Will Iran and Syria finally divorce?

Just as Iran has its nuclear issue causing the international community to stand on edge, its pal Syria has the Rafik Hariri assassination case, which has also kept news-watchers like myself on the edge of our seats. How long will Iran and Syria's little friendship last? Lebanon and isolation by (in Syria's case) and dislike of (in Iran's case) the United States are two of the common threads. As a result both have been known to harbor or support extremists. Contrary to what the White House says every day, there is no pure evil, no clear enemy, in world politics, or most other things.

But neither Damascus or Tehran should take their alliance for granted.

On Wednesday, the U.N. Security Council voted to establish a special court to try those who participated in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Syria is the prime suspect in the crime. Its allies blocked passage of the tribunal through the Lebanese Parliament, which is why the Security Council decided to approve it unilaterally. However, an increasingly pertinent question, albeit one only now beginning to provoke interest, is what the tribunal might mean for Syrian-Iranian collaboration in Lebanon.
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Lebanon, thanks to a series of Security Council resolutions designed to bolster its independence from Syria, investigate the Hariri murder, and reinforce a U.N. peacekeeping force along the border with Israel, finds itself under de facto international trusteeship. For Hezbollah to find the Americans at their doorstep again must have been galling. The United States, France, the United Nations, and leading Arab states, especially Saudi Arabia, have attempted to firm up the country against two parallel developments: Syria's persistent efforts to destabilize Lebanon, mainly to undermine a Hariri tribunal that threatens the Syrian regime; and Iran's desire to use Lebanon as an outpost in the Levant from where it might derail American, Israeli, or Western initiatives with which it is unhappy; but also from where it can deter, through Hezbollah, an Israeli or U.S. strike against its nuclear facilities.

But will Syria and Iran remain on the same wavelength in Lebanon now that the regime of President Bashar Assad is more vulnerable than ever? The two countries have cooperated closely, and according to a diplomat who travels to Damascus, Iran is manning listening posts in Syrian territory from which even Russian experts are denied entry. The notion of a sudden Iranian-Syrian split seems, for the moment, naive.

However, with a green light for the Hariri tribunal, things may become more complicated.

So the Mid-East chapter of the "axis of evil" might soon be no more. But don't count on it happening anytime soon.

Olmert's political losses

Ehud Olmert is a man with a problem — well, several problems in fact. He is the prime minister of a nuclear state, a world player in fact, with many security troubles and political conundrums. His country gets more attention than most; and the majority of his neighbors resent the country he governs. Olmert is the prime minister of Israel. He faces many problems: investigations into the ethics of his administration; the loss of political support within his new centrist party as well as in the wider population; frequent acts of terror from both inside and outside Israel's borders — among other issues. His personal goals — namely the much needed Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank — are in shambles and his nations external security is looking as bleak as ever. America seems to be the only steadfast ally, and even it is hinting at doubt in Israel's handling of itself and Olmert's handling of Israel. Every foreign policy move Olmert makes might find itself under international scrutiny.

So why is this flaring up all of the sudden? A panel released its findings of last summer's torrential Israeli-Lebanese war (i.e. the 2006 Lebanon War), which was mainly a conflict between Hezbollah and Israel's defense forces. (From the start the battle was seen as poorly executed, and this is a result of a major inquiry.) Lebanon is still unstable following the skirmish of summer 2006. Israel took the militant group's bait, and now Israel is seen as even more of an aggressor against innocents — in the Arab Muslim world as well as abroad.

An Israeli government commission excoriated Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Monday for "severe failures" in last summer's war against the Lebanese militia Hezbollah, setting off a furious debate on whether he should remain in office.

The commission accused him of having decided hastily to go to war, neglecting to ask for a detailed military plan, refusing to consult outside the army and setting "over-ambitious and unobtainable goals."

Israel's political troubles are vast and wide. In its parliament, the Knesset, parties must gain power often by forming coalitions, many times with more extreme factions of the Israeli politik. Israelis also doubt how pulling out of Palestinian territories will help — they think the attacks will continue nonetheless just as some Palestinians fail to rationalize how a stop in the fighting will help them too.

Israel's policy towards Palestine is a prime example of the fire paradox at work: in fighting terrorism, Israel has created more. For example, Hezbollah's support has arguably grown following last year's conflict with Israel, which killed many civilians, left even more scared, and destroyed all too much. Hezbollah, fueled by funds from Iran, helped rebuild and aided civilians. However, some view Hezbollah's moves as haphazard and blame it for sparking the conflict with Israel. That launched a perpetual drive of terrorism and recruiters take advantage of the poor, hopeless, yet angered, Palestinians. And its a two-way street. There are also plenty of militant extremists within Israel, extra-Zionists, so to speak, who think the world is theirs for the taking, and Israel should not fail to resort to heavy military means when attacked.

How to fight the terror? Sending tanks into a neighborhood of Lebanon (home to Hezbollah) or Palestine (home to Hamas) that is already angry because its power and water supplies are cut off, and the bridge is blown up, does not help. There is also the issue of the politics within Israel's neighboring states. Would Israel rather moderate Islamic rule in its Arab neighbors, or dictatorships which are more of a hotbed for terror?

If Israel really wanted to take back its captured soldiers in Southern Lebanon and Palestine last summer, black ops or special forces could have gotten the job done much better. Now there are ever more terrorists, terrorist supporters, and potential terrorists wanting to get their revenge on the state who they feel harmed them and their people. Both the Israelis and their neighbors are also scared, and there are plenty of examples of how people act amazingly irrational when scared.

