Even the French are giving him a red-carpet treatment..(Photo: NY times)

As if we haven’t had enough foreign meddlers in our country, our judicial system took it upon itself to add another one. Just like that, we decided that our life is so boring right now that we need to infuriate a crazy Arab leader who has money to spare.

It doesn’t matter who came up with the idea and it doesn’t matter if it’s the “right thing to do” at this moment. It is definitely not the wisest thing to do. An angry Gaddafi could sniff out the political party behind this decision and shower their opponents with petrodollars to buy weapons and “defend themselves”.

Do we really want to open this door? While we’re at it, why not issue arrest warrants for the Syrian president, the Egyptian president and the Saudi king? Didn’t they all somehow contribute in our uncivil war?

The Lybian president is a terrible person, but a Lebanese warrant to arrest him is nothing but utter stupidity.

The Israelis practice their response to chemical attacks that they think Hezbollah might undertake

All of Lebanon Is Not Hezbollah
Firas Maksad

In a very significant and potentially dangerous move, Israel’s security Cabinet recently decided to reverse its long-standing policy of distinguishing between Hezbollah and the democratically elected Lebanese government. Instead, Israel has threatened to respond to actions by the Syrian- and Iranian-backed Hezbollah by attacking Lebanese state institutions and the Lebanese national army - on which the United States and the international community have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to bolster as a counterweight to Hezbollah.

The reasons cited by Israeli officials for this abrupt shift in policy are Hezbollah’s participation in Lebanon’s newly formed national unity government and a Lebanese Cabinet statement recognizing the right to “resistance” until the disputed border area of the Shebaa Farms is returned. These compromises allowing Hezbollah to retain arms independent of the Lebanese state are unwelcome to many Lebanese - not only to Israel and others. Yet they hardly constitute a conclusive victory for the militant group, and they certainly do not justify the radical and sweeping policy shift Israel has undertaken.

Hezbollah’s participation in Lebanon’s current government is restricted to one token minister out of 30 - no different than the arrangement in previous governments. Furthermore, the Cabinet statement on the Lebanese right to “resistance” until the return of the Shebaa Farms is arguably a measured improvement over previous ones that, due to Syrian pressure, unconditionally supported Hezbollah’s military activities.

What Israel’s latest decision on Lebanon demonstrates is its lack of regard toward Lebanese moderates who have repeatedly confronted Hezbollah in the hope of building a sovereign, liberal and peaceful Lebanon.

These are the more than 1 million Lebanese who in the 2005 Cedar Revolution peacefully took to the streets to directly challenge Hezbollah, Syria and Iran. They are the same people who supported the government earlier this year when it confronted Hezbollah by deciding to dismantle the organization’s countrywide communications infrastructure and remove the pro-Hezbollah security chief of Beirut’s airport. It is worth remembering that the democratically elected government was forced to rescind its decision after being left to fend for itself, with little support from the international community, against an armed assault by Hezbollah.

These Lebanese have not vanished. They are still there, and they number in the millions. They need to be spared the wrath of collective punishment and misguided policies, which only serve to undercut them.

Israel will not defeat Hezbollah by adopting failed strategies that force Lebanese society into embracing the militant group as its only viable means of defense. By lumping all of Lebanese society into the same category with Hezbollah and threatening collective punishment, this is exactly what Israel’s latest Cabinet decision will do. It will leave the Lebanese with no choice but to grudgingly stand behind Hezbollah, just as they were forced to do last month when Israel repatriated Samir Kuntar and other Lebanese prisoners to the militant group instead of to the Lebanese state.

Israel must cease adopting policies that undermine efforts by the United States and the international community to strengthen the Lebanese state and the moderate forces within Lebanon. Whether intentional or not, that is exactly what it is doing.

Bombing Lebanese state institutions that compete with Hezbollah in providing social services and security would not serve the interest of regional peace and stability. A more sensible approach would allow the United States and the international community to strengthen the capability of those in Beirut who are striving to spread state authority at the expense of Iranian and Syrian proxies.

Firas Maksad is the Washington director of the Beirut-based Lebanon Renaissance Foundation.

Yesterday, in a televised speech, the leader of Hezbollah put the blame for Georgia’s “defeat” on Gal Hirsch, an Israeli military man “who was defeated in Lebanon [then] went to Georgia [as a military consultant]“.

