Nawaf Salam, president of the International Court of Justice, a U.N. agency in The Hague, was designated on Monday as Lebanon’s next prime minister.
Salam, who previously served as the country’s ambassador to the United Nations for more than a decade, was called on Monday by the office of Lebanon’s newly elected President Joseph Aoun to form a government. He was endorsed by a majority of the country’s lawmakers during discussions with Aoun.
The judge routinely targeted Israel during his time at the United Nations, voting to condemn the Jewish state some 210 times in a period of 11 years. In 2008, the 71-year-old accused the “supreme Zionist leadership” of pursuing a policy of “ethnic cleansing” via “terrorism and organized massacres.”
On several occasions in 2016, he labeled Israel an “apartheid” state after referring to Israel as a “triumph of blatant racist and colonialist choices.”
Notably, Salam’s voting record has found sympathy with current leaders of Iran and not long ago with Syria under its longtime former president, Bashar Assad, who was deposed by rebels in December.
This announcement comes just four days after Lebanon’s parliament elected Aoun, a general and former commander of the Lebanese Armed Forces, as president—second in charge after the prime minister. Aoun, a Maronite Christian, finally got the role after 12 failed attempts in nearly two years.
Both the United States and Saudi Arabia back the 61-year-old leader.
