware that there's a such a direct
connection. Everywhere you go, you find
out Lebanese Americans are everywhere. I
had no idea that Shaheen's husband was
Lebanese. And then a superstar,
Ambassador Tom Barrett of Lebanese
American heritage. And so my I'm really
grateful in my office, the legislative
director. Hey, over and over again.
>> And so we blame everybody. But I uh
again I'm just really grateful the
connection that we have and then it's
it's also an exciting time. We met with
Alsara, President Alsara yesterday. To
me uh it's so important for the people
of Syria and the region. Uh to me this
has the I believe the consequence the
fall of the Berlin wall now have the
fall of Basar Assad. Uh there's such an
opportunity for stability, security, for
economic prosperity for everyone. And
I'm just so grateful that we also have a
president uh working with Ambassador Tom
Bareric and Morgan Ortega who is a
visionary. Who would ever imagine uh
just recently the uh he he's a proponent
of peace. The agreement between Armenia
and Azan. I was in Europe about a year
ago. The prospect of that was totally
inconceivable, but it's occurred. And so
we have a president who wants to step
in. Donald Trump who wants a Middle East
that's prosperous, stable, capable of
having opportunities for the the younger
citizens, everyone. So, I'm grateful to
be part of the delegation bipartisan by
camera. Thank you.
>> Thank you so much.
>> One thing we have a great ambassador
here, but President Trump's one of his
closest friends has been picked to be
ambassador Lebanon. We try to get them
this number.
>> Thank you so much, Senator. Thank you so
much, Representative Wilson.
Thank you guys so much. We really
appreciate it.
>> Thank you.
>> All right, back down, please.
>> Okay, if everyone could take their
seats, we're going to have
[Music]
One second, please. One second, please.
Hold on.
Right?
>> You want please be quiet for a moment
>> and I want to tell you something. The
moment starts becoming chaotic like
animalistic, we're gone.
>> So you want you guys to know what's
happening, act civilized, act kind, act
tolerant because this is the problem
with what's happening in the region.
So I beg you, do you think this is fun
for us?
>> Do you think this is economically
beneficial for Morgan and I to be here
putting up with this insanity
in cadence with your kindness, your
interest, and your thoughtful questions,
we'll give you responses. If that's not
how you'd like to operate,
>> we're gone. Okay? Did I accept
everybody?
Now, what are we doing?
>> I can't even have two minutes.
>> So, more than you all know.
>> Our our goal is to match Beauty and the
Beast. And you know which side of that I
am. So Morgan Morgan is coming back as
as a valued hand and very difficult
puzzle
solvation of what was
>> and I'm going to answer together. We'll
answer your questions. We've been in
Israel. We've been in Syria. But here's
the bottom line. Here's what I I I want
you and you just have three of the most
powerful people in the US Congress. This
is huge because I know what you all want
to happen is have America fix this
problem.
As much as America is going to fix this
problem is what Donald Trump has done,
what he did hand in hand with Israel and
Iran.
What he's done for Syria and taking the
sanctions off and what he said for our
benefit, for Lebanon's benefit, that he
wants a healthy and prosperous Lebanon.
Now what's really the issue we keep on
talking about
Hezbollah being disarmed. What we
haven't talked about was what happens to
the Shia people, what happens to the
Hezbollah military, what happens to the
people, what happens to the south and
why is Hezbollah armed.
So I want to give you just a framework
for what we're doing and then Morgan can
answer this question.
If you think about it for you, Hezbollah
is a political party. She is represent
30 40% of the population. And you have a
very good set of leaders today in my
opinion.
The major three leaders, the president,
prime minister, the speaker are all
trying to do the best job they can for
you of ushering to a new era of
tolerance, a new era of peace, and
ultimately prosperity.
So why is Hezbollah armed?
You have outside interference. What's
the outside interference? Iran,
Israel,
the apprehension of Syria.
What did we do? We went to Syria.
I can tell you President Alshara has no
interest in having an adversarial
relationship with Lebanon in any way.
Zero.
There's no Sunni fundamentalist cause
that he's targeting a weakness in Iran
or a perceived weakness in Shia as an
opportunity for him.
