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Vol. 9 / September 2006 / Rosh Hashana 5767        A JOURNAL OF POLITICS AND THE ARTS

 

Nationalism and Politics in Lebanon
The Future Depends on Leadership and Regime Change

Mordechai Nisan 

On Religion and State

In the 1943 National Pact, the distribution of public office and power and representation in Lebanon was set forth for the various communities: Maronite Christians would serve as president of the Republic as well as the commander of the army, the prime minister was to be a Sunni Muslim while his deputy a Catholic, and the speaker of the Parliament a Shiite Muslim and his deputy an Orthodox Christian. This distribution of power accorded with section 95 of the 1926 Lebanese constitution, and fixed the confessional principle at the heart of public office despite the fact that the same article called for the elimination of confessionalism, or religious sectarianism, in politics.

The intention was thus to achieve a balance between Christians and Muslims at the most senior political and military levels. The 1989 Taif Agreement, orchestrated by the Saudis and the Syrians with key American involvement as well, again called for removing confessionalism from politics, while equalizing the status among the three “presidents” – the Maronite president, the Sunni prime minister, and the Shiite parliamentary speaker. This traditional Lebanese model of government froze the distribution of political power and the political structure itself. Indeed, this arrangement appeared appropriate to the pluralistic character of Lebanese society, especially responding to the Christians’ anxiety for their fate in the Middle East facing Muslim-Arab threats nearby.

The Parliament itself would, like the government, be based on a confessional-religious political key. In the beginning, the Christians enjoyed an edge of 6:5 deputies over the Muslims (whose numbers confusingly include the Druzes). This numerical ration emerged from the population census of 1932, which recorded a slight Christian majority within Lebanon as a whole. In 1989 the Taif Accord equalized confessional parliamentary representation, despite the widespread view that the Muslims were enjoying a commanding demographic majority. The Chamber now is divided between 64 Christians (that include 34 Maronites) and 64 Muslims with equal membership of 27 for both the Sunnis and the Shiites respectively, eight Druzes and two Alawites. Undoubtedly, the impressive legacy of the Maronite community as founders of Lebanon, along with their educational achievements and economic record, has granted them political primacy though their numbers have proportionately dwindled.

The Shiite community, presently the largest in Lebanon, attributes its growth to a very high birthrate. Their parliamentary representation increased from 19 to 27 members, according to Taif, but this did not satisfy their expectation and demand to carry greater political weight in the country. As a result, Hizbullah, originally an extra-parliamentary group though with parliamentary representation since the 1990s, provides a springboard for radical Shiite supremacy within Lebanon as a whole.

It would seem correct to argue that confessionalism in politics paralyzes the conduct of government in Lebanon. Christians and Muslims maintain conflicting views and interests on a broad range of domestic and foreign subjects. Developing national consensus is thereby a difficult task. As a consequence, Lebanon as State and as Army remained on the margins of the Arab-Israeli conflict and its wars, because Christians inclined toward Israel while Muslims were disposed toward the Arabs. This political draw prevented an active role for the Lebanese Army; and this paralysis is illustrated against the background of the confessional balance of power:

  • In 1958, the Lebanese Army declined to act in the face of a civil war due to conflicting confessional interests – Christians supported a foreign policy of the status-quo and a pro-West orientation, while Muslims were enthusiastic about pan-Arab nationalism led by Egyptian President Gamal Abdul Nasser and his leftist and pro-Soviet orientation.
     

  • In 1969, the Lebanese Army succumbed in the Cairo Agreement to the PLO armed presence in the country, which itself undermined the sovereignty of the State.
     

  • From 1975-1982, during the variegated war within Lebanon, the government ceased to function as a centralized institution for the following reasons: 1. Division between the Muslims and the Druzes on the one hand - who sided with the Palestinians in their campaign against Israel – and the Christians on the other hand who adopted an opposing position. 2. Syria’s incremental domination over Lebanon and its institutions. 3. The dissolution of the Lebanese Army as an agent for order and security. 4. The formation of the Lebanese Forces and the Lebanese Front as military and civilian agents of the Christians in particular, parallel with the weakening of the State institutions.
     