Perhaps Mr. Nasrallah is right and the Georgian setback was due in fact to an incompetent foreign adviser. But the taunting Mr. Nasrallah is engaged in against Israel reminds us of his 2006 provocation which caused heavy destruction in Lebanon (which, if one is to take Mr. Nassrallah’s standards on Georgia, amounts to a Lebanese defeat)

The taunting and provocation has put Mr. Nasrallah on the same footing with another character in the Caucuses, namely with the Georgian president Michael Saakashvili, an adventurist halfwit who thought he could get away with poking a neighboring foe with the ability to destroy his entire country.

That, Mr. Nasrallah, should be our lesson from Georgia.

(Photo by AP. Mahmood Tawil)

Yesterday, in a sight that brought cold chills down many Lebanese spines, men and women clad in black overalls holding black flags with Islamic scriptures staged a sit-in in front of the military court in Beirut to protest the arrest of their family members.

The relatives in question had been rounded up by the Lebanese army two years ago in Tripoli during the Fateh el Islam insurgency in the North and have been kept in custody without trial since. Do the protesters have a fair case?

In a way, the event was clumsy. Whatever PR they sought by writing slogans in English was immediately overturned by the gloominess of their outfits. Also, some of their demands were downright silly. For example, they want “amnesty” for their “boys” because “many people have done wrong to the country and their sons were not arrested” as written in their statement. In other words what they are saying is “there are other bad guys out there so our bad guys shouldn’t be singled out”. Bogus.

But not all of their demands should be dismissed. A free and fair trial is a human right that everyone deserves including Islamists whose looks we don’t particularly like. Some of the men captured are dangerous terrorists, but some are also held there because of individual soldiers’ discrimination. Habeas corpus was invented to objectively tell the difference between the bad guys and the good guys, and there is no excuse for the courts to drag their feet.

Every Lebanese who likes to criticize Guantanamo Bay and the way the American government illegally treat their “enemy combatants” should look closer to home.

Next week, president Suleiman will be making his first official trip to Syria. Yesterday, the Israelis told us that the Lebanese government will be held responsible for Hezbollah’s actions. Also, M.P. Michel Aoun declared from parliament that the people of Lebanon, its government and its resistance are all one entity.

Is there anything in common between these events?

At the heart of them are the fundamental notions of independence and responsibility. The stakes in Lebanon have become too high and the Lebanese citizens will have to soon make some choices and accept their consequences.

To illustrate my point, let’s talk about Israeli overflights over Lebanese territories. By all measures, they are internationally illegal, and in a sense we have the “right” to shoot them down as Hezbollah had suggested. Yet for some quirks in history and international norms of fairness, Israel happens to be a military power with the capability of destroying Lebanon and getting away with it.

The choice every single Lebanese faces is this: Do we want to be right and keep our dignity at the expense of our lives and that of our children? Or do we want to stay alive and suck up the occasional air violation as a trade off to our prosperity?

To many, this isn’t an easy choice. But it so happens that we have to make it in the next general election. Do we want to vote for leaders who believe that “the people of Lebanon, its government and its resistance are all one entity,” knowing what the consequence of that vote might be? Or do we want to vote for leaders who want to “stay away from trouble” like Mr. Seniora, even at the expense of our national pride and dignity?

Israel has made it clear that we can no longer blame Syria and get away with it. This time, we have to be careful because we are truly responsible for our choices. We can’t whine, we can’t protest the unfairness of it all, we can’t blame anyone else. It is a difficult choice but we have to make it.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is the true meaning of independence.

Families fleeing the violence hiding in Tripoli public school

There is already talk in Tripoli that the army cannot to be trusted with protecting the citizens, and that if you want to protect your family, you have to put some weapons in your house. That is a very dangerous line of thinking that is becoming more and more entrenched in the North.

So far, the army’s way of dealing with Lebanon’s warring factions has been to avoid angering any one side at any cost. But there’s another way, and that is to provoke all sides equally by confiscating all weapons and raiding the sources of all sniper fire.

If you look at this video, you see the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation interviewing three men, blatantly unmasked while showcasing their automatic rifles and rocket propelled grenade, brazenly claiming to be defending themselves. If the LBC can reach those men, there is no excuse for the army not to round them up and punish them severely to serve an example.

When bullets and rockets are doing the talking, the army’s job is to protect the unarmed children and the elderly, not to cover politicians’ behind.

The party of God couldn’t care less about what the official government has to say about the indictment by the International Criminal Court of Mr. Omar Al Bashir, the Sudanese president . Instead, they decided to hold a meeting in Support of Mr. Bashir.

