Can Hezbollah be Ignored?

Sometime in the early 1980s, a number of fundamentalist, profoundly anti-Israeli, Shiite extremists began to congeal under a new organization, Hezbollah. Centered in Lebanon, Hezbollah has drawn weapons, training expertise and cold hard cash primarily from sponsor states like Syria and Shiite-dominated Iran. Neighboring Syria maintains virtual hegemony over Lebanon (see my December 6^th Seriously Simmer Syria blog), even though its forces have technically withdrawn after an international controversy alleging a Syrian-supported assassination of pro-Western, former prime minister Rafik Hariri, in 2005.

Hezbollah is one of the two most powerful political and military elements in Lebanon, the other being the official government of the country. But Hezbollah’s forces are better-funded, better-trained and more powerful than the official Lebanese army. Bottom line: nothing can happen in Lebanon without some collusion with or consent from Hezbollah. Indeed, as time has passed, the power of what the United States, most of the Western world and most certainly Israel has been marginalized at best as this terrorist-labeled organization (Hezbollah) has grown unstoppable. Even the formerly pro-Western political forces in Lebanon, notably the last vestiges of the former Christian majority and the pragmatic Druze community, have come to the rather obvious conclusion that refusing to work with Hezbollah is no longer a realistic political position for anyone trying to survive in this war-torn nation. And allying too closely with the United States and the West is no longer consistent with that political survivalist desire.

Indeed, as a United Nations tribunal investigates the Hariri assassination note above, it is likely that Hezbollah and Syrian perpetrators will be named in an international indictment. Interestingly enough, the current Lebanese prime minister, Saad Hariri, is Rafik’s son… and he is head of a government that may contain his father’s killers. The United States remains unwilling to deal with any “terrorist” organization (including Hezbollah), but its choices are increasingly being narrowed. In 2006, after Israel flattened a significant portion of Beirut (the Dahiye southern suburb, a Hezbollah stronghold) in retaliation for Hezbollah attacks on Israel, U.S. influence on moderate local leaders began to wane. “Four years on, Hezbollah is stronger than ever. It has the more powerful of those two armies (the other being the Lebanese armed forces), a presence in government, veto power over Lebanon’s direction, and a leader — Hassan Nasrallah — whose popularity as the proud face of Arab defiance has never been higher.” Roger Cohen writing for the December 13^th New York Times.

Indeed, no real politician in the country these days can afford to ignore Nasrallah, and former anti-Hezbollah leaders are beginning to switch positions and move closer to this “terrorist” leader, a position which infuriates American policy-makers: “Even Walid Jumblatt [pictured above], the leader of Lebanon’s Druse community and the ultimate Middle Eastern survivor, [who once] spoke of the ‘start of a new Arab world,’ went anti-Syrian and was a strong advocate of the tribunal. As he’s a Lebanese bellwether, that seemed significant… Now, over an exquisite lunch in his Beirut villa, I found the twinkly-eyed Jumblatt speaking of the ‘madness’ of that moment, his brief sojourn on ‘the imperialist side,’ his sense that he had ‘gone too far with the Americans and the Arab moderates,’ and his realization that the survival of his small community depended on taking the familiar road to Damascus.” Cohen in the NY Times.

Hezbollah-controlled sections of Lebanon are modernizing at a furious pace, suggesting moderation in this terrorist-labeled organization. Dahiye “now bustles with construction and commerce, including state-of-the-art juice bars and risqué lingerie stores. It feels about as threatening as New York’s Canal Street.” Cohen in the NY Times. With Lebanon flanking Israel on the latter’s northern border, it would seem imperative that Israel would have some reliable conduit for indirect communications with what is now the de facto superior force in Lebanon. Yet an unjustified American belief that Hezbollah power in Lebanon will wane (it’s done the opposite) and its refusal to deal with Hezbollah as a terrorist organization have pretty much eliminated any meaningful influence the United States might have in Lebanon and pretty much left Syria and Iran as the unchecked dominant players in that country. Is it time for a reassessment of American policy? At some point in conflicts, isn’t it inevitable that one must negotiate with one’s enemy if there is any chance at defusing such conflicts?

I’m Peter Dekom, and deciphering the Middle East – particularly Lebanon where I spent most of my teenage years as a foreign-service brat – is exceptionally difficult… but very necessary.