  • From 1982-2000 and thereafter, Hizbullah became a military-terrorist and a civilian-social force. Its political status increased astoundingly while benefiting from intimate Syrian and Iranian support, and in contrast to the withering of government in Beirut. The Lebanese Army was defunct.
     

  • In 2006, after Hizbullah ambushed an Israeli military patrol within Israel’s territory, a fierce war erupted between this Shiite-Iranian organization and the State of Israel. The Lebanese government and army played no demonstrable role, appearing perplexed and disdained, while Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah ordered Hizbullah to fire short and medium-range missiles into the Israeli north. Neither Lebanon’s president nor prime minister took any authoritative decisions, rather Nasrallah in his bunker directed Hizbullah’s private month-long war against Israel from within Lebanese territory.

It is not uncommon for countries with pluralist populations to act with less than determination in the face of controversial and unresolved issues on the political agenda. Canada, for example, found itself divided between her English and French communities regarding military participation in the first two world wars. Switzerland, with its varied population, has adopted a position of neutrality. In Lebanon, the political communities agree not to agree instead of trying to shape and build a shared identity and agreed-upon policies in the name of all communities and their elite leaderships. As a result, the public space vacuum permitted violent and insurgent forces, like the PLO in the 1970s and Hizbullah in the 1980s, to erode and virtually destroy Lebanon’s independence, along with its historical and normative national profile.

Is this really Lebanon, in its soul and identity, peering from beneath the breakdown that has afflicted it for three decades?! 

The Political Reality of Lebanon

We would like to propose, in contrast to the conventional view of a religious-ethnic standoff being at the heart of controversy and conflict in Lebanon, that the real focus lies with political issues. Lebanese nationalism, as an undercurrent in historical consciousness, belongs not only to the Maronites and the Druzes as founding communities in Mount Lebanon, but to all Lebanese communities. Religious identity is therefore restricted and even secondary in importance in comparison with the inclusive and comprehensive national identity as the first choice.

Let us clarify six basic points regarding the national identity of Lebanon and its multiple political significances. 

1. Cooperation between Christians and Muslims at the Base of           Lebanese Politics

Differences of religion and even religious opposition have not prevented common efforts by Lebanese politicians. Beshar al-Khoury the Maronite and Riad al Sulh the Sunni arrived at an agreement for distributing political powers in 1943. Parallel to that Emil Edde, the Maronite rival to al-Khoury, was supported by certain Sunni politicians concerning the intra-Maronite leadership struggle. In the war in Lebanon in 1982, when Israel applied great pressure to expel the Palestinian terrorists from Beirut, it was in fact Sunni Prime Minister Shafiq el-Wazzan who worked to achieve this objective. These few examples present a normative interpretation of the lack of inter-religious conflict, without denying instances of such conflict which have marred the tapestry of Lebanese politics and nationalism over the years. But broadly speaking, Lebanese inhabitants from all communities have co-existed in jointly inhabited villages, as have community elites cooperated in the political arena. It would appear that so long as the politicians don’t interfere, the people can get along very well.  

That the politicians even today can also get along we learn from two recent cross-confessional political alignments that evolved in 2005-2006: the Sunni-Christian alliance between Sa`ad al-Hariri and his Future Movement with Samir Geagea and the Lebanese Forces, and the Christian-Shiite alliance between Michael Aoun and his Free Patriotic Current with Hassan Nasrallah and the leader of Hizbullah.

2. Conflicts within Communities Characterize Lebanese Politics

Family, clan, and party-political units, striving for political power, have created severe struggles among members within each community itself. In the 1960s, Saeb Salam and Rashid Karami confronted each other for Sunni political leadership. Among notable Druze families, the Arslans and the Jounblatts competed intensely. Among the Maronites, political rivalry descended at times into savage violence. For example, the Phalangists (Kata`ib) under the leadership of the Jemayel family, decimated members of the Franjiyyeh family in 1978. In 1980, in an attack on members of the Liberal Party led by the Chamoun family, the Phalangists again carried out a massacre of their foes. During the 1980s, the Shiites of Hizbullah and the rival Amel Party fought one another mercilessly in the southern neighborhoods of Beirut. In the mid-1980s, violent clashes erupted between the followers of Samir Geagea and Elie Houbeika over the leadership of the (Christian) Lebanese Forces. The most severe intra-communal bloodbath among the Maronites took place between LF Commander Geagea and General Michel Aoun, who commanded the Lebanese Army. Intra-Maronite warfare ended in late 1990 with the collapse of the community and the completion of Syrian occupation of Lebanon. 

