Article: The Role of Hezbollah in Lebanese Domestic Politics Flashcards
The Article is about:
overview of Hezbollah’s emergence, political evolution,
calculations in instigating the 2006 war, and its place in postwar Lebanon.
Overview: Hezbollah
- The organisation began as a cat’s paw of Iran (Iranian tool), militant collection of revolutionaries.
- with time and Iranian patron, it has built an array of institutions, some military, mostly to provide for the quotidian needs of a growing number of constituents.
- Its ideology has evolved and adapted to the realities of Lebanon
- anti-Israel and hostile to the American hegemony which it sees as a fundamental threat to the future of the Middle East and its cultural integrity.
- Hezbollah espouses a model of modernity and empowerment that has attracted a broad following in Lebanon’s large Shia community. Many other Lebanese see it as an existential threat.
1980s- early 1990s: infamous due to blatant acts of terrorism
successful campaign of resistance against Israel’s occupation of Lebanon while respecting non-combatant immunities and other key norms of warfare.
political party, which is now an integral part of the Lebanese political system
Israeli invasion
1982: Israeli invasion begins in the middle of Lebanese civil war (intention of destroying the Palestine Liberation Organisation, PLO and installing a friendly government in Beirut that would be ready to make peace with Israel)
1980s - first Amal: progeny of a reform movement created in 1974,
in 1982: battled Palestinian guerrilla groups. Amal supporters tired of living in the Israeli-Palestinian crossfire, blamed Palestinians for provoking Israeli attacks that victimised Lebanese civilians. Amal was supported by Syria (Amal seen as a check on the PLO), after Syria’s defeat by Israel in 1982 Amal momentarily embraced a pax americana and the notion that Lebanon’s civil war had ended.
Israeli invasion shaped the civil war: Israeli army aimed to lay siege to Beirut in 1982 facing resistance from Palestinians and Lebanese Shia fighters (Hezbollah).
The Israeli army remained in Lebanon although it withdrew to a border occupation ‘‘security’’ zone in 1985.
2000: Israel withdrew troops
Hezbollah Emerges
Began in 1982,
1984→ a coherent organisation.
For Iran: the creation of Hezbollah represented the realisation of the revolutionary state’s zealous campaign to spread the message of the self-styled ‘‘Islamic revolution’’, whereas
For Syria: a fortuitous instrument for preserving its interests: Syria’s alliance with Iran presented it with the means to strike indirectly at both Israel and the United States, as well to keep Lebanese allies, including the Amal movement, in line. Syria sceptic towards Hezbollah→ several clashes
Hezbollah defined itself in contrast to Amal.
Amal: reformist and secular,
Hezbollah embraced Iran’s revolutionary model of clerical rule and judged Lebanon’s bakshish (bribe)-lubricated political system to be unreformable.
In 1985, when Amal launched its ‘‘war of the camps’’, with Syrian support, to prevent a resurgence of Palestinian forces, Hezbollah lent key support to the Palestinians and thwarted Syria and Amal. Since then Hezbollah has built a web of alliances with the Palestinians, and has often spoken on behalf of expanding their rights and allowing them access to the economy, even though the prevalent opinion in Lebanon opposes naturalisation of the refugees.
Palestinian refugees registered in Lebanon:, most live in twelve largely autonomous refugee camps. Where militant and jihadist Sunni Islamist groups have emerged. Most oppose the Palestinian nationalist movement Fatah and Shias (apostates), hence also Hezbollah, (except alliances of convenience esp. against the US supported Beirut government of Fouad Siniora)
1988–89: Hezbollah and Amal fought, to contest the Shia heartland in the south and the southern suburbs of Beirut. Divided by both ideology and practice, Hezbollah was busy creating efficient institutions, including an array of public services, such as clinics and construction companies, while Amal offered its members a familiar patronage system. In the southern suburbs Amal was defeated in the capital, it remains an important force in the south. Despite periodic minor clashes, the two groups have reached a political modus vivendi, often under the diktat of Syria.
Exiting the Security Zone
Israel’s security zone provoked insecurity in Lebanon and kick-started the recruitment of Shias intent on liberating Jabal Amil, the region of southern Lebanon that figures importantly in the early history of Shiism.
Hezbollah’s reputation benefited from its central role in the resistance to the occupation.
Failed negotiations with Syria resulted as unilateral disconcerting Israeli exit from Lebanon.
