Dictatorship, The Only Solution For Lebanon?

I was listening to a band play some oldies and munching on some tabouli when the discussion on how to "fix" Lebanon came about. After much debate the director of my LAU program, a woman who had lived through the Civil War, and has a doctorate from Georgetown say, "the only way to fix Lebanon is with a dictator. Get a dictator who stops the sectarianism, makes us a nation, and gets some order." While she was fervently anti-Syrian, she must have noticed how Syria had grand gardens, clean streets, working traffic lights. Laws were observed and there was a semblance and order about the place. This is all completely lacking in Lebanon. Lebanon looks like a tribal mishmash.

A village pledges allegiance to their feudal tribal lord and that's final. Most Lebanese still don't go outside of their sectarian boundaries. Many Lebanese Christians I've met still refuse to drive down to predominantly Muslim Hamra, in Beirut. Just to note, Hamra is no more than 10 to 15 minutes away from Achrafieh (the Christian area).

How can democracy even hope to thrive in a place where the people will really only vote for their feudal lord and/or their sons? Its less a Parliament and more of a Bedouin style gathering. Each family/sectarian group has its own "tent," ie the Druze tent would constitute portions of the Chouf, the Christians would have much of Jabal Libnan, the Shi'ites would have the Bekka and the the south, Sunnis would have portions of Beirut, Sidon and Tripoli. In the end they all gather and try to grab as much of the pie (Lebanon) as they can for the family and sectarian group.

And we expect democracy to win out and deliver Lebanon from Syrian domination? I think not.

Dictatorship offers:

• Stability
• Security
• A chance for a country to have a unified goal
• The possibility of secularism

However, Lebanon would need some sort of a benign dictator the likes of Lee Kuan Yew. I doubt we will see such "progressive" leadership out of Lebanon. A Lebanese leader would need to push Lebanon as the Middle East's leader for free-market reforms, be secular (no more sectarianism), clamp down on Islamists (that includes Fatah al Islam types and Hizbollah), build a strong Lebanese Army, shut down anti-Lebanon parties (this would include the likes of the SSNP, a group that wants Lebanon's union with Syria). All in all a successful leader would end up alienating a good 50% of the population, at the very least.

Lebanon has already been under a dictator's heel, one who let Lebanon retrogress. When Syria's Asad ruled Lebanon, it was like his own private fiefdom. The country's money was sucked dry and everything was as corrupt as could be. As such I have serious reservations about the decendents of Phonecian traders really being able to pull off a success story here in Lebanon through dictatorship. I just don't see the dynamism needed to pull off true reform.

When I am around my Lebanese friends, they usually talk about the need for federalism, and a strong central government. Normally I would be inclined to agree, but realistically it doesn't seem like a strong federal government will come about in this country. The people physically and mentally block eachother off, and the mentalities about outside groups (I'm talking about Christians thinking about Druze, Sunnis thinking about Shi'ites, that kind of thing) has remained unchanged since the 1800s.

What do you seek, my countrymen?

Do you desire that I build for You gorgeous palaces, decorated With words of empty meaning, or Temples roofed with dreams?

Or Do you command me to destroy what The liars and tyrants have built?

Shall I uproot with my fingers What the hypocrites and the wicked Have implanted? Speak your insane Wish!

What is it you would have me do, My countrymen? Shall I purr like The kitten to satisfy you, or roar Like the lion to please myself?

I Have sung for you, but you did not Dance; I have wept before you, but You did not cry.

Shall I sing and Weep at the same time? - Khalil Gibran, My Countrymen

© All Rights Reserved; www.ArzelJabal.blogspot.com

Democracy In the Middle East Means All Or Nothing

By. Phillip

Elections and Democracy, these words are often paired with freedom and justice. However, this hasn't been the case in the Middle East. Instead democracy has been just a byword for civil war. Four years ago the American people and the world were told to prepare for a democratic revolution in the Middle East, all thanks of course, to US forces blowing down the despotic regime of Saddam Hussein. One could say that truly has come to pass: with democracy came revolution. Unfortunately, the desired revolution of the Bush administration failed to come to fruition. The revolution now is an Islamist one, all thanks to democracy. As we look at the turmoil between rival Palestinian groups one can only blame a push to elections. In the Middle East, just as with George Bush's rhetoric: there is no gray, only black and white. "Democracies are good/peaceful, dictatorships bad," juxtaposed to "Islam is the only answer, democracy and anything short of Sharia law is evil." "You are either for us, or against us," is the only logic that transpires.

Machiavelli once said, "It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new order, this lukewarmness arising partly from fear of their adversaries, who have the laws in their favour; and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not truly believe in anything new until they have had actual experience of it." Gaza, Iraq, and Lebanon are all smoldering due to "democratic change." Why does this always seem to happen in Middle Eastern "democracies?" Islamist victory would clearly be a leap backward into the 11th century while current "populist" dictatorships are as moribund and corrupt as the former Soviet Union circa 1992.

We in the West should have expected Gaza to turn into a tinderbox following the Hamas victory, not just because Hamas is a violent Islamist terrorist group, but because politics in the Middle East to use the oft quoted Mao, "Grows out of the barrel of a gun."