3. Lebanese Patriotism is Not the Exclusive Possession of Any One Community

It is historically uncontestable that without the determined and talented Maronite community, Lebanon would not have been established in 1920 as a distinct national and political entity separate from Syria. And yet the Maronites cannot claim that the value of patriotism belongs to them alone. When the Maronite Michel Aoun declared a “war of liberation” against Syrian occupation in 1989, hundreds of thousands of Lebanese from all communities surrounded the palace at Ba`abda in enthusiastic solidarity with him and his goal. Rafiq el-Hariri, the Sunni, was a focus of patriotic sentiment when he tried to wrest Lebanese independence from Syrian claws, paying no less with his life when assassinated in February 2005, apparently by Syrian agents. Walid Jounblatt, the primary Druze figure, has for many years and with great courage denounced Syria’s destructive interference in Lebanese affairs. Indeed, Lebanese patriotism fills the hearts of many in that tragic and beleaguered country’s recent history.

It is worth noting in this connection the successful inter-confessional experiment within the South Lebanese Army which functioned until its dissolution in the year 2000. Most of its soldiers were Christian Maronites though its heroic commander from 1976-1984, Sa`ad Haddad, was a Greek Catholic. Overall, the ranks of the SLA were filled by Christians, Druzes, and even Shiites who fought – and in the many hundreds who were killed in battle - alongside the Israeli Army, facing Palestinian terrorists and Hizbullah guerrillas. Thus, the SLA authentically represented the nationalism and patriotism of the Lebanese people. 

4. A Civil War Did Not Break Out in Lebanon in 1975

Despite widespread opinion to the contrary, the war that erupted in 1975 in Lebanon was not caused by inter-communal divisions or confrontation among members of the different Lebanese communities. On April 13th, following confrontations with the Lebanese Army, armed Palestinians-foreign residents within the country – opened fire with the intention of murdering Pierre Jemayel and the persons surrounding him on the steps of a church in the Ayn al-Rummaneh neighborhood of Beirut. That day, Lebanese-Palestinian fighting erupted and escalated into a war between Lebanese and non-Lebanese. The PLO and its various factions considered Lebanon easy prey on the road to fulfilling their goals of overwhelming Lebanon and destroying Israel. The subsequent Syrian intervention in the war added another alien element pitting Lebanese against foreigners. We can not however ignore the fact that the evolution of the war assumed, among other features, the face of a civil war between Christians on the one hand and Muslims and Druze on the other. But the pluralistic confessional character of Lebanon did not light the match that set fire to this terrible war.

Moreover, when inter-communal fighting had indeed escalated into warfare – as in 1958 and 1975 – this took place because external intervention from the Arab world had caused this to occur. Even civil wars in the middle of the 19th Century between Christians and Druzes erupted when French conspiracies and Ottoman intrigues from without catalyzed warfare within Lebanon. 

5. Shared Electoral Lists among the Various Communities

General elections in Lebanon are conducted according to the following rules: The country is divided into many electoral constituencies and in each one the number and religious identity of the elected representatives are pre-determined. For example, in the Matn, eight deputies are elected and they include four Maronites, two Orthodox Christians, one Greek Catholic and one Orthodox Armenian. In another example, the electoral constituency Ba`albek-Hermel sends 10 representatives to the parliament in Beirut, that includes six Shiites, two Sunnis, and one each representing the Maronite and Orthodox communities. These electoral lists carry far-reaching national and inter-communal significance, because in distinction from the image of inter-communal clashes and competitions, they call for cooperation during the election period and subsequently in the parliament. The essential competition is therefore among members of the same community who appear on the different and competing electoral lists.

