Lebanese President Emile Lahoud is said ready to re-designate outgoing Premier Karami (who resigned in the face of protests) to form a new pro-Syrian government:
The re-designation is bound to reverse the fortunes of a peaceful opposition uprising to shake off Syria's 29-year-old suffocating hegemony, which was sparked by the assassination of ex-Premier Hariri three weeks ago. It is also locally seen as a slap to President Bush's contention that "democracy is knocking at Lebanon's door."
Bush has served a clear-cut ultimatum on President Assad Tuesday to pull out his entire army and security personnel form Lebanon before the spring elections of a new Lebanese parliament so that these elections would be "free and fair," or become "even more isolated from the world."An Nahar said the opposition boycott of Wednesday's consultations has set the grounds for Karami's re-designation by at least 60-to-64 votes of the 128 parliament members.
Speaker Berri set the pace of the pro-Karami drive. "I have nominated Omar Karami, begging Bahia Hariri's pardon," Berri told reporters as he emerged from a meeting with President Lahoud. Hariri's sister, who is a parliament member, has been widely tipped as Lebanon's next prime minister.
Asked to comment on his impending return to the premiership after his resignation nine days ago, Karami told An Nahar "I am not enthusiastic. But let's wait and see how things go." The remark was interpreted by the newspaper as clear indication that Karami would accept the re-nomination.
Walid Jumblatt says that this development will, "extend the crisis in Lebanon indefinitely."
So this is the strategy. Lahoud, feeling good after yesterday's rally, is emboldened to consolidate the Syrian regime's grip on Lebanon even as Syrian troops redeploy to Eastern Lebanon. The opposition has called for a government not running in the upcoming elections as a way of countering Syrian influence and manipulation of the results.
ThinkingMan from A Lebanese Abroad posts his reaction to Hizballah's big show yesterday:
I am really confused now about the Hizbullah-Nasrallah messages. So, the United States and France is the enemy? And Israel,- with whom the Palestinians are currently sitting with, face-to-face, to discuss peace- well, they will always be the enemy. Saudi Arabia and Egypt who also aren’t playing along with Syria and are too close to the U.S., are also the enemy. And at least 2 million other Lebanese people (perhaps more, but I am being conservative) are also enemies because they don’t believe that Syria is really Lebanon’s friend and wants our well-being. So, by deduction, after alienating the West (represented by the U.S. and France), most Arab countries (lead by Egypt and Saudi Arabia), and a lot of Lebanese, who is left as our friends: Syria and Iran?
Here we have a perfect illustration of why Hizballah is in such hot water. They are further alienating themselves from the greater world by aligning closer still to the terror states.
ThinkingMan feels that the fight is over militarily and that the measure of the relative success of the two sides will come in elections rather than demonstrations. I hope that he is right, but I worry that there is still too much pitted against the Lebanese from the Syrian and Iranian regimes. Remember that although Hizballah is considered partly a political party, they are an armed political party.
The key may be getting Syrian intelligence out of the country. Without Syrian intelligence apparatus, Hizballah would have a very difficult time getting arms and support from Iran.
Later on in the post, ThinkingMan gets down to pointing out Hasan Nasrallah's convoluted arguments:
And why are you feeding us lies? You said about Israel and the United States: “Forget about your dreams about Lebanon. There is no place for you in Lebanon.” Don’t you know that, as a first step to discussing peace with Israel, the Palestinians received a pledge for $1 billion dollars in economic aid from Western nations, and that’s only the beginning. So why would Israel and the U.S. want Lebanon as the enemy while they are making peace with the Palestinians?
Mr. Nasrallah, you must be having really bad dreams, because you are seeing imaginary enemies for Lebanon, while ignoring the enemy within, i.e. Syria.
Tony from Across the Bay posts an email about the Akkar incident:
The Syrian intelligence came yesterday and wanted to arrest 150 people. However the whole village protected those people and prevented the arrest.
In an editorial, the Daily Star responds to Nasrallah's call for the US to "stop interfering in Lebanon." Here, the Star points out that the different sides are closer than they appear.
Ironically, despite our ideological differences, Nasrallah, the opposition and the Americans are all saying the same thing at the same time: Give Lebanon its freedom, sovereignty and independence.
We hope we won't be led into another situation like 1990, when America's strategic interests outweighed Lebanese democratic aspirations, and Syria was given carte blanche in Lebanon in exchange for its support of the U.S.-led Gulf war. Lebanon must not fall prey to any outside agendas; the Lebanese must be free to democratically govern themselves, without any foreign interference.
Things are getting stickier by the minute. Stay tuned.
Part of this has been cross-posted at BNN.
Comments