In contrast, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hasan Nasrallah revealed a cool demeanour. His statements stood out for the clarity of their analysis and his calm assurances of Hezbollah’s careful preparations for the aftermath. He insisted that there would not be retaliatory killings and revenge attacks.
2000: withdrawal: residents flooded in to take possession of their liberated homes and villages. There was very little violence and Nasrallah was the star of day.Those Israelis who remained were tried for collaboration by the state, typically being given sentences of four or five years. Orderly period, in contrast to the history of internecine violence that has scarred Lebanon for previous decades.
The Shebaa farms file
Though Israel’s withdrawal was certified by the United Nations, Syria was not at all enchanted with losing Hezbollah’s role as a willing device to pressure Israel.
before the Israeli withdrawal, pro-Syrian figures began talking about the Shebaa farms. The farms are a 25 square kilometre patch of land owned by Lebanese but located in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. While the prevailing international view has been that all of the Golan Heights are occupied Syrian territory, Lebanon – with Syrian support – now underlined its claim that the farms were Lebanese territory. Unless Israel withdrew from the farms as well, its withdrawal from Lebanon would be incomplete.
Up to early May 2000, senior officials in Hezbollah knew little about the area, but over the next six years the Shebaa farms would become notorious as a locale for periodic Hezbollah attacks on Israeli occupation forces. For Hezbollah, and Syria, the purported occupation of the Shebaa farms was very convenient because, under the banner of resistance, Hezbollah could periodically remind Israel that the Golan Heights remained unfinished business.
→Debate within Hezbollah - focus to the Lebanese politics or to maintain their resistance posture in both Lebanon and the Middle East. The party declared that the task of liberation was incomplete. Lebanese Shias embraced Hezbollah’s argument that its armed presence along the border was a deterrence to Israeli aggression, others refused to buy the claim.
From the Israeli withdrawal of May 2000 until the eruption of war in July 2006: aggressive patrolling, heated rhetoric and periodic episodes of violence by both sides.
Most of the armed attacks were in the disputed Shebaa farms.
In general, clashes respected ‘‘rules of the game’’, which had been codified in writing in 1996 and specified that Israel would not attack civilians in Lebanon and Hezbollah would not attack Israel.
The Hezbollah thought that its demonstrated military prowess, and military arsenal provided by Iran and Syria, was successfully deterring Israel from invading Lebanon again.
Playing Politics
Lebanon has a curious electoral system: intended to accommodate its diverse religious & regional interests and personal rivalries. The state is weak at the centre, making it exceptional in the Middle East. Parliamentary elections every four years (except the years of the civil war, 1975–90).
Tae ̈f Agreement of 1989, which marked the end of the civil war: seats are now divided equally between Christians and Muslims (prior distribution favoured Christians by 6/5 ratio). Some seats are subdivided along confessional lines, but most districts are confessionally mixed. Voters cast ballots for each available seat in the district regardless of the seat’s confessional label. Since candidates have to appeal across confessional lines, the system tends to promote local inter-sectarian electoral alliances.
In its early days, Hezbollah was contemptuous of Lebanese politics. The coterie of young clerics who comprised Hezbollah’s cadre resented the non-clerical leadership of Amal, and the movement’s accommodation with clientelism and corruption. Unlike the Amal politicos, who aspired to becoming the new Shia bourgeoisie, the cadre of Hezbollah had been trained in Iraq or Iran, where they were ideologically inculcated by Ayatollahs and taught that there could be no accommodation with a corrupt political system.
1992: Hezbollah: whether to adhere to its declared ideological position and reject participation in a confessional political system that it described as corrupt and unreformable, or should it compete in the election?
key questions including: whether participation in a ‘‘non-Islamic’’ government was legitimate, where ideology should bend to practical interests, whether by participating Hezbollah would be co-opted and thereby desert its principles and its Islamic vision.
Majority supported competing in elections.
The decision to play Lebanese politics was widely popular in the Shia community where there is a deep-seated sense of political disenfranchisement. Winning seats in parliament also offers greater access to government resources (literally, allocations), which are typically distributed confessionally in Lebanon. Strategic benefits to winning elected office: Hezbollah would gain both official recognition as a political institution in Lebanon as well as a place at the table to be able to head off problematic initiatives.
In 1992, Hezbollah and its non-Shia electoral allies captured around 10% of the seats. With some modest variation from one election to another, it has maintained that pattern. As a result of local elections, Hezbollah controls about two-thirds of predominantly Shia municipalities, including the Beirut suburbs of Bourj al-Barajnah and Ghobeirre.
