An Infected Band Aid Over A Festering Wound

"Thank God for this agreement" was an oft repeated phrase I heard out of many Lebanese I know. Thank God for what? Was a war REALLY averted, or is it as many suspect, just a temporary fix for a wide ranging problem? The common Lebanese citizen doesn't want war, they want the tourism that summer often brings them, peace and some stability. However, Lebanon's rejoicing civilians are only looking through a small peep hole and missing the much larger picture.

For starters the (unconstitutionally elected) president of Lebanon will now be General Sleiman. This was the same man appointed by the Syrian regime and intelligence apparatus to be, first the commander of the Lebanese Mukhabarat and then leader of the Lebanese Army. This is the same guy who used to drag anyone protesting the Syrian occupation into a nice dank cell and introduce them to one of his agent's fists. I'm sure many grassroots FPM'ers or LF'ers could attest to that in the mid 90's.

I have heard the argument made that this is the return to Chehabian style rule in Lebanon. I feel that nothing could be further from that. While Chehab may have been the compromise candidate following the '58 War and Camille Chamoun's exercise in trying to take more power, he still was no Sleiman. Chehab's rule was characterized by his use of the secret services to essentially safeguard the Lebanese nation from external (often those "external parties" were living inside Lebanon) threats. For starters, Chehab increased the Lebanese Army(LA)/mukhabarat apparatus to control the Palestinian fedayeen. He did quite a good job with that. Nevertheless, his intelligence apparatus still couldn't stop fighting between the LA and PLO in the 1960's completely.

This brings me to Gen. Sleiman (who may I add was appointed by SYRIA to do his job, NOT Lebanon), the armed presence that is a threat to the country is no longer the Palestinains, now it is the Islamist Hizbollah, and instead of having the government watch over this group, the group now is not only part of the government but has many of its supporters in the LA (quite a role reversal if I do say so). Hizbollah will keep its arms and essentially have free range to do whatever it pleases. Sleiman has essentially de-facto agreed to this arrangement, and did little during the Hizbollah 2008 Coup to do anything to avert the fighting.

While the Doha agreement was worked out by Lebanese parties under the auspices of Qatari guidance, it is pretty obvious the Saudis, Syrians, Iranians, and other Gulf states were pushing the March 14th alliance into a humiliating retreat. On the moralistic side it was great that March 14th didn't establish (strong) militias to counter Hizbollah, but, on the realist side it would have been the only way to avert the coup, or at least resist Nasrallah's onslaught. Of course, many will say, "This proved Hizbollah would use their weapons on fellow Lebanese" ...But when was this really in doubt? Hizbollah, the great "resistance force" used its arms on fellow Shia in al Dahiya in the mid-late 1980s, against Christian parties (in 1992 Nasrallah accused Kataeb of being Israeli proxy), and even had some battles with the Druze. Maybe they have been discredited, but where does that get the pro-democracy/Western groups? The quick answer is: Nowhere.

Back to the main piece, this agreement is as the title states, "an infected band aid over a festering wound". The Lebanese system is moribund, the West did nothing (merely proving to the already doubtful Lebanese that Western help is a joke), and again the Syrians, in their own way, regained control of Beirut. Of course just sticking some "compromise" candidate sounds great, hurray for peace and stability, but that very stability wrests not on bedrock but on quicksand. This Pax Temporarius, is just that. Hizbollah has its head in the sky, and as with all Lebanese groups it will only demand more power. They may even go into war against Israel (again), when will it stop? Who will stop them? The Lebanese citizenry WILL get sick of seeing their country get destroyed by Hizbollah, the question is when, and how will they and the world react?

For right now, the Lebanese only care enough about normal life. Tourists need to come for the summer, Casino Liban needs to be open for blackjack and if sacrificing life and liberty is the cost...So be it. After X amount of wars, the Lebanese need a respite, but the long term costs WILL be staggering. Maybe Robert Kaplan was right in his book, Eastward to Tartary: Travels in the Balkans, the Middle East, and the Caucasus, that the Lebanese wouldn't care about whether they lived under the Syrian yoke as long as they could have the newest cellphones or Mercedes Benz. Lebanon has proven again the effectiveness of using terrorism, the Syrian campaign of assassinating anti-Syrian leaders whittled away at journalists and politicians. Then the terror cum militia cum political group finished the job. The world stood by, said nothing, and the Lebanese ship took on more water then it could hold. No tribunals, no justice, just the same lack of rule of law.

This way of living is truly unsustainable. Lebanon has brief periods of "stability " with mini-crises in them, then there is a melt down when all hell breaks lose, and once and for all the winner controls the country. We all thought that all hell broke lose during the coup, but that was merely another crisis. The hell that will encompass Lebanon is coming, and it will be decided by Nasrallah and his circle of those who believe in the Wilayat Faqih (term describing the Islamic state run by jurists). Sleiman will be a Lahoud-light, a strongman who does Hizbollah's bidding, and when the next war breaks out (whether between Lebanese or with Israel) he will sit in Baabda pondering which award bestowed upon him by the rulers of Damascus best matches his suit.

Mabrook Lebanon! Hurray for Stability! Hurray for Pulling Off the Same Garbage For 50 years!

In memory of Gibran Tueni, Rafiq Hariri, Pierre Amine Gemayel, George Hawi, Samir Kassir etc. because your murderers will NEVER be brought to justice.

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