Saudi minister slams Hezbollah as ‘party of Satan’

BEIRUT: A prominent Saudi minister has accused Hezbollah of being a “party of Satan,” as he warned about the consequences of its actions in Lebanon.
Thamer Al-Sabhan, minister of state for Arab Gulf affairs, was apparently responding to criticisms against Saudi Arabia and Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Al-Hariri and former President Michel Suleiman, which were made by Nawwaf Moussawi, a Hezbollah-aligned member of the Lebanese Parliament.
“The inhumane crimes committed by the party of Satan (Hezbollah) will certainly have consequences in Lebanon,” Al-Sabhan tweeted.
“The Lebanese people should choose to either stand with it or against (Hezbollah) because the blood of Arabs is precious.”
Hezbollah recently brokered a deal that allowed hundreds of Daesh fighters and their families to leave the Lebanese-Syrian border areas in buses, heading toward Daesh-held areas near the Syrian-Iraqi border.
The deal — which was highly controversial in Lebanon — involved Daesh revealing the location of the remains of Lebanese soldiers it abducted in 2014 and who were later killed.
Lebanese politician Okab Sakr warned Hezbollah over its claims that the exchange deal with Daesh was “just a humanitarian issue.”
Sakr accused Hezbollah of collaborating with the Syrian regime and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps to create and safeguard Daesh and similar terrorist organizations.