- General Michel Sleiman -

Commander of the Lebanese Armed Forces.

 

Background

General Michel Sleiman is the current commander of the Lebanese Armed Forces. He has been in the Army since 1976 and slowly climbed up the chain of command finally being appointed as commander of the Lebanese Armed Forces in 1998. The Lebanese Armed Forces underwent their last transformation in 1991 and currently maintains a standing army of approximately 60,000 men.

He joined the Military Academy as student officer in 1976 and graduated from the Military Academy as 2nd Lieutenant in 1970. He was born on November 21st 1948 in the town of Amchit - Caza of Jbeil.  He graduated from the Military Academy as 2nd Lieutenant 1970 and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Politic and Administrative Sciences from the Lebanese University. He also masters English and French languages.

General Sleiman has previously held the positions of:

• Director of Military Intelligence for Mount Lebanon (1990-1991)

• Secretary to Army Command (1991-1993)

• Commander of the 11th Infantry Brigade (1993-1996)

• Commander of the 6th Infantry Brigade (1996-1998).

He was promoted to Brigadier General in 1996 and to Lieutenant General in 1998. In 1998, he was also appointed as Commander in Chief of the Lebanese Armed Forces.

 

Key Accomplishments

The Lebanese Armed Forces Official Website cites the following as General Sleiman’s key accomplishments:

1.      Fighting terrorism and extremism, notably through the following operations:

a.       Discovering Israeli spying and terrorist networks, most lately the network discovered during the “dawn surprise” operation carried out on June 6th 2006.

b.      Discovering and fighting terrorist organizations in the high and barren mountains of North Lebanon in 2000, eliminating most of their members, dismantling their cells in all Lebanese regions and arresting their members.

c.       Attacking the organization of “Fateh El Islam” in the camp of Nahr El Bared on 20/5/2007 in retaliation for the act of treachery launched against the Lebanese Army posts in the perimeter of the camp and in some other locations. The structure of this terrorist organization inside and outside the camp was destroyed the thing that led to an unprecedented popular support to the role of the army and for the first time in the history of Lebanon as the protector of the national unity.

2.      Confronting the Israeli Army and supporting the resistance until the liberation of the south in the year 2000

3.      Completing the Army redeployment operation all over the Lebanese territories following the withdrawal of the Syrian Armed Forces on April 26th 2005 in addition to the disturbances and security violations during the year 2007

4.      Restructuring the Lebanese Army after the amendment of the military service law.

5.      Dedicating the Army to protect democracy and not as to be the Army of the Authority repressing its political opponents, but rather an Army that preserves the security of the citizen and his rights. The Army clearly assumed its national role of maintaining the security of the protestors, public and private institutions and liberty of expression all through the year 2005 following the assassination of the Prime Minister Rafic Hariri and during the year 2006 till now.

6.      Offering a plan to end the Israeli war on Lebanon which happened in 12/7/2006. As a honorable solution for all parties. This plan includes the planning and the preparation for the deployment of Lebanese Army in the south and on the land and sea crossover, this operation carried out accurately and devotionally and at the conclusion of the operation on the second of October, the Lebanese flag was hoisted on the hill of Labbouni adjacent to the southern border indicating the return of the Lebanese sovereignty to the south.

 

 

Arguments against General Sleiman

 

These Arguments have been collected from multiple sources:

1.      General Sleiman was appointed by the Syrians as commander of the Lebanese Army in 1998.

2.      General Suleiman was the head of the army when many Lebanese were subjected to torture at the hands of the Army and the military intelligence.

3.      General Sleiman was the head of the army when many Lebanese were arrested and brutalized based on orders from Syria on August 7, 2001

4.      During the 2006 war with Israel, Suleiman ordered the Lebanese army to cooperate with Hezbollah and allowed Hezbollah to use the army’s facilities, including a coastal radar station used to aim and fire the missiles which hit and damaged an Israeli ship on July 15.

5.      Since the July 06 war, General Suleiman has been covering for Hezbollah during their rearmament in direct violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, and has refused to use the Lebanese Army to cooperate with UNIFIL to patrol the borders or stop Hezbollah from moving back into its old positions in south Lebanon.

6.      In his speech to army graduates on August 14, 2007, General Sleiman exonerated Syrian intelligence from arming Fatah al-Islam despite the confessions of the captured Fatah al Islam terrorists about their links to Syria.

7.      His brother in law, Gebran Kuriyyeh was the official spokesman of Hafez Assad, father of the current Syrian president Basher Assad.

 

 

© 2007 Lebanese Information Center – www.licus.org

 

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