Hezbollah tells Lebanese president to “buzz off”

Al-Akhbar's front-page screamer

This morning, a Beirut daily’s one-word front-page screamer read: Erhal إرحل , Arabic for “Buzz off!”

It was addressed to President Michel Sleiman.

It marked one of the unique times in Lebanese peacetime that a newspaper tells a sitting President of the Republic to step down.

The newspaper is al-Akhbar, Lebanon’s mouthpiece for Hezbollah, Iran and Syria. The author of إرحل is none other than its editor-in-chief Ibrahim al-Amin.

Amin slammed the president and told him to quit for doubting the wisdom of Hezbollah’s military involvement in Syria and urging a national defense strategy to end the twofold possession of legal (read Army) and illegal (read Hezbollah) arms.

Sleiman was speaking Thursday during celebrations of Lebanon Army Day.

Overnight, three rockets slammed into Beirut’s Fayyadiye, Yarze and Baabda districts, all home to presidential and army facilities.

Back to Ibrahim al-Amin’s إرحل editorial:

Strange is President Michel Sleiman.

What’s happening to him? Who’s pushing him? What’s he thinking? What’s he worried about? Who’s his team? Who does he consult? Who thinks for him or on his behalf and whispers to his ear? Who’s he addressing today?

Strange is this president.

Who put in his mind that he is the number one statesman? Who made him believe Lebanon’s salvation can only come through his hands? Who told him his words are sacrosanct? Who put in his head the country lives by his words and by his thoughts?

Strange is this president.

Who put across to him that extending his presidential term is inevitable? Who made him believe he is the eternal commander in chief of the Lebanese Army?

Who made him believe he is the trusted master of the country and people? What’s his grasp on facts in the country, the region and the world?

Which facts does he gather and how does he discard what needs to be discarded and highlight what needs to be highlighted?

What calculations govern his steps when figuring his conduct as President of the Republic?

Why his family members’ haughtiness – whether in charities, or by ruling the roost in clubs and municipalities, or in the way they commute back and forth from their homes?

Yesterday, President Sleiman expressed a sudden whim.

He said: “The Army’s task becomes more difficult when one or several Lebanese factions get embroiled in conflicts beyond the borders, thereby importing external crises to the interior (…)

“The Army’s task becomes more difficult, if not impossible, if the twofold possession of legal and illegal arms persists (…)

“It is urgently necessary to address and approve the national defense strategy, given developments in the region and the sudden redirection of Resistance weaponry to a target outwith Lebanon’s borders.”

What the president said is that he decided, without us knowing, that the Resistance is putting the country and its people at risk.

His Excellency decided yesterday that the Resistance has exceeded its limits – and Lebanon’s limits as well.

Discussing with the president his remarks is of no consequence anymore. Discussing anything with him is useless anyway. Debating his or his aides’ brilliant ideas and creative proposals is pointless.

The only logic, or the only language, or the only short expression that can be used with him today and tomorrow is: “Time you left office. Buzz off!”

Separately, U.S. Ambassador-Designate to Lebanon David Hale said in a statement at his Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing yesterday:

…The Syria crisis is having a profound effect on Lebanon.  The spillover threatens to disrupt Lebanon's progress toward democracy, independence and prosperity.  There are those who would drag Lebanon into the Syrian conflict.

Hezbollah is putting its own interests and those of its foreign backers above those of the Lebanese people.

Hezbollah’s active military support for the Syrian regime contradicts the Baabda Declaration, violates Lebanon’s disassociation policy and risks Lebanon's stability.

My mission, if confirmed, will be to do everything possible to support the Lebanese in their policy of disassociation from the Syrian conflict, help them maintain their sovereignty and ensure that America is helping to meet the humanitarian and economic challenge posed by refugee flows into Lebanon.

Violence is already spilling over. The work of the Lebanese Armed Forces and Internal Security Forces to protect Lebanon from these consequences reminds us that U.S. security assistance is a pillar of our bilateral relations and serves U.S. interests.