If Olmert is forced out or his political condition worsens, there are multiple fears about the potential repercussions:

A more conservative government might take power, and institute policies only making the Palestinian issue worse and not act in the true national interest;

Groups like Hezbollah will see it as a victory and will launch future, more powerful attacks;

Israel's domestic political situation will be very bad, to say the least;

Olmert, if still in office, will have to make concessions to conservative Israelis or political groups in order to stay in office, thus worsening the situation.

The execution of the war in Lebanon was botched from the start. Who is to blame? Should Olmert be forced out because of his government’s poor decision making, which costed and affected hundreds of thousands of Lebanese lives, not to mention many Israelis, and increased the tension between his country and its Middle Eastern neighbors, and the international community. The strategy also proved to be counter-intuitive and might yet breed more terrorism. Israelis should take note of these major mistakes, and in the future strive for not repeating them.

For now it looks like Olmert's job is secure. But with new protests, it's anyone's guess. One outcome could be a (more) hawkish, right-wing party — more conservative than Likud — winning over support from Olmert's ruling centrist Kadima party.

technorati tags: ehud+olmert, israel, hezbollah, hamas, terrorism, lebanon, middle+east, arab+israeli, 2006+lebanon+war, olmert+political+israel, palestine

Lebanon: the next Iraq? (part 1)

Bad news about Lebanon, along with the announcement by the Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, that he would continue to fight to bring down the current, corrupt US-backed government (though it is all empty rhetoric; remember Hezbollah has a large say in the government and, like Hamas, has two faces: the moderate political one and the militant, charismatic, radical one). However, the fact that Lebanon is in such trouble may just be the thing holding factions like Hezbollah together in it. In a state where around one-third of residents are Shia Muslims, the government structure supposedly set up to lower religious political tension only exacerbates it.

CFR report:

For the last two months, Lebanon’s embattled government has barely managed to stay afloat in the face of massive street protests demanding the formation of a “unity government” in which the opposition would have a stronger voice. That opposition, made up of the Shiite Muslim group Hezbollah and its political allies, says a desire to avoid civil strife (al-Jazeera) is all that keeps them from toppling Lebanon’s leadership. But recent clashes among rival factions in Beirut have raised fears (Al-Ahram) of another Lebanese civil war.

An International Herald Tribune editorial says at the crux of the country’s unrest lies an “archaic and unfair political system that divides the country’s top offices among rival religious communities.” But all along the front lines of Lebanon’s power struggle, broader regional forces are testing their hands (USNews). The region’s widening Shiite-Sunni rift (Economist) has become particularly contentious in Lebanon, where the recent uprising was only diffused after the region’s major Shiite and Sunni powers—Iran and Saudi Arabia, respectively—intervened (AP). Iran bears substantial responsibility for the current state of affairs in Lebanon. Last week, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah matter-of-factly acknowledged what has long been asserted by regional analysts—that his group receives money and weapons from Iran (Haaretz) by way of Syria.

Syria, too, has much at stake in Lebanon. Near the heart of Beirut’s political power struggle is a proposed hybrid court that would try suspects in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The subject of an ongoing UN investigation, Syria’s involvement in the assassination is widely presumed.

From a political and humanitarian/human rights perspective, this is some good news dealing with Lebanon.

Lebanon Daily Star:

Two US Senators introduced legislation this week that would protect civilians from the deadly effects of cluster munitions - a bill that Human Rights Watch (HRW) said deserved "strong support." If passed into law, "The Cluster Munitions Civilian Protection Act," sponsored by senators Dianne Feinstein and Patrick Leahy, would prohibit the American military from using cluster munitions in populated areas and would ban the use and transfer of cluster munitions with submunitions that have a failure rate of 1 percent or more.

"If this bill passes, it would an important step toward controlling the deadly use of cluster bombs in the world," Nadim Houry, HRW's representative in Lebanon, told The Daily Star on Thursday.

Cluster munitions, which contain dozens or hundreds of small explosive submunitions, are typically dropped from aircraft or fired from artillery or rocket systems.

Cluster bombs pose a double danger to civilians as there is an immediate danger during attacks due to their inaccuracy and wide dispersal pattern, and a long-term danger after conflict, as many remain fail to detonate and can explode years later.

The US has a stockpile of millions of cluster munitions that contain between 720 million and 1 billion submunitions. Only around 30,000 of those submunitions have safety features that might bring the failure rate below 1 percent. The acknowledged failure rate for some of the others is more than 20 percent.

"This is the second attempt at presenting this kind of bill; the first was presented after the summer 2006 war with Israel," said Houry.

According to the United Nations, Israel released millions of cluster bombs in South Lebanon, where civilian casualties are still resulting from the weapons.

"The bill is being brought up again as there was a recent change in the Senate majority," said Houry.

During the 2006 war, The New York Times reported that Israel had requested delivery of surface-launched M26 artillery rockets for use against suspected Hezbullah positions in in Lebanon. Of course, the Israelis are not targeting civilians on purpose, while Hezbollah is.

According to the HRW, the wide dispersal pattern of submunitions from M26 rockets makes it very difficult to avoid civilian casualties when [deploying] the weapons in populated areas. "If bill passes, then Israel won't be able to get the M26 rockets, as their failure rate is higher than 1 percent," said Houry.

During and following the Lebanon (Hezbollah)-Israel conflict last summer many fretted over some of the weapons used by the Israelis — for example, some of these cluster bombs (supplied by the US) — and the civilian deaths and injuries they have caused. Both sides exercised injustice: Israel in irrational decision-making, Hezbollah in the aggressive acts that set off the conflict.

technorati tags: lebanon, hassan+hasrallah, hezbollah, news, politics, cluster+bombs, israel, 2006+lebanon-israel+conflict