Sen. Lindsey Graham, RS.C., quickly cut short a meeting with Lebanese defense chief Gen. Rodolphe Haykal after the Lebanese official refused to confirm that the Iranian regime-backed Hezbollah movement is a terrorist organization.
Graham posted a clear message to X about his frustration with the state of Lebanon in particular and Middle Eastern power politics in general.
“I just had a very brief meeting with the Lebanese chief of defense, General Rodolphe Haykal. I asked him bluntly if he thought Hezbollah was a terrorist organization. He said, ‘No, not in the context of Lebanon.’ With that, we ended the meeting. It is clearly a terrorist organization. Hezbollah has American blood on its hands. Just ask the US Marines.
He continued: “They’ve been designated as a foreign terrorist organization by both the Republican and Democratic administrations since 1997 — for good reason. As long as that attitude exists on the part of the Lebanese Armed Forces, I don’t think we have a reliable partner in them. I’m sick of the double talk in the Middle East. There’s too much at stake.”
Lawmakers question whether we are moving fast enough to capitalize on Hezbollah’s weakened state
Haykal’s refusal to acknowledge that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization has raised security alarm among leading experts on the movement.
Read on the Fox News app
Matthew Levitt, a leading Hezbollah scholar at the Washington Institute, told Fox News Digital that “Gen. Haykal’s comment will only raise further concerns that the LAF views Hezbollah as an actor it should deconflict with rather than disarm. The cease-fire agreement is clear that Hezbollah must be disarmed, both in the south and in the north of the country. In a few cases so far, the LAF appears to have shared with Hezbollah intelligence information obtained from Israel through the US-led mechanism, rather than acting on it.”
US Marines search for survivors and bodies in the rubble of what remains of their barracks headquarters in Beirut after a suicide car bomb was driven into the building and detonated, killing 241 US servicemen and injuring more than 60. The US military was in Beirut as part of a multinational peacekeeping force. Islamic Jihad, which later became Hezbollah, a terrorist organization, claimed responsibility for the attack which coincided with the bombing of the French military headquarters at the eight-storey “Drakkar” building. November 24, 1983, Beirut, Lebanon
(Getty Images)
He added: “At a time when the LAF is seeking international aid, ostensibly to disarm Hezbollah, failing to recognize the group as an adversary not only of Israel but also of Lebanon undermines the case for additional funding.”
Fox News Digital referred several media inquiries to the Lebanese embassy in Washington, DC
Israel warns Hezbollah ‘playing with fire’ and pressures Lebanon to act on arms pledge
Lebanese army vehicles patrol the Marjayoun area in southern Lebanon near the border with Israel on October 25, 2024
Sarit Zehavi, a leading Israeli security expert on Hezbollah at the Israel Alma Research and Education Center, told Fox News Digital that “I wasn’t surprised by what Haykal said. That’s exactly the problem. Hezbollah is not designated as a terrorist organization in Lebanon. The Lebanese army … is not willing to clash with Hezbollah. clash.”
Zehavi claimed that the Lebanese Armed Forces “helped Hezbollah hide military activity and weapons caches in southern Lebanon.”
U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham speaks during a news conference in downtown St. Michael’s Square on May 30, 2025, in Kyiv, Ukraine.
The US negotiated a November 2024 ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel. In August, the Lebanese government accepted a US plan to disarm the group by the end of 2025. That deadline does not appear to have been met.
The US ambassador to Turkey, Thomas Barrack, who also serves as the envoy to Syria, told a recent Milken Institute event that Lebanon is a “failed state”.
The Cartel Connection: Hezbollah and Iran Exploit Maduro’s Venezuela for Cocaine Cash
Barrack said: “The confessional system is not working. A Maronite president, a Sunni prime minister and a Shia speaker; 128 parliamentary seats equally divided between Islam and Christians; it’s all a stalemate.”
He said: “Hezbollah is a foreign terrorist by US standards” and “it also happens to be a major political party in Lebanon that has blocking rights… This idea of saying you have to disarm Hezbollah… you’re not actually going to do it militarily.”
Barrack said: “The US says Hezbollah must be disarmed, Hezbollah is a foreign terrorist organization, it cannot exist. My personal view is that you kill one terrorist, you create 10. That cannot be the answer.” He called on the Lebanese political leadership to “run to Israel and make a deal… there is no other answer.”
Walid Phares, an American academic expert on Hezbollah and Lebanon who has advised US presidential candidates, told Fox News Digital that “The disarmament of Hezbollah is not only a US and international demand, but most importantly it has been a request of the majority of Lebanese since at least the Cedar Revolution of 2005, when 1.5 million Lebanese and occupied Christians were attacked against the occupied devils and Christian militia. Khomeinist”.
Click here to download the Fox News app
Hezbollah fighters hold flags as they attend the memorial for their slain leader Sheikh Abbas al-Mousawi, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike in 1992, in the southern Lebanese village of Tefahta. A United Nations official has drawn the scorn of Israeli diplomats for thanking one of the terror group’s top leaders following a meeting.
He added: “While Assad’s forces retreated, Hezbollah remained armed. In May 2008, the radical Shiite militia led an urban military coup against the pro-Western government and seized full power until the Israel-Iran war, known as the 2025 12-day war. The latter was provoked by Hezbollah during the October 7 war.”
Fox News Digital reported in November that the Trump administration had stepped up pressure on the Lebanese government to disarm Hezbollah.
Source of the original article: Lindsey Graham abruptly ends meeting after Lebanese general refuses to label Hezbollah terrorists