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Damascus may have just lost the Arabs
Daily Star,
Lebanon, January 3, 2008
By Michael Young
Two things
happened this New Year's holiday to reinforce Lebanon's
deadlock. The first was the fighting early this week between
Hariri partisans and Shiite supporters of Amal and Hizbullah
in the mixed Basta neighborhood; the second was the nature
of the celebrations welcoming in 2008, a substantial amount
of which involved machine-gun fire.
Both events
indicated that the next irresponsible step forward by any
side in Lebanon's crisis could be the point of no return.
The Lebanese are armed, primed, and, while firmly opposed to
the idea of war, in a state of mind to sustain one if things
were ever to get out of control.
Oddly enough,
this balance of terror might be a good thing, as it will
oblige everyone to respect the advantages of statis. The
parliamentary majority, despite talk of the contrary, will
almost certainly not go for a half-plus-one option to elect
a new president, because of the likely blowback in the
streets; opposition parties must now consider the grave
danger of blocking roads again, as some opposition figures
have lately implied they would. The system is tied in a
Gordian knot that only a regional shift will loosen.
The Syrian
regime has blocked everything, but in so doing may have
overplayed its hand. Its monochromatic policy in Lebanon -
that of re-imposing Syria's writ without compromise - is
backfiring. Damascus can destroy but it cannot really build
anything. Its ultimate card is a Lebanese civil war, but for
the moment Iran appears not to want one. Having spent
hundreds of millions of dollars, if not more, on Hizbullah
during the past year and a half, it seems reluctant to
sanction a debilitating conflict that would swallow up its
main Lebanese ally, much as the 1975 Civil War did the
Palestinian Liberation Organization. Moreover, sectarian
fighting would only mobilize Arab Sunnis against Iran and
force Tehran to turn its attentions to a country not a
centerpiece of its regional strategy.
Iran and Syria
are usually on the same wavelength, but there is a key
difference between them. Syria's efforts are largely
concentrated on Lebanon, the Assad regime's ticket to
regional relevance, while Iran's are not. Without Lebanon -
specifically the ability to manipulate violence along the
northern Israeli border for leverage - Damascus cannot
seriously contemplate resuming peace negotiations with
Israel. None of the self-styled mediators between Israel and
Syria seem to have grasped this reality. Denied the Lebanese
card, Syrian President Bashar Assad has few means of pushing
Israel toward a deal he can sell to his own people. That's
why his Lebanon policy is not driven by a need to avoid a
"hostile" government in Beirut, as some insist; it is driven
by the need to dominate Lebanon entirely, without which
Syria will remain weak regionally.
The Iranians
play on a wider field. Lebanon is important to them, and
Tehran will continue to fight hard to avoid a Syrian debacle
there. However, the Islamic Republic must also consider its
relations with the United States, Europe, and Russia, its
ties with the mainly Sunni Arab states (amid improving
contacts with Egypt and Saudi Arabia), the balance of power
in Iraq, the Iranian economy and its impact on regime
survival, and myriad other interests that discourage
adventurism in Lebanon. Also, the complex, often hostile,
relations between different power centers in Tehran make
equilibrium between them a natural default position when
shaping foreign policy, checking the behavior of Iranian
allies outside.
French
President Nicolas Sarkozy got all the attention last weekend
when he announced that his government was cutting off
contacts with Syria over Lebanon. This detracted from the
equally important statement of Egyptian President Hosni
Mubarak, who also blamed Syria for the Lebanese impasse.
This was the same Mubarak who had repeatedly tried to
mediate between the Syrians and Saudis, and who, last
November, floated the idea of army commander General Michel
Suleiman (then regarded as acceptable to Syria) as a
presidential candidate. The fact that Mubarak should have
expressed public exasperation with Syria alongside Sarkozy,
as the Syrians prepared to torpedo a joint effort by Egypt
and Saudi Arabia to hold an Arab League foreign ministers
meeting on Lebanon, suggested he is close to the end of his
tether with Assad.
It's difficult
to have much confidence in the Arab states, but Lebanon's
fate has become an existential issue for the Saudis - beyond
the question of their support for this or that faction. With
Iraq effectively under Shiite control, Iran now spared an
American attack, at least momentarily, and Syria and Iran
having undermined the inter-Palestinian Mecca Accord, Saudi
Arabia is not about to cede more ground in Lebanon.
This week, a
story in the Kuwaiti daily As-Siyassah quoted a Lebanese
diplomat in Cairo as saying the Saudis believe Syria has
sponsored anti-regime Salafists in the kingdom itself.
As-Siyassah is close to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and no
Lebanese diplomat would have made such a charge on the
record without getting a Saudi green light to do so.
Whatever the truth of the accusation, it is an extremely
serious one, underlining that the Saudis are increasingly
willing to label the Assad regime a threat to their
stability. The logical flip side is that Riyadh might
retaliate by playing domestic Syrian sectarian politics.
Pro-regime
media and analysts in Syria have lately put out the word
that Syria is confident the Arab League summit scheduled for
March in Damascus will be successful. That bravado betrays
deep anxiety. The summit is supposed to be a crowning moment
for the Assad regime, where it can prove that it is a bona
fide regional heavyweight. The Syrians hope to use the
gathering in one way or another to cash their Lebanese chips
in. They also probably hope that a diplomatic triumph will
strengthen their hand with Iran, buying Syria more
credibility in the partnership and more room to maneuver
throughout the region. If the summit is a fiasco, Syria
could be shown up as being regionally irrelevant.
No amount of
car bombs in Beirut will make the Arab summit a success if
the Saudis and Egyptians, like the Americans and French,
believe that a dangerous and unreliable Assad merits
isolation. A Lebanese civil war, in turn, assuming that Iran
would ever agree to push Hizbullah into such a mad venture,
could have negative repercussions for Syria itself. Hafez
Assad, who always hooked Syrian behavior to a regional
consensus; who avoided placing Syria at the forefront of
Sunni-Shiite tension for too long; and who always kept an
open line to Riyadh, must be rolling in his grave.
Michael Young is
opinion editor of THE DAILY STAR. |
