Hezbollah’s biggest mistake right now is unleashing its "brigade of agitators" on social media to attack the President. Just as with Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, these attacks backfired, as Lebanese from all communities rallied in support of the targeted leaders, rejecting treachery, insults, and derogatory rhetoric.

The problem with Hezbollah is that it has come to represent a new form of isolation within the Lebanese political landscape. It functions as an isolationist organization, while also facing isolation due to its actions, which are rejected by the vast majority of Lebanese. The hard truth is that we are attempting to engage a leadership that is increasingly detached from reality—and, more importantly, from the Lebanese national fabric. Even the longstanding divisions among the Lebanese regarding the party’s weapons and its regional and local role have all but disappeared.

The division has resulted in an almost complete separation between the overwhelming majority of the Lebanese people, in all their diversity, and Hezbollah—led by a small circle that cannot represent the entire honorable Shiite community—along with a group of isolated individuals in their respective communities, sects, and regions.

Moreover, we can say that the political, economic, and financial forces that were complicit with this party in a relationship lasting two decades have begun to distance themselves from this compromising and harmful alliance. From this, the leaders of Hezbollah, who continue to draw support from a popular faction, should recognize that the era of the militia state has come to an end. Even if President Joseph Aoun played the card of negotiation, understanding, and cooperation, the room for maneuver has narrowed until it has vanished entirely.

The president knows better than anyone that the disarmament of Hezbollah is first and foremost a Lebanese demand, before being an international or Arab one. He emphasized this in his recent speech to the diplomatic corps accredited in Lebanon, addressing the international community directly. Consequently, the party in question has lost all pretext for retaining weapons that have long been illegal, once shielded by a semblance of legitimacy imposed through coercion or complicity.

The era of attempting to manipulate the will of the Lebanese people and exploit international legitimacy has come to an end. We therefore call on the leadership of Hezbollah to act with reason and return to the path of the Lebanese state, on equal footing with all other Lebanese communities.

However, if the party in question fails to conduct a serious reassessment—away from its regional patron in Tehran and its own narrow interests—the outlook will indeed be bleak, particularly with regard to the risk of renewed violence in the coming weeks. Accordingly, the party’s leadership should publicly commit to handing over its weapons in the second phase and beyond, across all stages and throughout Lebanese territory. In the absence of rational and responsible behavior, the party will drag its immediate environment and all Lebanese components into a cycle of war and catastrophe that could prove even more devastating than the previous one.

Criticism of the president or any other official is an indisputable right. We are among the first to criticize the way negotiations with the party have been managed. However, organizing defamatory or derogatory campaigns against the president—or against any official—will only deepen Hezbollah’s isolation and accelerate its political and moral suffocation, which is already approaching its breaking point.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by the writers are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Annahar.