Lebanese President Michel Aoun marked his first foreign policy success during his visit to Saudi Arabia Jan. 10. He broke the ice in the ties between Lebanon and Saudi Arabia, which have been tense for over a year due to the repercussions of the Saudi-Iranian tug-of-war on Lebanon.

The rhetoric of Saudi Arabia and its Lebanese March 14 coalition allies in the past few years emphasized that the Lebanese state had been hijacked by Hezbollah, which was violating Lebanon’s sovereignty with its military intervention in Syria and its meddling in Arab and Gulf affairs, especially in Yemen and Bahrain. As a result, in March 2016, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) put Hezbollah on its terrorist list.

But Hezbollah denied these accusations and accused the kingdom of supporting and funding jihadi groups in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq. The party also blamed Saudi Arabia for the spread of Wahhabi thought in the Muslim world and condemned its war in Yemen and military intervention in Bahrain, as well as its support for the armed opposition in Syria to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime. On Dec. 3, 2013, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah accused Saudi Arabia of plotting the bombing of the Iranian Embassy in Beirut Nov. 19.

Also, Saudi Arabia had frozen the military aid grant for Lebanese security services in February 2016, after the Lebanese government failed to condemn the attacks carried out by Iranian protesters against Saudi diplomatic delegations in Iran.