Hezbollah’s takeover of Beirut is nothing less than an “armed coup,” Lebanon’s ruling party said today. “The armed and bloody coup which is being implemented aims to return Syria to Lebanon and extend Iran's reach to the Mediterranean,” one official in the US-backed government said. The militant group made further progress, the New York Times reports, with troops loyal to the government disappearing and Hezbollah knocking state TV off the air. (More Lebanon stories.)