Talk about good timing. The ten minute interview was done in the White House and broadcast directly to Lebanon.

President Bush has insisted anew that Syria should “get out completely” from Lebanon and let the Lebanese people decide their own future in internationally monitored elections on schedule and free from external influence or intimidation.

Bush pledged, then, to drum up global monetary assistance to help “this country back on its feet.”

In a rare direct address to the Arab world, Bush also said in an interview broadcast by Beirut’s LBCI television network from the White House he wanted the Assad regime to shut down Hizbullah’s office in Syria, asserting the Party of God should disarm in Lebanon.

“The United States can join with the rest of the world, like we’ve done, and say to Syria, get out — not only get out with your military forces, but get out with your intelligence services, too; get completely out of Lebanon, so Lebanon can be free and the people can be free,” Bush said in the 10-minute interview.

The Syrian withdrawal should include people who “have been embedded in parts of government” to allow Lebanese — “not another government, not agents of another government” –to decide the country’s fate, he said.

Bush’s interview, with Arabic subtitles, was aired late Tuesday. A transcript was provided by the White House press office. It grabbed page-one banner-lines in the Beirut press on Wednesday.

The election “ought to be as scheduled. And the elections need to be free and fair, without interference,” Bush said, adding that international monitors should oversee the balloting.

Bush said the Lebanese “are tired of living under a government which, in essence, was a foreign occupation.” Syria’s military presence, the key to its domination of the country, began in 1976 when Syrian forces entered the country to stop a civil war that lasted another 14 years.

The demands for Syria to leave Lebanon sharply rose after the Feb. 14 assassination of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri, which sparked mass anti-Syrian protests across Lebanon.

Bush declared U.S. support for this debt-ridden country, promising to help Lebanon’s “new democracy succeed” by working closely with the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and other international organizations as well as the European Union “to help this country get back on its feet after occupation.”

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