Algeria 1992: In 1991 the FIS, an Islamist party won 188 seats in Algeria's parliament following democratic elections, giving it a very clear majority. Following the elections, a secular military junta led by Mohammed Boudiaf took power, canceled the elections and declared the Islamists to be invalid. So started the the Algerian Civil War that continues today. Bombings, assassinations (including the assassination of Boudiaf), and massacres occurred. Its important to note that the FIS, formed the AIS (its armed wing) as early as 1992-1993. So, when the government clamps down, get a gun. That doesn't sound too unreasonable considering this is how many revolutions in the West have occurred, but of course in the Middle East militia politics is interchangeable with politics.

Lebanon 1975: Demography has always been at the heart of Lebanon's political system. Maronite Christians (the majority when the last census was held in 1932) hold the Presidency a Sunni Muslim is Prime Minister and a Shi'ite is the Speaker. Threatened with a growth in Muslim population and power and feeling as alone in a sea of Islamic enemies, not to mention an influx of heavily armed Palestinians, Lebanese Christians form themselves into a number of militias. The largest and most powerful of which was the LF (Lebanese Forces). Muslims who either felt disenfranchised, wanted union with Syria, or sided with the Palestinians (to name a few reasons) also formed numerous militias.

When arguments break down in parliament it is always good to have thousands of heavily armed men who can attack your opponent(s). It is a kill or be killed world on the shores of the southern and eastern Meditereanean.

In 1982 Lebanese President elect and LF commander Bachir Gemayel was to sign a peace deal with Israel. For this he payed with his life, as an SSNP (Syrian Social Nationalist Party) bomb ripped through an apartment building he was speaking in. As a result members of the LF in an operation to "clear PLO militants" out of the Sabra and Shatilla refugee camps used the opportunity to massacre their despised enemy, the Palestinians. 600-1000 Palestinians were killed in response to the murder of their leader. Clearly one side cannot be left standing, it is not as the Bible describes as "eye for an eye" but instead a village for an eye. The rationale is: there won't be an enemy if I wipe every single one of them out, once that occurs "my side" can preserve/take power.

Syria 1982: Syrian President Hafez Asad is threatened by a rebellion by the Muslim Brotherhood. Members of Asad's sectarian group, the Alawites are gunned down in an Artillery school in 1979, and open rebellion by many Islamist Sunni Muslims becomes widespread. In keeping with the "village for an eye" rules Asad crushes the Muslim Brotherhood. Hafez's brother Rifat commands 12,000 men; complete with helicopters, tanks, and armored vehicles. These 12,000 men besiege the Muslim Brotherhood in their stronghold city of Hama. Rifat under orders from Hafez simply flattened the city of Hama killing by some estimates up to 20,000 people. Editorialist Thomas Friedman described the action and how politics are waged in the Middle East in his book Beirut To Jerusalem as "Hama Rules." Now, even though the Islamist insurrection in Syria took place not because of democratic elections, but because Sunnis (70% majority population) and Sunni Islamists regarded Asad and his minority Alawite religious group as heretics, the Hama Massacre only highlights that in the Middle East the common way of dealing with opposition is to crush it ruthlessly.

Gaza 2007: After the January elections the Palestinian terrorist group, Hamas, took the parliamentary majority, they ran on a ticket opposing the corrupt Fatah party and on a goal to destroy Israel. Fatah, while still a sponsor of terrorism, saw Hamas as a clear and present danger to its over a decade long hold on Palestinian Authority power. Hamas on the other hand saw Fatah as a bug that needed to be crushed, so they could be the main power broker of the Palestinians. Subsequently, Hamas started to smuggle more weapons in via its Gaza tunnels. Fatah remained on high alert, fearing its tenous grip on power in Gaza would fall. In ensuing the power struggle there were shootings and kidnappings, what some would call a low-scale tit for tat squabble.

As with many civil wars/inter-sectarian conflicts, small raids devolved into full scale open conflict. More than one hundred people are dead from a weeks worth of fighting. Masked Hamas Gunmen stormed offices belonging to Fatah officials and related organizations. They subsequently threw their enemies off of roofs or summarily executed them in the streets. It was the shootout at the OK Corral, only in Rafah. One man would be left standing, even though many Arab countries tried to form a Palestinian unity government, coexistence and uniting for a common cause (even against a much hated enemy: Israel) couldn't be achieved. It was simply impossible for Hamas or Fatah officials to imagine they could be in the same government together. It was one or the other, black or white. Hamas now has Gaza, Fatah is solidifying its hold on the West Bank.

Rules for Politics in the Middle East:

1. Always have a militia/armed wing to back up a political party. If there is no force behind your party then you are as good as dead.
2. If you must engage your enemy in open conflict make sure they are crushed completely and ruthlessly. If you wipe out an enemy then there can be no one to counter you.
3. Even winning an election doesn't mean you have power, the only way to achieve full power is to wipe out any and all opposition.

Welcome to the Middle East. Where an outsider has to go along with the rule of the "enemy of my enemy is my friend" (i.e. a "secular" dictatorship providing enough coercive force is much better to have around rather than a radical Islamist dictatorship). Democracy in the Middle East is as a Lebanese friend put it, "demockary," one can claim to have free and open elections, but regardless of the results the one with the most guns makes the rules.