In each election, the Hezbollah leadership has declared that its members are legally required, as though commanded by Allah, to support the party, leading its opponents to blast the party for exploiting religion. Despite this problematic use of Islamic doctrine, Hezbollah’s political campaigns exceptionality is the extent to which non-religious themes are habitually emphasized, including economic exploitation and underdevelopment, inequities in the political system, personal freedom, opportunity, and security.
Syria’s electoral engineering
The central preoccupation of the Shia community was for many years the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon.
in 2000, (Israel’s unilateral withdrawal) Hezbollah might have won more seats at the expense of Amal, BUT the ‘‘Syrian ceiling’’ = an upper limit set by Syria on the number of Hezbollah candidates permitted to compete.
The ceiling reflected Syria’s usual balancing game in Lebanese politics with the result that in 2000 an Amal-Hezbollah alliance – the Resistance and Development Bloc – won all 23 available seats in southern Lebanon and more than a quarter of all seats in parliament.
Syria played an intrusive role in Lebanon’s elections between 1992-2005. Syrian manipulation included composing candidate lists and drawing electoral districts with a view to isolating opposition voices and ensuring the victory of allies. Syria’s ‘‘pro-consuls’’ in Lebanon, imposed periodic diktats, notably three-year extensions to the presidential terms. In each case the Lebanese parliament compliantly approved the ‘‘one-time exceptions’’ to the constitutional provision that limits presidents to a single six-year term.
In the case of Lahoud, there was significant and vocal opposition. The most notable opponent was Prime Minister Rafic Hariri. The 2004 extension provoked a firm response by the United Nations Security Council, which passed Resolution 1559, which called for, among other things, the disarmament of militias (that is, Hezbollah) and the withdrawal of foreign forces (the Syrian army). The assassination of Hariri, widely attributed to Syria, prompted massive anti-Syrian demonstrations in Beirut that helped to loosen Syria’s grip on the Lebanese political system. Facing concerted international pressure and Lebanese demonstrators, the Syrian army left Lebanon for the first time since it had intervened in the civil war nearly three decades before.
Under significant pressure, particularly from the United States, the elections were held in May 2005. Calls for reform of the electoral law by opposition groups, including Hezbollah and Michel Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement, were spurned. The result was a resounding victory by the ‘‘Cedar Revolution’’, a coalition of Sunni Muslims, Druze and some Christians, who captured a robust majority in the parliament. Druze leader took the initiative to co-opt both Hezbollah and Amal as a device to prevent an electoral alignment between the Shia and the most popular Christian politician. Hezbollah gained two ministerial posts in the new government and received the government’s acknowledgement of its role as a national resistance force.
The 2006 War
A ‘‘National Dialogue’’ bringing together top Shia, Sunni, Druze and Maronite political leaders began in March 2006 to address 3 issues, the UN-led enquiry into the assassination of Rafic Hariri, Lebanon’s relations with Syria, and the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1559, which calls for the disarming of militias. The dialogue continued into June but it skirted the issue of disarming Hezbollah as increasing numbers of Lebanese were demanding. Hezbollah’s argument continued to be that there was no other credible instrument for defending Lebanon from Israel + unfinished business of the still-occupied Shebaa farms. Nasrallah had pointedly secured Siniora’s agreement, when it joined the cabinet following the May 2005 elections, that the group was a resistance movement (not a militia).
Finally, on 12 July 2006, despite Hezbollah’s public and repeated insistence that it would do nothing to jeopardise the upcoming summer tourist season, it was to deliver on ‘‘the faithful promise’’ to secure the release of the three or four remaining Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails that Hezbollah launched its operation – presumably to demonstrate its tenacity and ability to strike and deter Israel. Hezbollah probably reckoned that Lebanese proponents of disarming the militia would be silenced by a dramatic success. These calculations were premised on measured and limited Israeli retaliation. As events would show, and as Nasrallah and others would later admit, Hezbollah had made a major miscalculation. Vowing to crush Hezbollah as a military force and to free its two captured soldiers, Israel responded massively. Israel and its US ally viewed the conflict as a proxy war with Iran, and both countries were intent to see Hezbollah crushed. Israel enjoyed broad international support, including widespread condemnation of Hezbollah for violating Israel’s border and snatching the soldiers. Key Arab states were quick to voice their disapproval of Hezbollah’s action, including Saudi Arabia, which within a day criticised ‘‘uncalculated adventures’’. Jordan, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates followed suit.
