The Baabda Declaration was issued at the end of a national dialogue session held at the Presidential Palace on June 11, 2012, and involving all Lebanese parties. The most important of its 17 articles provide for committing to a security, political and media truce, working on consolidating stability and civil peace, preventing the country from sliding into strife, adhering to the Taif Agreement and keeping Lebanon far removed from regional and international conflicts to avoid the negative repercussions of them. An exception is the Palestinian cause, including the Palestinian refugees’ right of return. The declaration has provoked disagreement between the March 8 and March 14 alliances. 

The March 14 faction has been calling on Hezbollah and its allies in the March 8 coalition to commit to the Baabda Declaration. They have demanded since June 2012 that the declaration form the basis of the ministerial (policy) statement of any government formed by Prime Minister-designate Tammam Salam, and they flatly reject the triad of “the army, the people and the resistance,” an axiom of Hezbollah, as part of any such statement.

The March 8 coalition, on the other hand, complained this month that the Baabda Declaration, as promoted by the March 14 alliance, does not address the issue of “the resistance” (i.e., Hezbollah) and its weapons or the controversial defense strategy involving them. The March 14 coalition attempted to present the declaration to be directed against the resistance and counter the statement of the currently resigned caretaker government of Najib Mikati that emphasizes the importance of the equation of cooperation between the army, the people and the resistance in the face of Israeli aggression. Meanwhile, on Aug. 14, the president of the Hezbollah parliamentary bloc, Mohammed Raad, declared, “The Baabda Declaration was born dead.”

Amid this controversy, on Sept. 12, 2013, the office of President Michel Suleiman issued a statement asserting, “The Baabda Declaration did not include any text on the resistance and its arms. It did not address ways of benefiting from resistance capabilities and put them at the disposal of the Lebanese state.” It went on to assert that these “proposals and concepts were part of the strategic vision for the defense of Lebanon that were delivered by President Michel Suleiman before the dialogue committee during the session held at the Presidential Palace on Thursday, Sept. 20, 2012.”