In that meeting, the political aide to the secretary general of Hezbollah had this to say:

“We in Hezbollah are honored to meet with you today in defense of a
national, pan-Arab, and Islamic cause, which is to stand side by side
with our brothers in Sudan - leadership and people. This is because
this beloved country is facing an ugly conspiracy to undermine its
unity, freedom, and independence.”

Hezbollah –which has taken to conduct its own negotiations with foreign bodies– didn’t even bother consulting with the government or with the rest of the Lebanese, who, perhaps in light of the international Hariri tribunal taking place, wouldn’t very much appreciate hearing what Hezbollah really thinks of international justice.

But then again, how can you blame them? The government itself still doesn’t know what it stands for.

The international news outlets are talking of this as a “mutual” breakthrough, as if Lebanon somehow sacrificed to accept having a Syrian embassy in Beirut.

All the Lebanese people ever wanted from Syria was a recognition, a concrete recognition, that Lebanon is a sovereign country like say, Jordan, Saudi Arabia or Turkey. But the problem all along was that both the Syrian government and the Syrian people believed in their heart of hearts that Lebanon was somehow stolen from them during French colonial rule, and that we somehow yearn to the embrace of our historic mother ship.

The Assads have always attempted a gradualist “redressing” of that “historic error”, but to placate intense Lebanese and international resistance, they have always paid lip service, like they’re doing now in Paris, to Lebanon’s independence and sovereignty.

If they stick to their usual habit, they will eventually find some way of weaseling out of their commitments after the world turns its eyes away from the matter. This usually happens after the Syrians pocket the benefits of their empty promises. Remember, there is a good reason why the Germans are skeptical.

Of course, things could be different this time, but my hopes aren’t set too high. Mr. Sarkozy and the media can talk all they want about the Syrians opening an embassy in Lebanon, but as far as I’m concerned, I’ll only believe it if I see it with my own eyes.

I don’t often post fawning pieces on this blog, but I also don’t often find many politicians who make decisions to further the interest of the country before their own.

The Doha agreement allotted three ministerial positions to Mr. Suleiman, yet instead of installing hardcore loyalists –perhaps from the Army– as any ambitious politician would have done, he decided to sacrifice one to end the feud between Mr. Aoun and the Murr family over the Ministry of Defense. As for the Ministry of Interior, he chose Mr. Ziad Baroud, perhaps the most qualified person in the country to supervise the upcoming elections and reform the electoral system.

Mr. Ziad Baroud is a young, energetic, promising human rights lawyer with extensive experience in electoral reform in Lebanon. Here’s a brief profile of him from an NYU school of Law website:

Ziad Baroud is a Managing Partner at Haddad Baroud Daher and Tohme Law Firm in Beirut, Lebanon. He supervises the long and short term consultancies and legal advice in various legal disciplines, including: public and administrative law, civil law, educational law and syndicate law. In addition, Mr. Baroud is the Secretary-general of the Lebanese Association for Democratic Elections and the Retainer legal counselor for the World Bank’s office in Beirut. He is also a Lecturer of Public, Labor and Syndicates Law at the Universite Saint-Joseph de Beyrouth in Beirut. Mr.Baroud received his Master in Law from Universite Saint-Joseph in 1992, and his Diploma in Conflict Resolution from Lebanese American University in 1996.

Here’s more from Now Lebanon:

Ziad Baroud is a lawyer and human rights activist. He is a lecturer at St. Joseph University, where he received his masters in law in 1992. Baroud’s areas of specialty are public and administrative, civil, educational, and syndicate law. He also works as a consultant with the United Nations Development Program, offering advice on local governance and decentralization, and is the retainer legal counselor for the World Bank’s office in Beirut. Baroud served as secretary general of the Lebanese Association for Democratic Elections and was a member of the National Council for a New Electoral Law, which wrote a draft law in 2006. He disagreed with the law’s mandate to divide the mohafaza of Mount Lebanon into two constituencies and lodged a formal objection, which was submitted to parliament along with the law.

As a disclaimer, I don’t really know anything about the third guy (Joe/Youssef taqla) except that he descends from one of the fathers of Lebanese Independence, but if his genes are any indicator, he’s hardly a yes-man.

Mr. Sleiman has put the right people at the right place, and for that he deserves our praise.

There are rumors that the Lebanese parties in Doha are trying to carve a self-serving electoral law. It is being said for instance that Mr. Aoun is proposing Beirut divisions that allow the Shiaas to vote for the Christians and that Mr. Hariri would love to keep (Christian) Zgharta in the embrace of (Sunni) Tripoli.

