How revealing it was that the first place Syria's more obedient supporters visited Saturday night to celebrate Bashar Assad's vague and disdainful speech was the headquarters of Syrian intelligence in Beirut. How unsurprising that some of the same people would fire at unarmed youths soon afterward. How unfortunate that Hizbullah should find itself objectively on the side of those louts, and of their paymasters, at a time of fundamental change in Lebanon.
The massive demonstrations in Beirut's downtown area on Tuesday sent a brusque social and sectarian message. Despite Hizbullah's formal explanation for the event, what many saw was yet another affirmation of presence by a specifically Shiite underclass against the rest of Lebanese society. This assertion of class and sectarian differences contrasted starkly with the multi-confessional spirit of the opposition demonstrations in recent weeks, and revealed that Hizbullah has today, quite voluntarily and in contrast with its policies throughout the 1990s, placed itself bluntly against the Lebanese consensus on Syria.
Much has been said in praise of Hizbullah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah lately, and the man's qualities are undeniable. But amid the salvos of compliments (but also feelings of genuine anxiety toward Hizbullah's disproportionate power), no one has bothered to state what should be obvious: Lebanon is paying the price for the party's continued ambiguity about its own destiny. After a Syrian withdrawal, assuming one takes place, will Hizbullah primarily be a group that bends to the Lebanese consensus on continuation of the resistance? Or will it try to preserve its status as an autonomous force, under Syrian protection, that pursues resistance despite the preferences of most of its countrymen, with whatever that might entail by way of Israeli and international retaliation?
Nasrallah might respond by saying there already is a consensus around the resistance. If so, he would be wrong. Not only is there no desire in Lebanon, even among many in the Shiite community, to bear the potentially devastating consequences of continued conflict with Israel; there is also no consensus to continue providing Hizbullah with the cover it needs to pursue a regional agenda that might harm broader Lebanese interests. The most the party should expect once the Syrians leave is a refusal on the part of all Lebanese religious communities to sign a separate peace treaty with Israel; beyond that, the bets are off.
After 25 years of evolving from a motley collection of armed gangs into a legal political party with a recognized base of support, Hizbullah must now decide what the next stage is. Alas, the party has been used to having its cake and eating it too.
In 1982, and even earlier, Lebanon's Shiite community revolted against an order that had unjustly marginalized it. The first rumblings of rebellion came thanks to the efforts of Imam Moussa Sadr in the late 1970s, though the decisive impetus would occur in 1982, when Israel invaded Lebanon. This not only cleared southern Lebanon and Beirut's southern suburbs of Palestinian groups that had hitherto controlled politics in the areas, it also brought Iranian Revolutionary Guards into the Bekaa Valley. At the time, Shiite aspirations were embodied in Amal leader Nabih Birri, who would represent the community's integration into the Lebanese state far more than allegiance to Iran's Islamic revolution.
In the subsequent decade, Hizbullah, or what the Iranians would formally organize as Hizbullah in the mid-1980s, would build on Birri's successes to offer up something rather different: a parallel strategy combining greater integration into the Lebanese state (culminating in the party's participation in the 1992 parliamentary elections) with efforts to become a regional vanguard in what Hizbullah continues to perceive as a seminal fight against the United States and Israel.
Thanks to Syrian domination of Lebanon, Hizbullah can keep alive that duality, since its domestic and regional agendas reinforce each other and serve Syrian interests. However, in the context of a Syrian military withdrawal the situation becomes very different. Hizbullah would have to choose between two options: Does it want to be local or does it want to be regional? It cannot be both.
Nasrallah is hoping the choice can be deferred to a distant future. The lengthy timetables for the Syrian withdrawals from Beirut and the Bekaa Valley, touched upon Monday between presidents Bashar Assad and Emile Lahoud, are intended to allow Syria, once its soldiers depart, to leave behind a Lebanese government and Parliament it controls. As Assad himself indicated in his weekend speech, he has every intention of ensuring, if not enforcing, close Lebanese-Syrian ties. Borders can be porous things, so Damascus is wagering that once its forces return home international attention on Lebanon will abate, so that Syria will be able to continue arming and supporting its Lebanese allies under the table. At the top of the edifice will sit Lahoud, buttressed by the security services, with Hizbullah acting as the regime's Praetorian Guard. Former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri being gone, no Lebanese will be capable of advancing a project for independent statehood.
Yet the plan won't work, both because a majority of Lebanese will reject it and because the international community will prevent it. Hizbullah would do well to avoid hitching its fortunes to the sinking Syrian ship. Despite the party's demonstration on Tuesday, the national consensus in Lebanon is clearly behind a complete end to Syrian hegemony. Lebanon's Shiites are part of that consensus, though Hizbullah has persuaded many of its brethren that a Syrian withdrawal, by threatening the resistance, would mean the weakening of the community as a whole.
It is deplorable that Hizbullah should generate such unexplainable insecurity - so unbecoming to a demographically large community that has, in the past two decades, been fully integrated into the new Lebanon. Shame on the party for taking Shiites back to a time when they could still justifiably doubt the commitment of the Lebanese state and its myriad communities to Shiite interests. That time has gone, and it serves neither Hizbullah's interests nor those of the Shiites - many of whom are not Hizbullah supporters, one hastens to add - for the party to manipulate these fears just to ensure that Syria will continue to hold sway in Lebanon.
Hizbullah's destiny is a Lebanese one, and must be negotiated with all other Lebanese communities. If that means the party must one day peacefully disarm, so be it. Lebanese society is under no obligation to accept permanent revolution and open-ended Syrian domination just so Hizbullah can remain regionally relevant. At the same time, there is broad agreement that the party has a major role to play in the future, as it did when it fought the Israeli occupation. Syria is cutting Hizbullah off from the rest of Lebanon. Nasrallah is, most regrettably, playing along.
Michael Young is opinion editor of THE DAILY STAR.
Lebanon
Copyright (c) 2005 The Daily Star
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