LEVANTINE LABYRINTHS
by Antony T. Sullivan
The National Interest Online, DC
May 1 2007
LEBANON IS caught in a vortex of sectarian storms, fomented largely
by outside players (within and beyond the region) that are now, in
turn, impacted by the country’s upheaval. The question remains: What
will this maelstrom mean for the greater Middle East in the coming
years? As one Lebanese observer put it, "Lebanon has entered the
tunnel of political uncertainty for years to come." It would hardly
be surprising if the contest within and for Lebanon ends as badly
as it potentially could for all involved. But the prospect of those
dire possibilities in the Levant could also create the impetus for
resolution-if a more adaptive Washington recognizes and acts upon it.
Barring such realism from Washington and others, the panoply of
consequences includes: civil war in Lebanon and even violent infighting
within the groups themselves; the strengthening of Al-Qaeda close to
Israel’s border; another Israeli invasion of Lebanon (in Hizballah’s
view) and, of course, a general escalation of foreign involvement in
Lebanon, particularly by Iran.
According to numerous reports, since the end of the Israeli-Hizballah
war of July and August 2006, thousands of Sunni Muslims have converted
to Shi’i Islam out of adulation for Hizballah head Hassan Nasrallah
and his resistance to Israel’s invasion. However, there is also an
economic factor at play, since Iran subsidizes the $200 doled out to
each poor and converted Syrian-Sunni household across the border. The
Syrian-Alawite regime appears to tolerate this financially subsidized
conversion.
The primary challenge for Hizballah may now be resisting the
temptation to capitalize on its popularity by attempting to cross
bridges that simply should not be crossed. Such a temptation may be
hard for Hizballah to resist, driven as it is by a fervent sense of
religious righteousness.
Still, Hizballah’s strategy in Lebanon is sophisticated and
well-organized. Financially, Hizballah is said to pay full-time
demonstrators in Beirut’s central Martyr’s Square $100 daily, in
addition to offering them meals and soft drinks. This food comes from
international and Arab aid given to Lebanon during last summer’s war,
which has been "taken over" by Hizballah. Part-time demonstrators
receive $37 a day. That is a very good value for Lebanese who otherwise
struggle to make ends meet.
Veiled women who participate in Hizballah demonstrations receive $15
per demonstration, while non-veiled women get $37. The reason for
this discrepancy, Lebanese report, is that Hizballah wishes to remind
all Lebanese that the protestors represent sectors of the Christian
community, as well as the overwhelming majority of Lebanese Shi’a.
Lebanese observers also state that students at Beirut’s Lebanese
University who have been participating in sit-ins have received
reassurances from the university that they will suffer no reprisals.
Indeed, some may even be getting exam questions in advance. Hizballah
has become its own industry in Lebanon, economically provident as
well as militarily feared and respected.
Recently, reports have been circulating in Beirut that Hizballah
has opened two camps to train suicide bombers in the Beka Valley,
which now boast over 120 graduates. With these recent recruits,
Hizballah is now said to have an army of over 1,000 suicide bombers,
most trained by officers from the Iranian "Jerusalem forces." Among
these potential bombers, interestingly, are a number of females. Given
the fact that it has now become extremely difficult to target leaders
of the pro-American March 14 coalition for assassination because of
heavy security, Iran may have opted to use women in such operations.
One observer comments: "In Lebanon, it is easy for pretty women to
enter the social circles of politicians and to ‘befriend’ their
intended targets before killing them with poison, or guns with
silencers." Potential female suicide bombers are reported to be
circulating in the Monot Street bars and nightclubs in Ashrafieh, near
downtown Beirut. These locations are very popular with diplomats and
Western journalists. Lebanese politicians have been advised to stay
away from this area. All of this might remind one of the memorable
hotel-bar seduction scene in the movie Munich.
BUT ALL of this does not reflect the whole picture. Cadres within
Hizballah are not of one mind. In fact, most Lebanese factions have
their own internal divisions, upon which regional and international
forces prey. This is as true of the Maronite community as it is of
Hizballah. What most informed observers in the region do agree on is
that Hizballah does not wish to push Lebanon back into civil war.
In Hizballah’s case, there are two separate factions. The "moderate"
one wishes to take power through a political showdown. This is
Nasrallah’s position. The Hizballah extremists, on the other hand,
advocate a putsch. However dubious Hizballah’s capacity to succeed
in any such sudden seizure of power might be, especially in light of
the determination of French troops in the un Interim Force in Lebanon
to prevent such an attempt from working, proponents of this policy
clearly believe that Hizballah can do it successfully.
Moreover, there is within Hizballah a small but rising minority that
wants the party to fully integrate within Lebanese national life,
and specifically, to sever its ideological orientation toward Iran
and its geostrategic alliance with Syria. This group argues that all
the Shi’a in Lebanon have gotten from Iran and Syria are weapons and
destruction. This minority believes that the Syrian regime will work
against Hizballah if it believes that it may get a new or better deal
from the United States. This subgroup wishes to merge Hizballah with
the Lebanese army.
