US sanctions Lebanese Gebran Bassil for links with Hezbollah

Washington is prepared to impose sanctions on the leader of the Christian party, the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) of Lebanon and Hezbollah's ally, Gebran Bassil, according to the US newspaper Wall Street Journal.

A US official and another person informed of the plan told the American newspaper that the United States is preparing sanctions against Bassil for helping Hezbollah, a terrorist organisation designated by the United States and backed by Iran.

The move is expected to revolutionise attempts to form a new cabinet in Lebanon as the country faces an economic and political crisis.

The decision has already been approved in principle by the US Treasury Department and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is expected to unveil the sanctions in Washington this Friday.

Bassil is the former foreign minister of Lebanon and president of the political party Free Patriotic Movement which was created by his father-in-law, the current president of Lebanon, Michel Aoun.

Just a fortnight ago, the US Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) imposed new sanctions against Hezbollah leadership figures and Iranian entities. It targeted Nabil Qaouk and Hassan Baghdadi, members of Hezbollah's Central Executive Council.

When the sanctions were imposed, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin said, "Hezbollah's top leaders are responsible for creating and implementing the terrorist organisation's destabilising and violent agenda against the interests of the United States and those of our partners around the world.

Earlier this year, the United States expanded the scope of the sanctions on Lebanese officials to include non-Hezbollah members. Ali Hasan Khalil, former finance minister and chief political aide to President Nabih Berri, was sanctioned along with former public works minister Yousef Fenianos.

Lebanon has been without a government since August after Hassan Diab resigned following the deadly explosion on 4 August in the port of Beirut.

The legislators appointed Mustapha Adib, Lebanon's ambassador to Germany, to form a new government. He also resigned after being unable to form the executive he wanted, free from the influence of the traditional political parties.

Saad Hariri was nominated on 22 October to attempt to form a government. Although reports suggested he had made rapid progress in his efforts to form a new government team, and the momentum appears to have slowed down in recent days.

The new executive will have to address the country's worst crisis since the civil war of 1975-1990. A banking crisis, monetary collapse, growing poverty and crippling state debts, together with the health crisis caused by the coronavirus and the aftermath of the huge explosion in the port of Beirut in August that killed nearly 200 people and caused millions of dollars in damage, are making Lebanon a country on the brink of the abyss.

Lebanon's political system assigns the post of prime minister to a Sunni Muslim, and Hariri's return will be greeted with dismay by many anti-system demonstrators who have called for an end to the country's power-sharing system.

Sunni leader Hariri's last coalition government was overthrown almost exactly a year ago when protests took over the country, furious with Lebanon's ruling elite. 

The protests began against plans to charge taxes for calls made in Whatsapp, but quickly turned into demonstrations against endemic political corruption and the economic crisis.