Author: Helena

Today is the one-month commemoration of Rafiq Hariri’s killing. The organizers of the (heavily anti-Syrian) “We want an investigation into the killing!” movement have been organizing a demonstration today, and according to early press reports have been able to pull together a crowd in Beirut that may equal that pulled together by Hizbullah last Tuesday…
In such a highly-charged situation it’s extremely hard to find reporting, including on the estimated size of demonstrations, that is objective enough to rely on. (The BBC’s website was particularly unhelpful on the size and nature of Hizbullah’s March 8 demonstration–though the BBC World News t.v. feed was pretty good on it. Here’s the latest BBC website report on today’s pro-investigation event.)
My present conclusions from the events of the past month in Lebanon– and from my conversations there last fall, and my preceding 30 years of study of and life within the country– are the following:

(1) There has been a huge amount of anger in Lebanon at Syria’s meddling in internal Lebanese politics, though not all of this has been a globally “anti-Syrian” sentiment. Much of the anti-Syrian feeling derived primarily from anger at the gross mis-management of the country and the economy by pro-Syrian president Emile Lahoud and his cronies. So last August’s clumsy, over-reaching Syrian insistence on extending Lahoud’s term in office was seen as an outrage. But many leaders of the pro-Syrian-withdrawal movement, including Jumblatt, did not want to see a complete Syrian humiliation; equally, he and many– perhaps most– others in the pro-withdrawal movement never bought at all into Washington (and Israel’s) parallel agenda of combating Hizbullah.
(2) The Syrians now seem fairly serious about effecting a complete withdrawal. They have already started this, and if Terje Larsen is to be believed they intend to finish it pretty soon. This will leave a different political arena in Lebanon– but of what kind?
(3) Deep divisions remain inside the Lebanese body politic, but it’s very important to try to tease apart the complex issue of what these divisions are about. It may be easier for everyone involved to do this once the “lightning rod issue” of the Syrian presence has been removed.
(4) Hizbullah evidently has a large popular constituency that goes somewhat –but it’s not clear how far– beyond the bounds of the country’s Shiite community, which makes up just under 50% of national numbers. If Syria’s heavy political hand is removed from Lebanese politics, Amal– which the Syrians used as a counterweight inside the Shiite community to the more independent-minded Hizbullah– will certainly be weakened considerably; so Hizbullah can be expected to emerge much stronger than hitherto. (I wonder if, during the recent Syrian-Iranian consultations in Teheran, the Iranians effectively urged the Syrians to leave Lebanon, so then Hizbullah could have a freer hand?)
(5) However, Hizbullah is still very far from being able to exercise majoritarian power inside Lebanon. Based on my interviews with H politburo members last November, it seemed evident at that point that they did not seek to do this. Might that have changed since then? I doubt it. They are canny calculators who understand the political dynamics within Lebanon very well, and have been persistent and far-sighted in their campaign to reach out to members of the non-Shia communities in the country.
(6) It’s extremely noteworthy that since the ghastly killing of February 14–and perhaps, indeed, as a reaction to the grisliness of that action itself– the Lebanese people from all political stripes have shown discipline and commitment in not using methods of violence to pursue their continuing political differences. Given how very grievously they suffered from the violence of the civil war, this present insistence on using only nonviolent means of political interaction should be celebrated around the world, and everyone concerned about the fate of the country should commit themselves absolutely to not breaching it.

Today’s mass demonstration thus far looks quite impressive, and evidently represents a constituency of opinion that should be taken very seriously. I’ve been interested to see the reported strong participation of Sunnis in it. It seems that Lahoud’s insistence on renaming Karami as PM may have been politically inflammatory. (I was just reading here that in the municipal elections of last spring, Karami’s bloc was unable to win even in his hometown of Tripoli, which seems extremely lame to me… )
More broadly though, there does seem to be a real crisis of leadership and of community organization within the Sunni community, whose concerns have effectively been brushed aside by the bigger confrontation going on between the Shiites and Maronites…
But I think the bigger story over the weeks ahead will be the twin questions of whether the Lebanese parliament and government can actually organize he parliamentary elections scheduled for May in a way that is recognized by the Lebanese themselves as “free and fair”, and what Hizbullah’s strategy for this electoral period will be.
The first thing we all need to do, then, is refresh ourselves on the arcana of this strange thing that is known as Lebanon’s electoral “system”. This is an excellent source on that.
Okay, class, are you ready? Here is the centrally important part of that description:

Continue reading “Lebanese prospects”

There are quite a few interesting points in this piece by Nayla Assaf in the Beirut Daily Star today.
If y’all are interested you can go read it there. But here’s the lede:

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Friday that Hizbullah should be allowed a role in the country’s politics. His statements came at a time when sources close to the party told The Daily Star that they were holding ongoing meetings with representatives of Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Butros Sfeir to defuse the mounting political tension in the country.

Regarding Lavrov, Assaf makes the point that it was after a meeting with Walid Jumblatt that Lavrov made those comments. And she wrote,

Jumblatt and other members of the opposition have repeatedly called for dialogue with Hizbullah, which they acknowledge as the only legitimate party in the loyalist camp and an essential partner for a national entente.

Regarding the Hizbullah-Sfeir contacts (also called the “Let’s let the two wise Nasrallahs sort the country out between them” project), Assaf writes:

An unnamed source close to the party said two of its members, Nawwaf Mussawi and Ghaleb Abu Zeinab, were holding ongoing meetings with two Sfeir representatives: Samir Mazloum and Hareth Shehab.

Mussawi and Abu Zeinab are both Hizbullah politburo members. Abu Zeinab is in charge of the party’s relations with non-Shiite confessional bodies and leaders in Lebanon and has done a really good job in that role over the years. He was one of the H people I interviewed last November. (Is there still any need to plug my upcoming Boston Review piece, in which snippets from that interview occur? probably not.)
Assaf also adds this significant note:

On Friday, U.S. officials insisted they still view Hizbullah as a “terrorist organization has not changed,” but said that they will recognize any party that can win support democratically.

I’ve also been reading this article by Salama Naamat in today’s Hayat.
I’m still working on the Arabic there. But Naamat is reporting from Washington and the import of the article seems to be that unnamed administration officials have been saying that they’re getting kind of worried that, following the Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon, Hizbullah will just expand to fill both the security and the political vacuum there, inheriting Syria’s role in both dimensions throughout the country.
H’mmm, back to my Hans Wehr dictionary here…
Shirin? Salah? Anyone? Does any of you want to give that short piece by Naamat a quick read and tell me whether I’ve got the gist of it right?