That short-sightedness would be a big mistake, as it would be an admission that the Lebanese will never be able to manage things on their own. Every time new alliances emerge between the dominant players, a new Doha will have to be found to carve up a matching electoral law.

The arguments made in Doha should not be about politics. A fairer electoral division, even if it costs March 14 some seats, should not be portrayed as an attempt by the opposition to “harvest their military gains politically”, as Mr. Jumblatt is fond of saying. Mr Ghassan Tueni who embraced the draft law of the Lebanese commission for electoral reform should not feel pressured to follow March 14’s lead and should try to persuade them of the law’s long-term merits.

The electoral law they should be coming up with is one that can last at least another 50 years (where demographic changes could dictate some necessary tinkering and gerrymandering), a law that has enough moral clarity and weight to impose on politicians their electoral platforms. Anything else would be tantamount to treating cancer with an aspirin. ]]> http://beirutspring.com/blog/2008/05/20/haggling-over-the-election-law/feed/ http://beirutspring.com/blog/2008/05/16/obama-and-hezbollah/ http://beirutspring.com/blog/2008/05/16/obama-and-hezbollah/#comments Fri, 16 May 2008 10:05:19 +0000 Mustapha http://beirutspring.com/blog/2008/05/16/obama-and-hezbollah/ The Democratic presidential candidate revisits his previous statement on the events in Lebanon.

When Hezbollah begun its punitive actions against the Seniora government, Sentaor Barack Obama released a statement that Left many Lebanese bloggers unimpressed. Abu Kais spoke for many when he wrote:

Oh the time we wasted by fighting Hizbullah all those years with rockets, invasions of their homes and shutting down their media outlets. If only we had engaged them and their masters in diplomacy, instead of just sitting with them around discussion tables, welcoming them into our parliament, and letting them veto cabinet decisions. If only Obama had shared his wisdom with us before, back when he was rallying with some of our former friends at pro-Palestinian rallies in Chicago. How stupid we were when, instead of developing national consensus with them, we organized media campaigns against Israel on behalf of the impoverished people who voted for them.

Abu Kais wasn’t alone. American pundits were also surprised, and the New York Time’s David Brooks decided to investigate:

Is Obama naïve enough to think that an extremist ideological organization like Hezbollah can be mollified with a less corrupt patronage system and some electoral reform? Does he really believe that Hezbollah is a normal social welfare agency seeking more government services for its followers? Does Obama believe that even the most intractable enemies can be pacified with diplomacy? What “Lebanese consensus” can Hezbollah possibly be a part of? If Obama believes all this, he’s not just a Jimmy Carter-style liberal. He’s off in Noam Chomskyland.

So Brooks called Mr. Obama and asked him to elaborate further on his comments, and Mr. Obama obliged (apparently impressing the conservative Brooks):

Right off the bat he reaffirmed that Hezbollah is “not a legitimate political party.” Instead, “It’s a destabilizing organization by any common-sense standard. This wouldn’t happen without the support of Iran and Syria.”

I asked him what he meant with all this emphasis on electoral and patronage reform. He said the U.S. should help the Lebanese government deliver better services to the Shiites “to peel support away from Hezbollah” and encourage the local populace to “view them as an oppressive force.” The U.S. should “find a mechanism whereby the disaffected have an effective outlet for their grievances, which assures them they are getting social services.”

The U.S. needs a foreign policy that “looks at the root causes of problems and dangers.” Obama compared Hezbollah to Hamas. Both need to be compelled to understand that “they’re going down a blind alley with violence that weakens their legitimate claims.” He knows these movements aren’t going away anytime soon (“Those missiles aren’t going to dissolve”), but “if they decide to shift, we’re going to recognize that. That’s an evolution that should be recognized.”

Obama being Obama, he understood the broader reason I was asking about Lebanon. Everybody knows that Obama is smart (and he was quite well informed about Lebanon). The question is whether he’s seasoned and tough enough to deal with implacable enemies.

“The debate we’re going to be having with John McCain is how do we understand the blend of military action to diplomatic action that we are going to undertake,” he said. “I constantly reject this notion that any hint of strategies involving diplomacy are somehow soft or indicate surrender or means that you are not going to crack down on terrorism. Those are the terms of debate that have led to blunder after blunder.”

Obama said he found that the military brass thinks the way he does: “The generals are light-years ahead of the civilians. They are trying to get the job done rather than look tough.”

I asked him if negotiating with a theocratic/ideological power like Iran is different from negotiating
with a nation that’s primarily pursuing material interests. He acknowledged that “If your opponents are looking for your destruction it’s hard to sit across the table from them,” but, he continued:

“Thereare rarely purely ideological movements out there. We can encourage actors to think in practical and not ideological terms. We can strengthen those elements that are making practical calculations.”