If Israel enjoyed international license for a relentless attack, which its Chief of Staff General Dan Halutz vowed would set the Lebanese recovery back by two decades, the license expired after a few weeks of mutual pummeling. By the time a ceasefire was finally in place by mid-August, Israel and the United States were forced to scale back their demands dramatically. Indeed, a ‘‘7 point plan’’ promulgated by the Lebanese government, and preserving the sovereign prerogatives of Lebanon would decisively shape the ceasefire. The centrepiece for the ending of the war was Security Council Resolution 1701 which provides for the enhancement of UNIFIL, deployed in Lebanon since 1978. In practice, the force would avoid taking any action to disarm Hezbollah without (unlikely) government approval. For its part, Hezbollah would avoid brandishing weapons in UNIFIL’s area of operations.
UNIFIL is – like all UN peacekeeping forces – a collection of national contingents, each under UN command but also guided by the instructions of home governments. This characteristic was illustrated after a roadside bomb killed four Spanish and two Columbian soldiers in late June 2007. The perpetrators were linked with Fatah al-Islam, the al-Qaeda linked Salafi group that battled the Lebanese army in northern Lebanon throughout the summer of 2007. The attack, which was encouraged and then applauded by al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri, prompted national contingents to seek the cooperation of Hezbollah to help deter and detect further attacks despite the fact that such contacts contradicted the orders of General Claudio Graziano, the UNIFIL commander, and the intentions of the Security Council. So long as UNIFIL sustains its neutral stance it will find a lot of support in the local population, but that suggests that UNIFIL will function as a buffer not the assertive force envisaged in some quarters in 2006.
Postwar Lebanon
in the wider Arab world Celebration of Hezbollah’s ‘‘victory’’ in the war
x
in Lebanon: questioning of the party’s motives and the consequences, which included a reconstruction bill (damaged infrastructure) and a heavy toll in lives and personal property. Much of the cross-confession solidarity from the final weeks of war, as Lebanon was being pounded by Israel, quickly faded.
Tourism (crucial to the economy) suffered.
Beirut’s banking centre, and much of that business has found safer harbours. The war was a disaster for Lebanon esp. economically
War split Lebanon politically in two:
- Lebanon is represented by a coalition of mainly Sunnis, Druze and Christians that coalesced following the assassination of Rafic Hariri. March 14 group (=protest march of 14 March 2005 in Beirut in response to Hariri’s murder) Was in power during the 2006 war and considers Hezbollah’s provocative actions in the run-up to the war a coup d ’ ́etat and accuses the organisation of being an agent of Syria and Iran with the ultimate aim of installing a theocratic Islamic Republic.
- Lebanon coalition of mostly the southern Lebanese Shia community (mainly Hezbollah and Amal) and large elements of the Christian community. March 8 group: demonstration mounted by Hezbollah and Amal on 8 March 2005 ostensibly to respect Hariri’s memory but also to thank Syria for its supposed role in maintaining peace in the country. The ‘‘Aounists’’ and Shia share a sense of victimisation by a ‘corrupt and unresponsive political system’. e.g. the slow pace of government payments to those who lost their homes in Israel’s bombing x Hezbollah’s speedy distribution of payments to each family made homeless by the war. The opposition alliance, formally sealed in a written compact on February 2006, has proven remarkably durable. The opposition is trying to expand its share of power. The threat of a decline in Sunni prerogatives and power in Lebanon has prompted Saudi Arabia to become key backers of the government.
demand for a ‘‘national unity’’ government, including representatives of Hezbollah-ally the Free Patriotic Movement of General Michel Aoun – an attempt to pressure the current government out of power by insisting on a national unity government that would rule by consensus. In Western circles and in the March 14 group, Hezbollah and the Aounists are perceived as trying to protect Syria by stifling efforts to authorise an international tribunal to try those accused of responsibility for the killing of Hariri and his associates. Weakening of Syria would no doubt weaken its friends in Lebanon.
