A Historic and Frightening Moment in Beirut

A massive, peaceful, pro-Hizbullah and anti-government protest in Beirut this day, December 1, marks a unique occurrence in Arab politic, says, Rami Khouri.

BEIRUT - There is something at once both historic and frightening about the open-ended mass street protest that was launched in Beirut Friday by Hizbullah and its allies, aiming to topple the government headed by Prime Minister Fouad Siniora.

The historic element is that this is a rare instance of mass political action that is declared to be peaceful and designed to change a government. We simply do not have this tradition in the Arab World, which has been characterized more commonly by violent coups and long-running police states. It is also relatively positive that Hizbullah is focused on domestic political engagement, rather than fighting regional or internal wars. Its substantial clout and legitimacy, not to mention its armed capability, cannot long remain outside the structures of political governance or on their periphery.


It is historically useful, if slightly unsettling on the nerves, to find out exactly how the government and the opposition line up in terms of popular and political strength. The so-called March 14 forces of the government coalition and the March 8 forces of Hizbullah and its allies have now squared off in, hopefully, a peaceful, democratic, political contest of wills. The important new element here is not just Hizbullah’s aggressive domestic challenge to the government; it is also the government’s resolute resistance to Hizbullah’s challenge.

Never before has a Lebanese government stood its ground before a challenge from Hizbullah and its allies, as the Siniora government is doing now. This is a moment of historical reckoning for Hizbullah, its allies, and its supporters in Syria and Iran, as it is for the Siniora government and its backers in Lebanon, the Arab world, the United States and the West. We are in uncharted territory now.

Lebanon must renegotiate a new political compact based on a realistic rather than an imagined balance of power and demography that safeguards the interests and integrity of all Lebanese. If the current events represent phase two of such a renegotiated power balance -- phase one being the adjustments in the Taif accord that ended the civil war in 1989 -- then something positive might emerge from these street demonstrations and their associated political confrontations, assuming they lead peacefully to a new government or fresh elections.


The bad news is that this protest and what it may portend in the near future reflect several worrying realities. The Lebanese domestic political system of consensus-building in a multi-confessional society seems to have broken down. The executive cabinet, the parliament, and the special national dialogue of top factional leaders all simultaneously failed to address the political disputes that have plagued Lebanon recently. This is the common predicament of much of the modern Arab world, whose dysfunctional and often dishonest structures of governance do not accurately reflect popular sentiments.

For Hizbullah and its allies to drop the existing political structures and opt for mass street demonstrations, after participating in the government and parliament for years, seems perplexing to many, myself included. If this government is illegitimate, as Hizbullah charges, why did Hizbullah join the government in the first place? If the government’s illegitimacy is mainly a function of its determination to proceed with the mixed Lebanese-international tribunal that will try those accused of killing the late Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and others since February last year, then we have the bigger and more vexing problem of Lebanese-Syrian tensions. If so, this should be acknowledged and resolved as an act of honest and courageous leadership, rather than camouflaged as a perpetual charade that demeans the self-respect of Lebanese and Syrians alike.

It has always been both a weakness and a strength of Lebanese and Arab politics that honesty and clarity are sacrificed for the sake of an ambiguity that allows all sides to make compromises and achieve a usually unstable consensus. In Lebanon, this has always been referred to as the political system of “no victor, no vanquished.” Unfortunately, it also usually means no resolution of fundamental political disagreements.

This tradition cannot prevail if the real issue at hand is a Syrian-American confrontation in Lebanon through the proxy of Hizbullah and the Siniora government, which seems to be the case (just as this summer’s war was a proxy military battle between Iran and the United States). If Hizbullah wants to bring down the Siniora government mainly to stop or dilute the Lebanese-international Hariri murder tribunal on behalf of Syria, while a majority of Lebanese clearly wants the Hariri killers held accountable, there are no easy or quick solutions.

One option is to perpetuate the political clashes, and probably the assassinations and bombings, in Lebanon until the Hariri murder investigation is finished, the accused are named and tried, and, consequently, the fate of the Syrian regime and Syrian-Lebanese relations both become more clear. The other option is to force Hizbullah and its allies -- usually described as “pro-Syrian” -- to reveal if their main aim is to serve Syria or serve Lebanon, perhaps by giving them the one-third of the cabinet they want in return for their approval of the tribunal.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2006 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global