U.S. President Joe Biden congratulated Lebanon’s army chief Joseph Aoun, after an overwhelming majority of the country’s parliament voted to elect him as president.
“President Aoun has my confidence,” Biden said on Thursday. “I believe strongly he is the right leader for this time.”
Noting that Aoun’s election “comes just six weeks after the United States secured an end to the hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel,” Biden said the new head of state “will provide critical leadership as Lebanon and Israel fully implement that cessation of hostilities and as hundreds of thousands of people return to their homes and Lebanon recovers and rebuilds.”
The Lebanese people, he continued, have suffered for more than two years from a devastating war and continuing financial crisis, as well as the absence of national leadership.
“Through their elected parliamentarians, the people of Lebanon have exercised their democratic right to choose their own future,” Biden said. “They have chosen a path aligned with peace, security, sovereignty, and reconstruction in partnership with the international community. And the United States will support them as they walk that path.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar also congratulated Aoun and expressed his hope that “this choice will contribute towards stability, a better future for Lebanon and its people and to good neighborly relations.”