The formation of the electoral lists is in the hands of a predominant personality or a group of major political figures. Members of all communities residing in the constituency vote, most frequently, for proposed lists as promoted during the electoral campaign. Thus, voters from all the communities give their support to candidates representing the different communities. In southern Lebanon, in the Shiite stronghold, Hizbullah will present a list of candidates that includes not only Shiites but also a Christian candidate for Jezzine, who will subsequently be elected by the Shiite supporters of this intensely Shiite party. In order for that particular Christian to be elected, voters who favor him will also be voting for the Shiite candidates adhering to Hizbullah doctrine, who appear on the same multi-confessional electoral list. Other Christian candidates appearing on alternative lists will compete for that single Christian seat in Jezzine. In another example, Druze candidates appearing on different lists will compete for the single Druze deputy to be elected in the Ba`abda constituency south of Beirut.

Therefore, the complex electoral system both rests upon a confessional key while the mechanism and implementation of the system contribute to alliances and coordination among candidates from among the various communities. The government established following the elections will also reflect the multiplicity of communities and their representation in the executive branch. Despite debates and disagreements that will characterize the conduct of cabinet business, this forum will illustrate the vitality of Lebanese nationality in its unique form. Regarding the war between Hizbullah and Israel in the summer of 2006, Sunni, Christian, and Druze ministers jointly adopted a voluble anti-Hizbullah position. 

6. A Maronite President is Everyone’s Preference

It has been broadly accepted over time that, despite the relative decline of the Christian population, the Maronite community continues to hold the office of president. This would seem to be the optimal choice, at least now. From a political point of view, both Sunnis and Shiites prefer that the office of the president not be given into the hands of the other respective Muslim community. The Sunnis, for example, prefer a Maronite president rather than what would be perceived as a threatening and fanatical Shiite one, who might threaten Sunni resources, status, and future in Lebanon. The Druzes, numerically a small community, should prefer the Maronites over the Muslims for both historical and religious reasons. The conclusion is that a Maronite president constitutes no threat to any of the communities, and thus this political arrangement has been widely accepted since Lebanon’s modern foundation.

The Maronite patriarch, dwelling in Bekerke north of Beirut, adds an additional spiritual component to the Maronite community in the country. The patriarch indeed is considered to be the Patriarch of Lebanon and not just of the Maronites. People of all faiths visit him and seek his counsel, in a way in which religion and politics carry their special national flavor in the Lebanese arena.  

The Missed Revolution and the Third Republic

The assassination of Rafiq el-Hariri in February 2005 led to the extraordinary anti-Syrian demonstration in Beirut a month later on March 14th attended by a quarter of Lebanon’s population, with the participation of Muslims, Christians and Druzes alike. The “Cedars Revolution” was thus born in defiance of foreign occupation and oppression that Damascus had exercised over Lebanon for three decades. During the following months of April and May, supported by increasing international pressure upon Syria, Lebanon witnessed the withdrawal of Syria’s army, and thereafter the holding of general elections. Fouad Saniora formed a new government in July and it seemed that major change was coming. But hopes were dashed and the situation worsened. A series of assassinations and assassination attempts, with suspicion directed at Bashar Asad, Syria’s president, indicated that Lebanon was not as yet to enjoy full security and sovereignty.

Except for Pierre Jemayal, son of the former president of the same name, all ministers of the new government had been in one way or another connected to former Lebanese governments during the period of Syrian occupation. Moreover, for the first time two ministers from Hizbullah were members of the government and a third, foreign minister Fawzi Saloukh, was appointed with the blessing of Hassan Nasrallah. Not surprisingly, both President Emil Lahoud and Speaker of the Parliament Nabil Berri continued to maintain their political posts. Syria and Iran pursued their interventionist strategies unhindered with the transfer of military matériel to Hizbullah. Likewise, Hizbullah defined the political and ideological tone toward Israel by propagating its “resistance” to Israeli occupation of the Shaaba Farms.

Lebanon’s revolution manquée lacked an ideological compass, suffered from the absence of a new constitution or regime, without new policies and without new leaders. Mediocre and corrupt politicians dominated the public scene as before. Lebanon was in dire need of a pure leader who loved his people, tradition, and land, a patriot whose record demonstrated these noble ideals. Without such a singular leader, there could be no true revolution or liberation from the polluted politics of egoism, cowardice, and treason – and from foreign involvement that eroded the integrity of Lebanese culture and political freedom.

