The Fiction Writers Of The Lebanese Government Start A New Chapter

In recent years Lebanon has been a proving ground for the contention that a country can survive and even do well in the absence of an effective government.  Before that, the often crisis torn place had proved that armed anarchy was a very poor concept.

Now, it would seem the Lebanese are bound on recapitulating the lessons of the period of warring clans, factions, religious confessions, and assorted proxies of foreign powers.  Indeed, it is hard to see how the long suffering people of Lebanon can avoid this dreary future.  The country has been damned by leaders who place the interests of faction, religious confession, or external sponsors ahead of the needs of the population or the interests of the state.

The cause of the impending descent into the abyss is Hezbollah, the long extant Party of God.  Presumably, the deity referred to in the name is Allah, but the record of the group strongly suggests that the actual god of which they are the party is Mars or, perhaps Chaos.  For it is war and chaos which most strongly beckon Hezbollah and result from its acts, policies, and beliefs.

The emergence of Hezbollah as the government of Lebanon rather than as merely the dominant component would have not been possible without the presence of a facilitator.  This critical role has been played by Walid Jumblatt, leader of the Druze minority.  Jumblatt, who initiated a flirtatious relationship with the US and the West generally, has reversed his field, reverting to the traditional Jumblatt family tradition of supporting hard Left and pan-Arab entities.  He demonstrated his new stance dramatically by withdrawing his eleven members from the Hariri government and pledging their support to Hezbollah.

In effect, Walid Jumblatt pulled the plug on Hariri's future.  At the same time he pulled the plug on future cooperation between the Lebanese government and the International Tribunal for Lebanon.  It is this tribunal and the investigation report recently sent to the pre-trial judge for review and action which prompted Hezbollah to make its play for unquestioned authority a few weeks ago.

Jumblatt justified his action by saying his earlier assessment of Hezbollah had been wrong.  Now, he has seen the light and come to realize that it was not a terrorist group operating as a proxy of Iran and Syria but rather a legitimate resistance movement seeking justice for the Palestinians and against Israel.  He also averred that a recent commitment by Hassan Nasrallah, the jefe grande y supreme of Hezbollah, that his group would "respect" the Lebanese constitution, institutions, and traditions which fixed the allocation of offices among the several religious groups had reassured him regarding the group's lofty intentions.

If Jumblatt really believes Nasrallah's assurances, the Druze chieftain has way too much faith in his fellow men.  Hezbollah has made a career out of creative manipulation of perceptions through its extreme economy with the truth.  It is not necessary to be a member of Mossad to know that.

The de jure takeover of the government by Hezbollah will bring it into direct conflict with the US.  At stake are the millions of dollars promised to the government and Lebanese National Forces meant to assure the full implementation of UN Resolution 1701.  Given that Hezbollah has been declared a terrorist entity by the US government, there is no chance that the largess of Uncle Sam will continue--or that it should.  Even if the Obama administration is inclined to keep the cash flowing, the power of appropriation rests with the Republican controlled House which is less prone to flights of international fancy than the Guy in the Oval.

The stopping of the money flow will, of course, have no impact on Hezbollah or its government frontmen.  There is no doubt but Iran will step into the breech with alacrity and generosity.  It is well worth a few hundred million dollars for Tehran to bind Hezbollah closer to the foreign policy requirements of the mullahs.  As the example of Cuba shows clearly, the stopping of American aid simply gives the field over to an adverse power.

The full enforcement of Resolution 1701 was an illusion in the first place.  Hezbollah has been too strongly entrenched in Southern Lebanon for too long.  No matter who rules in Beirut, Hezbollah has the juice once the Litani river is crossed.  When Israel fully withdrew from Southern Lebanon and ended its support for the Christian South Lebanese Army, the resultant vacuum invited Hezbollah.  And, that group has never been noted for being slow on the uptake.

From the perspective of both the US and Israel the least-worst answer for the conundrum called Lebanon was allowing the Syrians to run the show.  While there were some major drawbacks to the Syrian operational dominance, the upside was Syria is a relatively risk-averse state whose army and intelligence services acted to keep the lid on any precipitant actions being mounted from Lebanon.  Quite simply were the Syrians still running the show, there is no chance that Hezbollah would have been allowed to stockpile the formidable arsenal of short and mid-range missiles it currently has in the south of Lebanon.  Or, if the missiles were there, so would be responsible Syrian officers.

The impending Hezbollah putsch will not only destabilize the country, perhaps to the point of another bloody sectarian internal war, but will do the same for the region.  Iran is a mixer and troublemaker.  Hezbollah is of the same stripe.  Syria, being the junior partner in the alliance, has lost the juice it once had to keep Hezbollah on the sanity reservation.  This implies the chance for war on Israel's northern front will grow significantly in the weeks and months following the emergence of Hezbollah to official prominence.

When developments in Lebanon are taken in conjunction with the stasis in the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, the problem for the Obama administration becomes an order of magnitude greater.  One of the major impacts of the failure of the Obama sponsored peace talks is that the relation between the administration and the Netanyahu ministry are at a record low.  This, in turn, implies that the US cannot deliver on the only subject which would alter Syria's stance vis a vis Iran and Lebanon--the return of the Golan Heights.

The solution to the Lebanese mess has always resided in major part in Damascus.  This should have been obvious to every American administration in the past thirty years.  Whether evident or not, the brute fact remains that no US administration has trusted Syria sufficiently to allow it the free hand in Lebanon which Syria has long believed it is entitled to.  Nor has any administration taken Syria at its word that the Golan Heights was the one and only problem which needed to be solved before Damascus could and would emulate Cairo and sign a comprehensive peace treaty with Israel.

Now it may be a day too late to get on the right track.  But, this will not be known if it isn't attempted.  Sovereignty over the Golan will and must be a part of any overall Mideast peace, and, considering that it is the defining question in the mind of Assad and those around him, it is well worth making the effort.  Even Israeli intransigence need not be considered--Netanyahu knows that Israel must show some signs of seeking real peace with somebody if the international deligitimization campaign is to be arrested.

In short, the only hope for us and Lebanon is for the US to make an offer to Syria which it will not refuse and make a demand on Israel which it cannot refuse.  This way the only losers will be the genuine bad guys--Iran and Hezbollah.