Globe and Mail, Canada
March 8 2008
Lebanon: Middle East microcosm
RAYYAN AL-SHAWAF
March 8, 2008
MIRROR OF THE ARAB WORLD
Lebanon in Conflict
By Sandra Mackey
Norton, 303 pages, $29.95
It is quite fitting that A Mirror of the Arab World: Lebanon in
Conflict should be the latest offering by veteran Middle East
journalist Sandra Mackey. Her timing is propitious for two reasons:
Lebanon is much in the news these days due to continuing domestic
turmoil, while the larger Arab world risks being rent asunder by
deepening political and sectarian divisions.
Mackey, who has authored previous books on the Arab world, Saudi
Arabia, Iraq, Iran and Lebanon itself (Lebanon: A House Divided), now
comes full circle, attempting "to observe through the lens of Lebanon
many of the dynamics at work in all Arab states." Though the author
points out that "Lebanon is not a perfect microcosm of the Arab
world," she explains how it alone has experienced almost all the
major crises to bedevil the region since the First World War. These
include the propensity of sectarian loyalties to trump national
identity, the disruptive influence of Palestinian guerrillas, the
radicalization of the historically marginalized Shiites, and the
widening Sunni-Shiite rift. Alongside her account of the manner in
which such enduring phenomena have impinged upon Lebanon’s stability,
Mackey provides a strident critique of negative characteristics
unique to Lebanon.
Chief among these "Lebanonisms" is the role of "a coterie of
political bosses" wielding inordinate influence and power. "In
Lebanon prior to the civil war of 1975," Mackey writes, "the elite
was composed of the zuama, who were to Lebanese society what the
feudal lords were to medieval Europe and the ward heelers to American
politics." The author notes that even rival zuama would close ranks
when faced with any attempt to strengthen the state, which they had
effectively supplanted by establishing elaborate patron-client
relationships with members of their sect or region.
Yet Mackey is overly critical of Lebanon’s confessional system of
governance, to which she unfairly ascribes most of the country’s
ills. Though admittedly skewed in favour of Christians for decades,
and always abused by the zuama of all sects, the practice of
allocating political office on a sectarian basis ensures the
representation of minorities; if anything, it should be broadened to
include a quota for women.
Discontinuing institutional confessionalism without replacing it with
secularism (rejected by the majority of Lebanese Muslims and some
Christians) could easily lead to a measure of Islamization, as the
country’s Muslim majority would face no restraints on injecting Islam
into politics. The real tragedy is that many critics of Lebanon’s
confessional system depict the 1975-1990 civil war as its logical
outcome. This becomes a handy excuse for neighbouring Arab countries
– where minorities are often woefully underrepresented – to dismiss
proposals aimed at achieving proportional sectarian and ethnic
representation.
Mirror also suffers from factual errors. Apart from a brief remark
placing the mutasarrifiyya, an Ottoman administrative unit for Mount
Lebanon, in the 17th century instead of 1861-1914, Mackey makes
several mistakes when discussing recent and contemporary issues. For
example: Hezbollah’s unprovoked attack on Israel in the summer of
2006 did not occur in the disputed Shebaa Farms region, but in Israel
proper; Syria’s iron-fisted ruler is named Bashar (not Bashir) Assad,
while his father Hafez died in 2000, not 2002; Lebanon’s speaker of
parliament, Nabih Berri, attended the public Lebanese University, not
the private Beirut University College; Armenian citizens of Lebanon
are best described as "non-Arab," rather than the author’s
"non-Lebanese"; and Ragheb Alameh is not "the Lebanese Madonna," but
a male pop idol.
Nevertheless, the author’s undeniable erudition infuses the book with
a depth sorely lacking in most journalistic accounts of the Middle
East. Mackey excels when providing historical background to the
myriad competing interests that, from 1975 until 1990, turned Lebanon
into "a multi-layered battleground on which Christian fought Muslim,
the political left combatted the political right, Lebanese engaged
Palestinian, Syria sent in its army, Israel ravaged the PLO, a covey
of Western countries blundered as peacekeepers, and Iran further
politicized the Shia." Postwar Lebanon, characterized by Syrian
hegemony until the assassination of former prime minister Rafic
Hariri in 2005, also receives detailed coverage, replete with
all-too-timely warnings that Lebanon could yet again become the
staging ground for inter-Arab conflicts.
Strangely, for all her talk of Lebanon reflecting its neighbours’
struggles and dilemmas, Mackey ignores one particularly obvious
reflection in the Lebanese mirror: Israel. Though even the most
pro-Western Lebanese would likely shudder at the analogy, Lebanon’s
predicament clearly resembles that of the Jewish state, which "is
geographically part of the Arab world and culturally entwined with
the West." Yet whereas Israel’s politico-cultural leanings have few
if any external ramifications (Arab hostility toward Israel stems
from its oppression of the Palestinians, not its westward
orientation), Lebanon’s choices in this arena are often fraught with
danger.
Lebanon, after all, is an Arab country whose alliances are of no
small importance to its neighbours. A decision to align itself with
the West politically or even culturally would provoke the wrath of
anti-Western Arabs both inside and outside Lebanon. In the 1950s,
’60s and ’70s, this meant Sunni Arab nationalists; today, the
culprits are Shiite Islamists backed by Syria and non-Arab Iran, or
Sunni Islamists inspired by al-Qaeda.
Imagine being embattled Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora,
tentatively inching his country closer to the West. In order not to
offend the powerful Sunni establishment in the Middle East, you must
co-ordinate your move with its two pillars: Saudi Arabia and Egypt.
Yet to your neighbour Syria, its backer Iran and your own sizable
Shiite population – all already uneasy about your overtures toward
the West – such a strategy appears to place you squarely on the side
of Sunnis and against Shiites in the ever-widening chasm between the
two sects. Consequently, you must make concessions to the
Syria-Iran-Hezbollah triumvirate.
The result is admittedly very little movement in any direction, but a
more single-minded approach would almost certainly trigger conflict.
So whatever you do, don’t do much, and try to keep everybody happy;
directly above you, the Arab Sword of Damocles hangs precariously by
a thread, and there are plenty of folks with scissors.
Rayyan Al-Shawaf is a writer and freelance reviewer based in Beirut,
Lebanon.
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