The political blockage in Lebanon stands in sharp contrast to the lessons of political change that occurred in other countries. Lech Walesa in Poland symbolized and led a sweeping change when the Communist regime was thrown into the dustbin of history, as Vaclav Havel did in the Czech Republic, and so too Nelson Mandela in South Africa. The multitudes that congregated in Martyr’s Square in Beirut in March 2005 failed to move from a mass popular demonstration to then proceed to seize the Presidential Palace at Ba`abda in order to throw out Emil Lahoud. Ever more so, the Lebanese voted in the 2005 elections according to the constituencies’ map that had been imposed earlier by Syria, detrimental to the Christian communities and their political representation.

Indifference, weakness, and fear characterized the Lebanese people with the eruption of war between Israel and Hizbullah in July 2006, this following the Shiite movement’s provocations and attacks against Israel. As a result of intense Israeli aerial attacks, tens of thousands fled from the south to Beirut – while the government failed to direct the course of affairs and take political matters into its own hands. There was no effective leadership in Beirut, because Hizbullah ruled all of Lebanon. Instead of the government acting responsibly to disarm Hizbullah of its weapons - according to the 1989 Taif Agreement and UN Security Council Resolution 1559 from 2004 – Hizbullah succeeded in crushing Lebanon into political smithereens.

The establishment of a strong and responsible government requires a clarification of Lebanese nationality and nationalism. The question to be asked is: To what degree are all of the Lebanese bound by a shared common ethos that defines and distinguishes Lebanon from her neighbors? An initial response would illuminate the following: Lebanon is a land of refuge for small and persecuted communities who differ from the surrounding Arab environment – for Maronites and Armenians, Druzes and the Shiites. This is a country made famous for its cultural vitality, robust media and commercial savvy, seeking liberty and peace. Lebanon’s political identity rejected false and smothering pan-Arabism and fanatical Islam. Unlike the Arab states, she was historically free of dictatorship and oppression. Those Lebanese who had initially opposed a separate Lebanese entity in the 1920s would not dream today of union with Syria and its repressive Arabism. Despite years of suffering, the sons and daughters of Lebanon will not change her for another.  

Is There a Real Leader on the Horizon?

Every people that respects itself, and certainly that has gone through the trials and tribulations as the Lebanese people have, needs a leader who will express its yearnings and dreams, especially in such difficult times. No such leader has yet ascended the political stage in Beirut. Abu Arz, Lebanese freedom-fighter from 1975 who established and led the Guardians of the Cedars Party, recently wrote from his place of exile with poignancy and desperation about the political arena and its players, and generally on Lebanon’s condition:

...the need for a new state...to come in place of this defective government and its political leaders [February 17, 2006]...The Lebanese people dream of a president who will be cast in the image of a hero and holy man [March 25, 2006]...The addiction of the politicians to crawl to the gates of foreign capitals [April 1, 2006]...We are surprised how American and European leaders and officials continue [after the beginning of the war on July 12, 2006] to deal with the corrupt and failed political level...and what solutions can we ask from those who are the cause of pushing the country into the pit that it is in...and how people still rely on this political echelon whose members are divided when they meet, lie when they promise, deceive when they talk, and stick a knife into the back of those who believe in them, treasonous when they rule. The saying, that the people get the leaders they deserve, is not correct. The opposite: the leaders must be worthy of the people. So what are you waiting for? [July 28, 2006].1

Lebanon’s “satanic sectarianism” is not the problem. The problem is a lack of leadership, or more exactly, the absence of a leader who will guide the entire Lebanese people from servitude to freedom, from division to unity, from hatred to love, from war to peace.

In the beginning of the 17th century, Fakhr al-din II led Mount Lebanon by allying the Maronites and the Druzes to fight courageously against the Syrians and the Arabs. His efforts consummated in a Lebanese state from the area of Aleppo in the north toward Haifa in the south.

In the beginning of the 19th century, Bashir II the Shihabi, in leading Mount Lebanon, asserted the country’s independence from the Ottoman Turks.

