August 31st, 2009 by Zack

Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri announced on Sunday that his March 14 Forces will hold a large-scale meeting on Monday.  According to Hariri, the meeting “is aimed at showing the March 14 Forces remain a unified parliamentary majority, which is extending its hand to all other groups in the country.”  According to the Daily Star, apart from asserting March 14’s political control the meeting will also attempt to reach out to opposition groups, including the Progressive Socialist Party, whose leader Walid Jumblatt will be in attendence.

Hariri kept hopes of a “national-unity” cabinet alive when on Friday he announced his readiness to meet with Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun.  The two men will likely meet Monday to discuss the cabinet deadlock.

These moves come after Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Butros Sfeir had called for an all-March 14 cabinet and the senior Shiite cleric Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah had responded with an insulting attack against the patriarch.   Hezbollah later expressed regret over Fadlallah’s comments and MP Ali Fayyad called for “consensus, resistance and the need for reforms” as the country builds a national-unity cabinet.

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