We work with these two institutions to fight common terrorist threats.  We have a strong commitment to support the Lebanese as they build-up these institutions so they can project state authority to all corners of Lebanon.  Only with such institutions can Lebanon ever attain stability, sovereignty and security.

There are over 700,000 refugees from the Syrian conflict in Lebanon, a nation of four million. 

The strain is great. Our humanitarian aid helps the refugee population as well as Lebanese host communities, many disadvantaged themselves, with food, shelter, healthcare and schooling. If confirmed, I will seek new ways to support Lebanese protection and assistance for those fleeing the terrible violence next door.

Lebanon's banking sector is the backbone of its economy.  For the financial sector to continue to attract capital, it must meet international standards on countering money laundering and terror financing. If confirmed, I will work with the Lebanese banking community to ensure that it remains a stabilizing force for the economy…

“Difficult days ahead for Lebanon”

(Photo from al-Joumhouria)

By George Solage*

The situation in Lebanon becomes all the more dangerous as the Lebanese sides increase their meddling in the Syrian crisis.

Successive security incidents also show the struggle in and over Syria has started creeping into the brittle Lebanese interior, which is prone to blow up instantly at any time.

The controls have all but evaporated as sectarian compulsions get the better of national logic and external agendas take precedence over internal priorities.

The release of Shadi Mawlawi won’t pacify the Tripoli streets. Nor will holding to account the killers of sheikhs Ahmed Abdul-Wahed and Mohammed Hussein Merheb calm the volcanic anger of the people of Akkar, whose social and economic development rights have long been overlooked.

The people of the North feel targeted and hunted. They feel their youths are trailed. They feel accused of being Takfeeris. Weapons are seized from their hands but permitted in the hands of others. They are dubbed terrorist suspects liable to be penalized. They are banned from sympathizing with their Sunnite brethren in Syria. They are threatened with a return of the Syrian army to their region to supposedly prevent Akkar from becoming a sanctuary for the Syrian regime’s opponents and a buffer zone and launching pad for military operations inside Syria.

In light of this perception, which raised tension to unforeseen levels, chances of a political solution sponsored by Lebanese officialdom receded. Some branches of government floated the idea of a security solution on the ground, which effectively translates into pitting the Lebanese army against its own people in Tripoli and Akkar.

The security situation did not work in Syria and can’t succeed in Lebanon because the problem is not a question of security, but of politics. The problem needs to be addressed politically.

Even though some people point the finger at the army, the issue is not between the army and the political forces or the denizens of the region.

Talk about a likely return of the Syrian army to Lebanon is pure scaremongering. The Syrian army now is in no position to undertake such an adventure. Also, there’s no international decision to that effect. On the contrary, such a move would trigger an international outcry of which Syria is aware and can ill afford.

A high-ranking security source confirms this and does not anticipate security turmoil in Beirut at this stage, despite the incidents of the past couple of days. He is surprised by the amplification of reports about al-Qaeda cadres being in Beirut and heading to Syria. He is also confident the Lebanese army and the internal security forces are in control.

But good intentions alone are not enough and warnings are futile so long as “self-distancing” (from Syria) remains a (government) policy slogan, which the political authorities either don’t wish to uphold or don’t dare to respect.

Proof is that the “virtual (parliamentary) majority” still does not see the need to replace the present government with a salvation government in order to safeguard Lebanon from the high-risk challenges threatening its security, unity, sovereignty and future.

What lies in store (for Lebanon) is onerous and extremely intricate.

It will become more menacing if the past fortnight’s realities on the ground – the realities of coupling Lebanon’s north and the Syrian interior – take hold.

The directives by Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain to their citizens to avoid travel to Lebanon is one of many prices the Lebanese would have to pay should they choose to poke their nose further into the Syrian crisis and ignore the pressing need for a salvation government in anticipation of arms proliferating and the situation flaring up on a wider scale.

*This think piece by George Solage appears in Arabic today in the independent Beirut daily al-Joumhouria. Solage is a longtime media aide to Lebanon’s former defense minister Elias el-Murr. 

