Patriarch Bechara al-Rahi (Maronite Patriarch of Antioch) — Christmas speech, 24 Dec 2024 (per Naharnet): his "positive neutrality" doctrine — one army "instead of two armies," distancing Lebanon from wars and alliances, sovereignty and non-interference, Lebanon as a neutral meeting-place. (Implicitly against Hezbollah's arms and the Iran-led axis.)

Lebanon must protect its sovereignty and defend itself against any occupier, without interfering in the affairs of other states.

This neutrality enables Lebanon to play its active role as a place of meeting and dialogue between cultures and religions, and a defender of peace in the region.

[Source is English (Naharnet, a Lebanese English-language outlet, reporting his 24 December 2024 Christmas speech, which he delivered in Arabic; this is Naharnet's English rendering); tier-2, confirmed verbatim against the fetched page. NOTE: the same web page contains unrelated reader-comment text and trolling — those are NOT al-Rahi's words and are excluded; only his speech quotes are used. R1b's terminal comma (before "al-Rahi said") is rendered here as a period.] Declared position of Patriarch Bechara Boutros al-Rahi — the Maronite Patriarch of Antioch, the most senior cleric of Lebanon's largest Christian community and a leading national political voice. His signature doctrine is "POSITIVE / ACTIVE NEUTRALITY": in this Christmas 2024 address he called for Lebanon to have ONE army "instead of two armies" (a pointed call to end Hezbollah's parallel armed force and restore the state's monopoly on arms), for "distancing Lebanon from wars, conflicts, and alliances," and declared that "Lebanon must protect its sovereignty and defend itself against any occupier, without interfering in the affairs of other states," arguing that such neutrality lets Lebanon be "a place of meeting and dialogue between cultures and religions, and a defender of peace in the region." (He has separately urged Hezbollah to surrender its weapons and "free itself from Iran," insisting the constitution makes war-and-peace a government decision, not one party's.) This is the LEBANESE CHRISTIAN / MARONITE SOVEREIGNTIST-NEUTRALITY pole — state monopoly on arms, disengagement from the Iran-led "axis of resistance," and Lebanon as a neutral meeting-ground — directly opposed to Hezbollah's resistance doctrine (Mohammad Raad) and aligned in spirit with the sovereigntist Christian parties (Lebanese Forces / Kataeb). [Axes: sovereignty / state-monopoly-on-arms (one army; against Hezbollah's weapons), foreign-alignment / axis (neutrality; against the Iran-led axis; non-interference), sectarian-system / national-identity (Lebanon as multi-confessional meeting-place), war-and-peace (the state, not one party, decides).]