Leadership Quote by Walid Jumblatt

A “liberation” that comes with a loyalty oath isn’t liberation at all; it’s a transfer of ownership. Walid Jumblatt’s line lands like a warning flare aimed at the most volatile fault line in Lebanese politics: the gap between state sovereignty and the armed legitimacy of non-state actors. By invoking “those who liberated the South from Israel,” he nods to Hezbollah’s foundational mythos and its real historical capital after Israel’s 2000 withdrawal. But the second half of the sentence tightens the screws: that moral credit, he argues, must be cashed in only as allegiance to Lebanon, not to an external axis.

The intent is pointedly corrective. Jumblatt isn’t denying the narrative of resistance; he’s trying to domesticate it, to place it under the flag rather than above it. The subtext is a critique of dual loyalties - a polite phrasing for a harsh accusation that weapons, strategy, and political decisions can be steered by Tehran or Damascus instead of Beirut. It’s also a bid to reclaim the word “South” from being treated as a permanent front rather than a region with citizens who deserve normal politics.

Context matters: Jumblatt speaks as a consummate Lebanese power broker, fluent in the country’s sectarian math and allergic to any monopoly on force that bypasses the state. The rhetorical move is classic Jumblatt - acknowledging a rival’s symbolic victory, then setting terms that expose the rival’s vulnerability: if you are truly national, prove it. If you can’t, your “liberation” starts to look like leverage.