Given the sharp polarisation in Lebanese politics, the US and French commitment to support the government of Fouad Siniora and the deep enmity for Hezbollah
The opposition raises the ante
The autumn of 2006 was marked by an escalation of tension and demands, including a blatant ultimatum by Nasrallah on October 31 demanding that the government either agree to a national unity government, in which consensus prevails, or face widespread demonstrations and other forms of organised pressure such as blockades on the route to the national airport. In conjunction with these demands, all five Shia members of the government resigned in November, leaving even the legal status of the rump government in question. The opposition claimed that the 1989 Tae ̈f Agreement requires that every major sect much be represented in government, prompting President Lahoud to assert that the government was no longer legitimate (vis-a`-vis the question of an international tribune, notably). To block a vote on the tribunal, Speaker Nabih Berri refused to convene parliament, but in an end-run around the opposition, Prime Minister Siniora requested action by the UN Security Council to mandate an international tribunal. While Siniora’s request is of doubtful legality, given the refusal of President Lahoud to agree to it, the tribunal was approved by the Security Council in May 2007 under the terms of Chapter Seven of the Charter, which permits the use of force to confront threats to international peace and security. As a result, the tribunal now is a sword of Damocles that swings over the heads of the opposition. The postwar crisis took another turn on 21 November 2006 when 33-year old Pierre Gemayel, a minister in the government, son of a former president and namesake of the leader of the Phalange militia which led the ‘‘Christian’’ side in the civil war, was killed. The victim was a frequent critic of both Hezbollah and Syria, and is one of six prominent figures (and critics of Syria) assassinated since 2005.
Syria or Fatah al-Islam behind it?
The stakes were raised even further on 1 December 2006, when opposition supporters erected 1,000 tents in Beirut’s Riyadh al-Sulh and Martyr’s Square, literally at the feet of the government, and announced that they would not budge until the government succumbed. Tension rose more or less steadily and dangerously throughout December and January, and in late January clashes broke out between Sunni gunmen and Shia demonstrators. Hezbollah took a step back from the brink. The Lebanese army performed neutrally and firmly throughout this period. Since then neither side has budged very much from their political positions.
While the stalemate has been enormously costly to Lebanon’s economy, risk of a new civil war , the demonstrations are now remarkably restrained and peaceful. Opposition supporters occupied the tents, but after months of stalemate the tents often stand empty.
The risks of catalytic violence come from outside the government-opposition dyad. In northern Lebanon, from May to July 2007, the Lebanese army found itself in fierce battle with Fatah al-Islam, a group of Iraq-honed jihadists as well as some homegrown Islamists inspired by al-Qaeda. It is unclear whether Syria played a hand in supporting Fatah al-Islam, but the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - GeneralCommand, a group aligned with Syria, allegedly did provide it with limited help.
in June six Spanish and Columbian soldiers serving in UNIFIL were killed in the south. The attacks led to quiet security contacts between UNIFIL and Hezbollah.
Hezbollah’s rivals fear that its ultimate aim is to transform Lebanon into an Islamic state in Lebanon and that the party is only feigning attachment to Lebanon as a pluralist society. Nasrallah and his colleagues have claimed frequently that the conditions for establishing a state based on Islamic rule will probably never exist in Lebanon, since such a state could only be established on the basis of broad consent, which is highly unlikely. Widespread support for an Islamic state is infeasible is a sound one.
Much turns on how true Hezbollah is to the positions that it has frequently espoused over the past decade and a half, particularly its commitment to the survival of Lebanon as a diverse, multicultural society.
Conclusion
Since the assassination of former prime minister Rafic Hariri in February 2005, seven leading anti-Syrian figures have been murdered, including four pro-government MPs.
Between the killings and a few defections, the government will barely be able to muster 50 percent for the vote. It is doubtful that the government would retain its majority in parliament if new elections were held. Many Lebanese view Fouad Siniora and his government as too much of an extension of American influence in Lebanon.
Political crises are habitually resolved in Lebanon by following the dictum of ‘‘no victor, no vanquished’’. This suggests that there must be a dialogue between pro-government and opposition forces, but outside players, notably the Arab League, Saudi Arabia and France have at times worked energetically to undermine a compromise solution. The US, in particular, has been intent on seeing the opposition defeated, because it equates it with Iran-backed Hezbollah. Yet without a dialogue the Lebanon crisis is likely to become more dangerous and more explosive.
In September 2007, the opposition pointedly stepped back from its earlier demands for a national unity government. Hezbollah has signalled a readiness to compromise, provided that a bargain does not require it to disarm.
Lebanon will remain a lightning rod for regional tensions and rivalries, and that ensures that internal differences will not soon be reconciled.