Syria “chaos” entraps Lebanon

The victim, his blood-stained and bullet-riddled Range and a riot scene 

The so-called April 1975 “Ain el-Remmaneh incident” was the spark that set off Lebanon’s 15-year civil war.

Yesterday’s unprovoked killing by Lebanese soldiers of a Lebanese Sunnite cleric opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad could mark the date of Lebanon’s head on plunge into Syria’s “chaos.”

Sheikh Ahmed Abdul-Wahed was shot dead, along with his travel companion Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Merheb, in his Range Rover at an army checkpoint at Kwaikhat in Akkar, a district in the north Lebanon governorate.

He was on his way to address a rally in the Akkar capital of Halba. The event was immediately called off.

The Lebanese army promptly said in a communiqué it deeply regretted the incident, promising a military inquiry. The state commissioner to the military court, judge Saqr Saqr, later ordered the arrest of the three army officers and 19 soldiers who were manning the checkpoint at Kwaikhat.

Abdul-Wahed, a 1969 native of al-Bireh in Akkar where he founded al-Noor Islamic school and charity, was devoted to helping Syrian refugees in Lebanon. He was close to the anti-Assad “March 14” alliance led by former premier Saad Hariri’s Future Movement.

News of the killing by the army drove angry people to the streets of Akkar villages as protestors cut off roads with burning tires. Protesters blocked roads elsewhere in Tripoli, the Eastern Bekaa valley and the Beirut highway to South Lebanon as well as in the Beirut areas of Verdun, Mazraa, Tarik el-Jdideh, Beshara el-Khoury and Qasqas.

Armed clashes overnight in Tarik el-Jdideh between supporters of the Future Movement and their rivals in the Arab Movement Party headed by Shaker Berjawi, an ally of the Syrian government, left three people dead and 15 wounded overnight.

The fighting in Beirut was the most intense since May 7, 2008, when Hezbollah gunmen swept through Sunnite neighborhoods and torched the Future Movement’s TV station after the government tried to dismantle the group's telecommunications network.

Lebanon’s Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rasheed Qabbani has declared three days of mourning over Sheikh Abdul-Wahed’s death.

Future Movement MPs, including Khaled Daher and Marwan Hamadeh, said the incident was a targeted hit.

"If shots were fired at the tires, we would say there was a mistake. But we consider this a direct targeting from the army," he told Reuters.

"Frankly, we do not want to see the army here because it works at the service of the Syrian regime," he said.

Hamadeh said a number of lawmakers would seek a parliamentary probe into “the practices of some army intelligence and General Security personnel… that join efforts by the crumbling regime in Damascus to inflame the situation in Lebanon ahead of its downfall.”

Future Movement leader Saad Hariri also pointed the finger at Assad "infiltrators" in the military for the deaths.

"There are some infiltrators who want to use the military and its image to import the crisis of the Syrian regime to Lebanon in a desperate attempt to save Assad's regime from its inevitable end," he said.

Abdelqader Abdul-Wahed, the slain cleric’s brother, echoed the sentiments in an interview with Lebanon’s MTV. "Unfortunately, we have some infiltrated elements in the Lebanese army, possibly officers who work for the Assad regime," he said. "I hope the army institution cleanse itself from these elements."

After the Lebanese Army curbed the May 12-14 clashes between Tripoli's two adjacent districts -- the predominantly Sunnite “Bab al-Tebbaneh” and the overwhelmingly Alawite “Jabal Mohsen” – Lebanese Alawite chieftain Rifaat Eid talked tough at his Jabal Mohsen stronghold.

He told a May 16 press conference, “Everyone should be aware that sliding further into the unknown would mean no one could pacify Lebanon except through the intervention of an Arab army. And no one would be able to do so except Syria. If you asked me my opinion, I have no problem with (the Syrian army coming in). Better this happened today than tomorrow…”

Speaking in an interview broadcast the same day on Russian state news channel Rossiya-24, Assad put the blame for the Syria violence on the Arab Spring and said weapons bound for Syrian rebels were entering his country from Lebanon, adding: "And as I have said, if you sow chaos in Syria you may be infected by it yourself, and they understand this perfectly well." (See my May 17 post, “How Syria fire is creeping up on Lebanon”).

