Jumblatt calls Syria’s Assad ‘greatest liar in the world’

President of the majority Druze Progressive Socialist Party of Lebanon (PSP) Walid Jumblatt spoke about relations with Israel and the Western world on Thursday, during an interview in Beirut with RT released on Sunday.

“The Arab world does not exist,” Jumblatt said, speaking about negotiations between Russia and Western countries on Israel.

The Druze Lebanese politician claimed that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who is believed to be on friendly terms with Russia, is “the greatest liar in the world.”

“He haggles and raises his bets,” Jumblatt described Assad’s behaviour, reminding him of a conversation with a Russian diplomat, who had informed him about close links and communication between the leaders of Syria, Russia and Israel.

“This diplomat came to Moukhtara in 2012 and told me that Bashar al-Assad had sent a letter to Netanyahu with the help of Russia. At that time, Syria was under the threat of division. Assad wrote in that letter that the division of Syria or of the so-called Alawite micro-state, will not become a threat for Israel. ‘We want to receive relics of a spy [Eli] Cohen’. That was Israel’s answer to Syria, delivered with the help of Russia,” he added.

Rumours saying the body of an Israeli soldier in Syria, Eli Cohen, was exhumed appeared in early April soon after the return of the body of the Israel serviceman, killed in 1982. Eli Cohen worked for the Israeli intelligence services and was sentenced to death by a Syrian military court in 1965 on the charge of espionage.

The leader of Lebanese Progressive Socialist Party raised the question of the process of Lebanon’s border demarcation, as according to him it touches the oil drilling processes near the Lebanese border.

“In this case, when there is no border demarcation, I speak about the south area, they started drilling works in Israeli districts. As far as you know with modern technology, they are able to continue the drilling under the sea bed, stealing the wealth of another country in case there are no agreements,” Jumblatt said.

According to his view, the process of the border demarcation should be under the patronage of the UN, he also wondered if it was possible to start the demarcation process using the ceasefire agreement between Lebanon and Israel.

Lebanon and Israel have tensions on the southern Lebanese border, with both countries signing a ceasefire agreement following the Israeli war against Lebanon in 2006. Lebanon regularly reports that the Israel state breaches its airspace.

Jumblatt also commented on the Lebanese position on the Golan Heights issue and mentioned that the Shebaa farms and Wadi al-Asal areas, occupied by Israel and recognised internationally as Syrian land, belongs to Lebanon, but “only in theory.”

“This became the first ever geographic shift existing only on paper. The goal was to make a pretext, both Syrian and non-Syrian, to be able to say that the Shebaa Farms belong to Lebanon and it should be liberated [ from Israel],” he stated.

The Shebaa farms conflict was a low-level border conflict, with clashes following the withdrawal of Israeli troops from South Lebanon in 2000. There has been no major incidents on the border following the 2006 Lebanon War.