The Maronites, for their part, are the most divided of all Lebanese
sects. There is strong disagreement over the name of the next
(Maronite) president of Lebanon. Still, support does seem to be rising
among Maronites for Riad Salamah, an accomplished technocrat and
governor of Lebanon’s central bank, as the replacement for outgoing
Lebanese President Emile Lahoud. Lahoud’s term is approaching its end,
and he is currently under intense pressure from his children to quit
office and retire in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia. Pro-Lahoud and
pro-Syrian Maronites are of course totally opposed to the March 14
coalition and its current leader, Saad Hariri, son of the late Lebanese
Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. These divisions are likely to continue.
The one Lebanese community that is united is the Sunni bloc. Sunnis,
strongly backed by France and Saudi Arabia, are determined that
the current Lebanese government must survive all pressures from
Hizballah, Syria and Iran. Hizballah is reportedly shocked by the
almost unanimous support of Lebanese Sunnis for Prime Minister Fouad
Siniora. The more pressure that is exerted on the Lebanese government,
the more powerful Sunni solidarity is likely to become.
BUT IN Lebanon, as elsewhere in the Arab world, cooperation on specific
issues by otherwise antipathetic players is frequent. This occurs
especially in cases involving foreigners. For example, Nasrallah may
have survived last summer’s war by sleeping at the Hariri mansion in
the heart of West Beirut. Nasrallah is said to have made the mansion
his headquarters while Israel bombed Beirut’s southern suburbs and
cut off roads throughout the country. If true, Nasrallah’s actions
(and the Hariri family’s cooperation) resulted from an understanding
by both parties that for diplomatic reasons, Israel could not strike
the Hariri building. In particular, the Hariris understood that it
was also politically impossible to abandon the leader of the one
Lebanese force resisting Israel, while the nation was under attack.
Elsewhere, there can be no doubt that Al-Qaeda and other Sunni
fundamentalists continue to infiltrate Lebanon. Lebanese commentators
report that some fundamentalists have taken up residence in the Ain
al-Hilwe Palestinian refugee camp in south Lebanon, as well as camps
in the Beirut area. Not surprisingly, Shi’a Hizballah is distressed
about this, as is most of the Maronite community. Moreover, Subhi
al-Tufaili, the first (until 1991) secretary-general of Hizballah-and
a terrorist deeply involved in the kidnappings of Americans and others
during the 1980s-is said to be reorganizing himself politically in the
eastern Beka Valley. Al-Tufaili is reported to be trying to create a
new political movement to compete with Hizballah, which he apparently
believes has grown all too soft over the years.
Today, Al-Tufaili is persona non grata to Hizballah and the Lebanese
government. Here again, there is a possibility for Maronite-Hizballah
cooperation and a potential opening for the United States.
Many in the region believe it unlikely that any definitive political
agreement, disarmament of Hizballah, settlement of the disputed Shebaa
Farms area (a small scrap of territory claimed by Israel, Syria and
Lebanon) or an exit from the country’s deep economic depression will
be achieved. Lebanese economic growth in 2006 decreased by 2 percent,
despite earlier predictions of a 6 percent increase. During the past
seven months, some 2,000 Lebanese between the ages of 28 and fifty
(including at least 400 physicians and surgeons, and perhaps 600
engineers) have emigrated from Lebanon.
Entrepreneurs and industrialists are reported to be among the
emigres. Assuming no further major political or military surprises,
it will probably take Lebanon three years to economically recover
from the ravages of last summer’s war.
DANIEL BYMAN and Steven Simon’s article, "The No-Win Zone", makes
it clear that last summer’s war resulted in winners and losers. Most
obviously, Israel, which failed to destroy or even seriously cripple
Hizballah, and the United States, which (according to Byman and Simon)
emerged from its lethargy during the conflict "looking both cruel
and ineffective in Muslim eyes", were among the big losers.
Iran, and to a lesser degree Syria, were the principal winners.
Nasrallah was a spectacular winner, gaining both for himself and
his party unprecedented popularity among Shi’a and Sunnis alike,
both inside and outside of Lebanon-at least temporarily.
As Byman and Simon predicted, Iran has moved vigorously to re-supply
Hizballah militarily. Hizballah’s armory is reportedly now fully
replenished with a large number of new missiles and rocket launchers,
and huge quantities of arms and equipment. Hizballah may be better
supplied militarily than it was on the eve of the 2006 war. These arms
evidently include weapons originally earmarked for the Syrian army. The
Iranians are said to have sent Hizballah some 3,000 anti-tank missiles,
which proved their lethality against Israel.
There are unconfirmed reports that Iran may also have given Hizballah
a new, Iranian-built imitation of the North Korean Nodong missile
(the Shihab-3), which has a range of at least 1,000 kilometers and a
payload of 750 kilograms. Prominent Shi’a sources within the Lebanese
government have facilitated this military re-supply.
