00:00For The View Now from Lebanon, coming up, we'll be joined by Ghassan Salami, a huge academic and political figure
00:07in Lebanon,
00:08currently serving as the Minister of Culture since February 2025.
00:12Good morning, Minister. Thank you so much for joining us here on Euronews.
00:16Thank you for inviting me.
00:17Just first question, how severe is the situation in southern Lebanon, especially right now?
00:24Well, I think I agree with the Associated Press qualification of what is happening.
00:28Yesterday, AP has shifted from something quite vague into saying exactly that it's an invasion.
00:37I used to say it's a creeping action by the Israeli military.
00:41And I say since yesterday, it's now an invasion.
00:45And Israel is saying clearly that it wants to create a buffer zone in south of Lebanon.
00:50Are you fearing now a land grab?
00:52We've even heard one far right Israeli minister calling for annexation.
00:56Yes, that's true.
00:57We take seriously all these statements.
01:00I take seriously what Smotrich said, that he wants to occupy and annex all the areas south of the Litani.
01:07I take even more seriously what Katz, the Minister of Defence, said, that he wants to have a buffer zone
01:13until the Litani.
01:15The problem is the following.
01:17There is a long history of Israel with buffer zones.
01:20They had a buffer zone in south Lebanon for 22 years, until the year 2000, when they withdrew and said,
01:27we don't need it anymore.
01:28It is doing harm to us more than it is doing any good.
01:32But now, the new form of buffer zone they are trying to implement on the ground is very different.
01:42Wherever they go, they don't leave any civilians.
01:46They don't leave any house.
01:48They don't leave any possibility for civilians to go back to houses, because they are absolutely destroying all the villages.
01:55Thirty-four of them have been destroyed, and therefore, what they are, the new concept of the buffer zone is
02:04a much more radical one, much more damaging to the civilian population.
02:09And tell me, how are you supporting, how is your government supporting civilian populations?
02:13Are you encouraging people to stay in areas that are under attack, or should they flee?
02:18And do you have enough support for these people on the ground?
02:21It is very difficult to support them, because very often ambulances are hit, relief trucks are hit, etc.
02:31So, no, we leave it to them to decide what they do.
02:34But whenever they move from their homes, we take care of them.
02:38And that's why we have now more than 700 shelters across the country where they are received and properly treated.
02:47And I am going immediately after this interview to visit three or four of these shelters in the outskirts of
02:55Beirut.
02:56We take care of them.
02:58And I should say that the flow of international aid is starting to come and to help us by sea
03:06and by air.
03:07And we have put in place a service of very rapid distribution.
03:12Once we get any help, it goes almost the same day to those who need it.
03:19We have now more than 1,100,000 people.
03:24That's one out of five Lebanese who has been displaced.
03:28And some, I would say, 17 or 18 percent of them live in these shelters.
03:33And any hopes for talks with the Israelis to bring an end to this?
03:37We offer.
03:38We offer.
03:39The President of the Republic offer negotiating with Israel.
03:42We didn't have the proper answer so far.
03:45And we didn't, we didn't, we haven't been able to encourage possible mediators
03:55to put enough pressure on Israel to answer to our proposal.
03:59But the proposal was officially made by the President three weeks ago.
04:03And even if there is a ceasefire eventually between the US, Israel and Iran to end the war,
04:08to what extent could Lebanon just be left to be destroyed?
04:12It can be left to be destroyed.
04:14We need to, here we are, navigating very, very prudently between two possible scenarios we don't like.
04:23One, that there is a ceasefire in the Gulf, although I don't see it right now.
04:28I don't see it, but this is another story.
04:30But suppose you have a ceasefire in the Gulf, and Lebanon is left to itself to be destroyed entirely by
04:37the Israelis.
04:38This is one horrible scenario.
04:40The other, no less horrible scenario, is that Lebanon is one item on somebody else's agenda to negotiate.
04:48We don't want anybody to negotiate for us, because we know that it will be a serious violation of our
04:56sovereignty.
04:57Okay, Minister Salameh, thank you so much for speaking to us here this morning on your news, on your say.
05:03Take care.
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