Caretaker Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil led dozens of ambassadors and journalists to locations near Beirut's international airport on Monday, including a golf course and a soccer stadium, seeking to dispel Israeli allegations of secret Hizbullah rocket facilities.
In a speech before the U.N. General Assembly last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the Lebanese group of setting up rocket factories near the airport and hiding them among civilians, holding up an aerial image of the area with the alleged missile sites labeled.
Calling on the international community to prevent any Israeli attack on Lebanon, Bassil said the Lebanese government would not allow rocket facilities near the airport and that Hizbullah is "wiser" than to place them there. He said Netanyahu's claims were based on "inaccurate" estimates without any "compelling evidence."
"Lebanon demands that Israel ceases its madness," he said.
Bassil added that Monday's tour, which included the ambassadors and several reporters, was not "a fact-finding mission," but part of a "counter-diplomatic campaign" to rebut the allegations, which he said could serve as a pretext for an Israeli attack. Israel and Hizbullah fought a devastating monthlong war in 2006 in which Israel bombed the runways of Beirut's airport.