Hezbollah, Lebanon, Syria, Taif

[Laotra]

The Lebanese root cause of this problem is that the Shi'ites are terribly under-represented in parliament. They have been kept at the bottom of the Lebanese political heap despite being the largest sectarian community in Lebanon. They accepted this position in the 1989 Taif Accords, largely because Syria allowed them to keep their weapons. Since Syria left Lebanon in 2005 the other Lebanese communities – Sunnis, Druze, and Christian - have been demanding that Hezbollah give up its military weapons. At the same time, they have refused to allow the Shiites their proper constitutional role in government. They can’t have it both ways. If a deal to disarm Hizbullah is to be made in Lebanon, the Shi'ites, who represent 40 per cent of the population, will have to get close to 40 percent representation in parliament. This is going to be a major headache.

America professes that it wants a democratic solution to the Middle East, but it is refusing to promote true democracy in Lebanon. This is an analogy to the Hamas problem in Palestine and it is one of the reasons why Hezbollah and Hamas find themselves on the same side and why Arabs throughout the Middle East are rooting for them. So long as there is no solution to this fundamental injustice, there will be no peace in the Middle East. American and Israeli military might is no replacement for equity, justice and democracy.

The way Hezbollah has justified maintaining its arms is by focusing on its resistance role. If you want to eliminate that role of resistance, Hezbollah is going to have to be brought into the political center of Lebanon’s government so it becomes an established power, not an outsider throwing stones at a government dominated by others.

Syria helped broker the Taif accord, along with Saudi Arabia and America. The Americans were interested in maintaining Christian power in Lebanon, which they succeeded in doing by making sure that the Christian seats in the Lebanese parliament were not reduced below 50 per cent even though they constitute roughly 40% of the Lebanese population. The Saudis were interested in maintaining Sunni power in Lebanon which they succeeded in doing by making the Sunnis the most over-represented community in Lebanon - they were allotted the same number of seats as the Shi’ites even though the Sunnis are half as numerous. So in effect, a Sunni Lebanese is worth two Shi’a Lebanese in political terms. The Syrians went along with the deal because they wanted to look like good actors and, most importantly, because they were going to disarm the Sunnis and Christians and allow the Shi’ites to maintain their military weapons to act as a resistance to Israel. This allows Syria to maintain pressure on Israel to give back the Golan Heights.

More:
http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/L/Joshua.M.Landis-1/syriablog/index.html

[ananda]

1. Nothing that the USA or the UK has done..

.. in the ME ever had anything really to do with freedom or democracy,

.. or with helping factions negotiate land and representation..

.. or with bringing a lasting peace to the region, especially since our
presence there precludes the possibility of peace anyway.

Sue