He's looking at the historic
relationship of hand and glove
cooperation
of what Lebanon and Syria could be
ultimately. That's a fact. And he's
running to border
alignment discussions and a boundary
agreement. Running to
Israel. Morgan and I spent the day in
Israel after you can imagine
preparation.
The idea responding to the heroic act
that the president,
the prime minister,
the the council had taken in responding
to suggestions that we had given as to
what could a disarmament and withdrawal
plan be again going to disarmament is
what can we do for Hezbollah to show
them they don't need to be armed.
>> Nobody wants to go to the civil war.
I can tell you Israel's response was
historic.
What they've said to us personally, what
they've said to the president in
actuality, and what they've given in a
press release to you is they will meet
tip for tat in exact cities.
What we will do in an effort to make
sure that Hezbollah is not armed as an
adversary against them, they will
withdraw in the same cadence.
The reason they couldn't respond
specifically is we didn't give them
specifics yet. your government is coming
back with a proposal August 31st which
is a Sunday so it won't be August 31st
saying here is the plan and proposal
of what our intent is to disarm
when they see that they will give their
counterp proposal of what they will do
in withdrawals and security guarantees
on their border their boundaries those
five points in cadence with what
forgiving that. So the big picture is if
you take the adversaries away. So if you
take Israel and Syria away as every
discussion with Hezbollah and saying
great you from 1982 on you needed to be
armed. You were a militia. We had the
Palestinians. We had the Israelis. You
were serving a cause. There's no need to
serve that cause. Laugh can do it. You
can be a part of it. But when we talk
about the economic zone, we have to have
a substitute for what happens because
there's another outside party that we
just talked about, Iran, that we have no
direct relationship with. And Iran has
been the financeier of the growth of
Hezbollah
municipality and Hezbollah the militia.
So how do we substitute that? We bring
the Gulf countries in simultaneously in
a new economic zone which will have some
depth to it in the next few weeks as to
what can happen with outside and west.
What kind of outside? What does it mean
to the south? What does it mean to the
community?
So step by step you take out the Iranian
concern because you have another funding
source, another life source. You take
away the Syrian consent because Syria is
ready to have discussions tomorrow. You
take away the Israeli, you haven't
spoken, by the way, to Israel since
1949.
This is insanity. And I'm not even going
to go towards the fact that eventually
you're going to have to speak to Israel.
Whether it's a deconliction, whether
it's normalization, whether it's
ultimately a peace agreement, there's
only one road to ultimate peace and
prosperity in that in this region. And
that's for everybody to speak with each
other and for America to vanish from the
scene. So with that, I'll question
Morgan. You can take that over.
>> One question
over here, please.
>> This is just from
the main question is did you get a
commitment from Israel regarding
the stain of strikes on Lebanon?
response to the decision made by the
Lebanese government regarding the
dismantling of the
>> I think the ambassador was clear on
that. Um Israel is willing to go step by
step. It might be small steps, baby
steps, but they're willing to go step by
step with this government. Um as
Ambassador Bareric pointed out, uh the
entire Trump administration, Secretary
Rubio were all greatly encouraged by the
historic decision of the government a
few weeks ago. But now it's not about
words. Now it's about action. And so
what Tom and I are here to do is to
represent the president of the United
States. It's his policy, not our policy.
And we are here to help the Lebanese
government move forward with that
historic decision and to work with our
partner in Israel step by step. So every
step that the Lebanese government takes,
we will encourage the Israeli government
to make the same step. So what happened?
>> I know it's tempting.
two questions.
>> Are you saying are you saying are you
saying that nothing will happen until uh
the disarmment ofah?
So uh you mean that Israel will not do
will do anything until the real
disarmament of never any step because
last time you said that you will work on
a step from the Israeli side.
>> Yes. So let me let it's a good question.
Let me be more clear. What the Israelis
are saying is they will meet step by
step
whatever our disarmament plan is. You're
when I say our I'm speaking about less
right that on August 31st we're coming
back with some plan. I don't know what
it is. laugh and your government are
coming back with a plan saying our
proposal
to Hezbollah is to how to disarm him,
which is not necessarily militarily,
right? They're not talking about going
to war. They're talking about how do we
convince Hezbollah
to give up those arms. And what does
that mean? We don't know because there's
no Lebanese plan at the moment. They've
done a very good job south of the Latai
in this very confused setting. Remember
we had this November 2024 agreement, but
nobody abided by it.