Syria’s UN Ambassador Bashar Ja'afari wrote in a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon dated May 17 saying, “In some Lebanese areas bordering Syria, several warehouses have been set up to stockpile weapons and ammunition that are reaching Lebanon illegally…”

He said the weapons are “moved first to Akkar, then to Wadi Khaled, ahead of their smuggling into Syria… Premises of charities run by Salafists and the Future Movement in Lebanese areas bordering Syria are being used to provide safe havens to al-Qaeda and Muslim Brotherhood terrorists to launch hit-and-run criminal operations inside Syria. The injured among them are treated under fake names in hospitals and clinics affiliated to those (Salafist and Future Movement) groups and funded by Saudi Arabia and Qatar.” (See my May 18 post, “Syria seen lighting the Lebanon fuse”).

Lebanese political analyst Rosanna Boumounsef, in her column for the independent Beirut daily an-Nahar, says in light of the weekend developments in Akkar, “the Syrian regime’s resolve to forcibly drag Lebanon into its crisis leaves the Lebanese government in an extremely embarrassing position.”

Disputing the allegations made by Ja’afari verbally – as Prime Minister Najib Mikati has already done -- is not enough, she explains.  Ja’afari specifically wrote Ban Ki-moon and the president of the Security Council saying, “It would be highly appreciated if the annexed letter (describing Lebanon as a hotbed of terrorism) could be circulated urgently as an official document of the Security Council.”

This, Boumounsef writes, requires Lebanon “to respond in the same way – by writing a letter to Ban Ki-moon and the Security Council president challenging the contents of the Syrian document. This is part of the duties of the Lebanese government, irrespective of its makeup, since the document presented by Syria defames the whole of Lebanon and casts aspersions on its reputation. If the Lebanese government allowed the Syrian document to pass without a riposte addressed to the UN and the Security Council, it would be held accountable for document’s fallouts.”

Charles Habbour, in his think piece for the Lebanese independent daily al-Joumhouria published by former defense minister Elias el-Murr, sees Lebanon being forced to change direction and become Syria’s “playing field instead of its outlet.”

The north Lebanon turmoil, he says, shows Syria to be “in a hurry.” Within weeks of the attempt on the life of Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea that was meant to destabilize the Christian community, Damascus turned its gunsight on the Sunnites to export its crisis.

Habbour says Damascus “decided to push Lebanon to change course. Instead of perceiving Lebanon as its political, diplomatic, financial and economic outlet, Syria wants Lebanon to become a playing field and a trump card primed for explosion, coercion or a tradeoff.”

Habbour gives three reasons for the U-turn by Damascus:

1.     Lebanon can no more serve as Syria’s “lung.” Given persistent pressure from the U.S. Treasury, Lebanese banks are finding it increasingly difficult to launder Syrian money or handle financial transactions with the Syrian regime and its supporters.

2.   Syria wants to use Lebanon as a bargaining chip. It is telling the Saudis that the regime’s confrontation with its Sunnites has now spread to Lebanon. It is also inviting the Americans to do a deal for the sake of regional stability.

3.     Seeing no end to the uprising, Syria wants to expand the lines of confrontation in an attempt to “escape forward.”    

“As usual, Lebanon is made to foot the bill,” Egyptian media celebrity Imad Adeeb writes for the leading Saudi daily Asharq Alawsat. “The crisis is in Syria and Lebanon pays the price. The killer is in Damascus and the fatality will be in Beirut. It looks as though Syria is sending a regional and international message saying, ‘If you pressured us further, we would wreck your summer, your interests and your allies.’

“It is the same old game dating back almost half a century – the mafia’s game of trading off one crisis for another, one prisoner for a new and one hotspot for an additional.”