Moreover, a prominent Hizballah commander in southern Lebanon insists
that Hizballah’s weapons are still deployed along the Lebanese-Israeli
border, but are well-hidden. Israeli sources do not deny this claim. In
addition, Hizballah is reported to have now fully reorganized itself
south of the Litani river, under the noses of UNIFIL. Hizballah units
there appear to be numerous and are divided at the cell level. It is
reported that
there are usually several cells in each village. Each cell is
self-reliant and is under instructions to rely on their available
military stockpiles and not to expect to be re-supplied in case of
hostilities. There is minimal contact between the Hizballah village
cells and the central command (actually Hizballah does not have
a central command in the proper sense of the term). In case of a
military confrontation, each cell will receive brief and intermittent
codes which designate a certain action on the basis of an already
distributed and rehearsed list of possible courses of action.
Iranian weapons are being smuggled into Lebanon through twelve tunnels
dug through the Anti-Lebanon mountain range that runs along the border
between Lebanon and Syria. Reports are circulating that six of these
tunnels are between one and three kilometers long, while the other
six range from 400 to 800 meters. Hizballah is said to store most of
its missiles, heavy hardware and many tons of explosives in these
tunnels, which French reconnaissance flights are reportedly having
difficulty locating.
In addition, Iranian intelligence agents have reportedly flooded into
Lebanon and rented residential flats throughout the country. Iran is
also said to have sent hundreds of revolutionary guards to Hizballah
positions in Beirut’s southern suburbs and in the Beka Valley. The
Iranians man heavy-artillery positions and anti-armor missiles.
Also, hundreds of plain-clothed Syrian special forces are said to
have entered Lebanon as returning laborers. These forces have been
assigned to Hizballah positions in the Beka Valley. They are also
reported to have entered areas controlled by Syria’s close Maronite
ally in northern Lebanon, Sulaiman Franjieh. However, former Lebanese
Prime Minister Umar Karami has refused to allow Syrian troops to
enter Tripoli, for fear of negative Sunni reaction, since Sunnis in
north Lebanon have long been at odds with the Syrian regime.
Since the end of 2006, Iran is reported to have sent Hizballah hundreds
of millions of dollars via diplomatic pouch. Hassan Nasrallah’s
brother-in-law, who co-owns several companies in the Beka Valley that
generate revenues for the party, administers the funds.
The main Iranian source of this money seems to be the Imam Rida Center
in Mashad, Iran, while other Iranian religious institutions of lesser
importance are also being used to send money. One Middle Easterner
observes that the "Iranians are trying to give the impression that
the money sent to Hizballah is not governmental money but comes from
Shi’a religious foundations using religious contributions (khums)
money for philanthropic purposes." Such allocations are added to funds
that Hizballah receives from wealthy Lebanese Shi’a in West Africa and
Latin America, which are channeled through two foundations in Beirut’s
southern suburbs: Bayt al-Mal (the Treasury) and Al-Yusr (Easy Loan).
Further, as Byman and Simon note, Syria has also become emboldened,
having returned as a Lebanese kingmaker without bearing the incubus of
20,000 of its own troops on Lebanese soil. Most importantly, according
to Byman and Simon, "Syria has emerged as the only credible guarantor
of Hizballah’s future good behavior [in Lebanon], and Israel has been
reminded that it will not have peace with Hizballah unless it has peace
with Syria." That being the case, it is surely in the U.S. national
interest to open a direct dialogue with Syria, as recommended in the
Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group Report, to discuss these and other
regional issues.
Commentators in the Middle East make it clear that the Syrian
government is still hoping to constructively engage the United
States. Indeed, it is reported that Syria is trying to persuade
Khaled Mashal, the ultimate authority of Palestinian Hamas and
longtime resident of Damascus, to issue a statement recognizing the
"right of Israel to exist." Moreover, Syria is said to be "desperate"
to get Israel to resume peace talks with it.
The other good news is that Hizballah is not the only Lebanese player
that does not want revived civil war. Other factions are of a similar
mind. Syria, for example, is well-aware that if any such civil war
were to occur it would find itself flanked by two Sunni-Shi’a civil
wars, one feeding off the other. Both Syria and Hizballah wish to
avoid that. A civil war in Lebanon might well lead to a civil war
within Syria, pitting Alawites against the Sunni majority. The
Syrian authorities are determined to avoid any such development
at all costs. For its part, Hizballah certainly does not wish its
resources to be drained by any major Lebanese internecine conflict,
given its expectation that Israel will shortly renew last summer’s
war. And no one of significance in the Maronite community wants to
go over the brink again.
All of this provides openings for Washington, which may prove much
more conducive to the promotion of American national interests than
the current explosive regional standoff.
Antony T. Sullivan is president of Near East Support Services, a
consulting firm. He lived in the Middle East for many years and now
travels frequently to the area.