Right? So we talked about a sessation of
hostilities agreement which is still in
effect but nobody's paying attention. So
what will happen now? Why do I think
this is why personally am I hopeful?
Your government did something amazing
which is took 11 points and said we as a
government will commit to do these
things. The first major step of that is
we will ask LAF to prepare a an
agreement on how Hezbollah can be
disarmed which will be submitted to us
for approval. We haven't seen it. They
haven't seen it. It hasn't been
submitted. What Israel has now said,
which is historic,
is we don't want to occupy Lebanon.
We're happy to withdraw from Lebanon,
and we will meet those withdrawal
expectations with our plan as soon as we
see what is the plan to actually disarm
Hezbollah.
So it's words on both sides, but those
words are super important because we're
getting towards that narrow alley of
action and that's where we are at the
moment.
>> I want to ask regarding the economic
zone, but what mechanism could such a
plan realistically be acculated? So if
you think what's
how do we solve all these issues amongst
all of us
hope is a great thing but hope fades
quickly right so with me you're going to
get frustrated with me if I'm up here
for another six months saying it's going
to happen it's going to happen it's
going to happen you'll say let's move
from America to France let's go from
France to Germany let's go from Germany
to Saudi Arabia let's go some outside
source the only thing that works is the
hope of prosperity do that. So we have
to have money coming into the system.
The money will come from the Gulf.
Lebanon for all the reasons we know has
always had that historic ability to
harness enterprise business banking. You
know, they're working on a GAP law.
They're working on a new central bank.
They're working on a correspondent
banking system. They're working on the
port. They're working on logistics. We
need to speed that program. Qatar and
Saudi Arabia are are are partners and
willing to do that and saying for the
south if we're asking a portion of the
Lebanese community to give up their
livelihood because when we say disarm
Hasbro we have 40,000 people that are
being paid by Iran to fight. What are
you going to do with them? You want to
take their weapons and say by the way
good luck go plant more olive trees. It
can't happen right? We have to help
them. And the way we help them is to say
we all of us, the Gulf, the US, the
Lebanese are all going to act together
in creating an economic forum that will
produce
a livelihood
which isn't set upon whether Iran wants
it or not. That's the idea.
>> Did you discuss the issue of
extending?
>> Of course.
>> What's your opinion?
>> My personal opinion?
>> No, you are saying
Why do
>> So, let me ask you a question.
>> How long has Unifi been there?
>> How much do you pay them a year?
>> I'm I'm a businessman. Make it simple.
>> No, a billion dollars a year. How many
years have they been? You're all
journalists. You're brilliant. You've
been researching this. So, you can grill
me every day. How many How many years
has been anybody?
Right? So, I'm just a businessman. I
say, "Okay, a billion dollars a year, 22
years of advocacy, and you're in a
swamp.
>> They haven't fired a bullet. They
haven't fired a shot. You're in the
worst dilemma than you've ever been with
Israel and Hezbollah. And you want us to
weigh in more with laugh?" Laugh is the
answer. Your answer is laugh. Your
answer is not you. The Secretary of the
United States position is we will extend
for one year. That's our position today.
We we have to decide by the end of
August. Of course, Francancy is not in
that position. My personal position is I
sponsor the president of the United
States and the secretary of state 100%.
Concentrate on laugh. You have to do it
yourself. The more you rely on outside
influences, pretty soon you're going to
be substituting McDonald's for a kid
night, right? That's what's happening.
Every time you reach outside for outside
help, you're losing the value of what
you have.
Don't do it.
Hezel, you can convince them and a
non-adversessary my opinion in a nonivil
war environment to join one Lebanese
state.
This is my opinion.
>> Last question. Last question. You guys
are wearing me out. You have talked
about Syria, Israel and
why not taking the short way and United
States
to give an order and then we close the
>> Do you think that's not happening?
>> Goodbye.