In the beginning of the 21st century, a leader with uncontestable requisite stature, to unite all of Lebanon and repulse enemies within and without, is the political order of the day. The strengthening and renewal of a centralized government in Beirut would save Lebanon from total internal collapse. Following the first republic (1926-1943) and the second republic based on Taif from 1989, a third republic waits in the political wings of modern Lebanese history. A new regime will prohibit political parties with foreign agendas and programs that deny the territorial and national integrity of Lebanon, like the Ba`ath and the Syrian Social National Party. Thereby Lebanon will clarify that she is not a part of the Arab world, or at the least not subjugated to it, despite many points of contact between the two.

Meanwhile, high-level leaders and officials, both American and Israeli, advocate accommodating and accepting the Saniora government rather than weakening it, based on the assumption that it has the capability and certainly the authority to find the solution concerning the crisis regarding Hizbullah and the war with Israel. In truth, the Saniora government is the problem and not the solution. After Security Council Resolution 1701 determined the need for an international force in southern Lebanon, it would seem that this step delayed dealing directly and immediately with the root malaise of government in Beirut. For the real test facing Lebanon requires a fundamental change that would make of the president and the government sovereign decision-makers in the state. Distant diplomacy cannot replace political healing at home.

The sluggish Lebanese revolution requires a political boost-stage that only a great leader can provide. It is not reasonable that Michel Aoun, former commander of the army, who in February 2006 signed an agreement with Hizbullah and no less praised the movement’s role in defending Lebanese territory against Israel in the July war, is the kind of personality to launch the necessary change. The real leader, when he appears on the scene, will implement UN resolutions calling for disarming Hizbullah, while the national army assumes full control of order and security in the south. In fact, stationing the national army in the south represents a major achievement for Lebanon and its sovereignty, while the gain for Israel, to the degree there is one, is not the heart of the matter at all.

If Abu Arz would hold the reins of power in Ba`abda, he would undoubtedly send Shiite soldiers from the national army to disarm Hizbullah. This daring move would reflect the texture and strength of Lebanese nationalism for all to see. In the opinion of Abu Arz, religion does not block or limit the scope of patriotism. In this regard it is for each person within Lebanese society to believe in the special narrative of Lebanon, its land and people. There is no greater and authentic Lebanese than Abu Arz to recount the national tale with pathos and faith to the Shiite community in Nabatiya, Beirut, and Baalbek.

* * *

Let us conclude with an anecdote that Abu Arz related about a conversation he had with former Lebanese President Suleiman Franjiyyeh, in 1978. Abu Arz was a young man then, approximately half the age of his interlocutor. Franjiyyeh remarked with desperation that it is necessary to divide Lebanon, suffering from conflict between Christians and Muslims, because “a country with two heads [a Maronite president and a Sunni prime minister] cannot live.” Abu Arz wanted to reply with: “If there really was one head, there would be no need for another head – but Lebanon never had one real head.” But rather than this definitive (and humiliating) response, Abu Arz chose to explain that it is impossible to divide Lebanon, not geographically - considering the lay of the land with its mountains and valleys and the proximity of villages inhabited by different communities – and ever more so confessionally, because of the very existence of mixed villages and towns (Christian-Muslim, Druze-Maronite). But then Abu Arz added another dimension to rejecting Franjiyyeh’s call for political division, and said: “If you succeed to divide Lebanon, I will go live with the other side [the Muslims]. That’s because in the Christian-Maronite state, they [the Christians] will kill each other.”

These words astounded Franjiyyeh, causing him to jerk forward, his cigarette in the holder dangling from his mouth. Subsequent developments however validated what he had heard from Abu Arz. Within two months, savage violence struck the Maronite community from within in a fight that became a massacre: Phalangists mercilessly killed 33 people including Suleiman’s son, Tony, at the family home, in Ehden in northern Lebanon.

Recently, an enthusiastic and steadfast activist from the Guardians of the Cedars in Beirut stated: “Without Abu Arz, there is no Lebanon.”

Maybe his moment has finally arrived.

 * * *

Endnote

  1. Taken from the Guardians of the Cedars Internet site www.gotc.org. For an article written by Etienne Sakr (Abu Arz) see, “The Politics and Liberation of Lebanon”, MERIA, volume 9, number 4, December 2005.