My question to myself and to other Lebanese like Abu Kais. Should we be convinced?

Humiliated on Hezbollah TV. (Photo Credit: Yahoo!)

As Hezbollah moved into (Sunni) west Beirut and took on the moderate Future Movement, many will be tempted to portray this as a defeat for Lebanon’s Sunnis. That would be bad ideas whose repercussions will affect all parties in the country.

Unleashing the sectarian monster can seem like a good idea to Islamists allied with the Future Movement and to the Saudis, but they had better think twice before letting that genie out of the bottle. All parties, including the Future movement should actively portray this as a security and political situation, not a sectarian one.

Because before we know it, extreme elements can manipulate the sense of victimhood some Sunnis would have and target Shiaa symbols with terrorist operations that would unleash the same god-forsaken death spiral that exists in Iraq.

We don’t have to go through all what Iraq has suffered to realize that Al-Quaeda is not really what the Sunnis want for their protection.

Let them play. They’ll get bored soon (Photo credit: Reuters)

Remember back in December 2006 when Hezbollah took to the streets with a large amount of people for the stated purpose of toppling Mr. Seniora’s government? The Prime Minister told the Lebanese back then to stay home and raise Lebanese flags, until they ultimately weathered that storm and Mr. Seniora arguably prevailed.

Today, pro government hot-heads are seeing red. How dare they invade our areas and block our roads! “They need to be taught a lesson!” They spurt. But like in 2006, March 14 fans could do much worse than relax for a few days. Not because they’re cowards, not because they’re powerless, but simply because it’s the best way to beat Hezbollah’s thugs.

You see, Hezbollah goons are not behaving rationally. They are angered by the perceived encroachment by the government on their divine right to the Airport’s security levers. But if March 14 allows the dust to settle, Hezbollah rioters will realize that they’re cutting their own noses to spite their faces. The roads they’re blocking are also used by their families and friends who also want to travel, trade and live normally.

Moreover, “shock and awe” is a deliberate tactic by Nassrallah for cowing the Lebanese. If we are neither shocked, nor awed, we will take away Hezbollah’s psychological advantage. If on the other hands March 14 fights fire with fire, they will help feed Hezbollah’s supporters’ sense of victimization and prolong their “resistance”.

Leaders should be doing more to persuade their supporters that calm is the best weapon. Unfortunately, there are no signs of that.

This must be one of the saddest, most irresponsible spectacles I’ve witnessed in Lebanese politics lately: The Mufti of Mount-Lebanon emerges from a meeting with the Sunni leader of the largest parliamentary block, to denounce “Shiaa intervention in Sunni neighborhoods” , threatening to respond “in kind” to their armed presence.

To a certain degree, I understand why someone like Mr. Hariri could use someone like Mr. Jouzou to do his dirty work for him and to make a point that Lebanese Sunnis are no pushovers. But… A Mufti?

The cheer crassness of Mr. Jouzou’s remarks and the fact that he calls a spade a spade (as opposed to Sayyed Nassrallah’s more subtle “Hezbollah’s people” in reference to Shiaas) can come back to haunt Mr. Hariri in the future. Mr. Jouzou’s words can set a precedent for even more trashy and irresponsible public discourse which will makes the Sunni-Shiaa divide a self-fulfilling drama and the rule of law a more elusive dream.

Moreover, Mr. Jouzou is causing a serious image problem for Lebanese Sunnis. He is a Mufti after all, someone who’s supposed to be have gravitas and respect among his followers. His hate-spewing and crudity are rolling back the advancements Hariri the father worked hard on to improve his community’s reputation.

What Mr. Hariri needs is a March 14 version of Wiam Wahhab, not a fire-breathing “Mufti.”

Mr. Michel Sleiman, the man who until further notice is our next president, said yesterday that the way to solve the Lebanese Syrian “problem” is by more “Mutual trust building” (Via today’s Albalad).

Mr. Sleiman could be pandering to the pro-Syrians, but is he serious?

Mr. future President, how can you build mutual trust with a regime that perceives any form of opening up as weakness? Why is the burden on us to start building this trust? Aren’t the Syrians supposed to start by opening an embassy in Beirut, making official the status of the Shebaa farms and helping us draw our mutual borders? Shouldn’t they finally make that paradigm shift and understand that Lebanon is a sovereign country?

What we need Mr. Sleiman is more leverage, not more pointless brotherly initiatives.