Region | Lebanon
As tensions rise Lebanese again fear the worst
Posters slapped up on the walls of Beirut's Shiite southern suburbs show the face of a slain Hezbollah leader and declare that his death is a "sign of the coming victory".
- By Alia Ebrahim, Robin Wright and Ellen Knickmeyer, Los Angeles Times-Washington Post News Service
- Published: 00:17 March 23, 2008
- Image Credit: Reuters
- A Fatah fighter walks past damaged shops in an alley at Ain Al Helweh refugee camp after night clashes between rival Palestinian groups in the camp at Sidon in southern Lebanon, on Saturday.
Beirut: Posters slapped up on the walls of Beirut's Shiite southern suburbs show the face of a slain Hezbollah leader and declare that his death is a "sign of the coming victory".
Just out of sight from Beirut's shores, US warships ply the waters. Their presence, the Bush administration says, is the United States' own warning, directed at Syria, Iran and their local ally, the Shiite armed movement Hezbollah: The Americans are watching troubled Lebanon.
Lebanon's people, survivors of a 1975-90 civil war and persistent sectarian strife thereafter, are used to rumours of war sweeping the country. Now tensions are rising again among many Lebanese, as well as the regional and international powers that claim a strategic interest in the country's internal affairs.
The sharpest fears here centre on the possibility of renewed clashes between Hezbollah and Israel, which fought for 34 days in 2006 after Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid.
Surge in applications
Today, normally sleepy towns in the country's south are abuzz with stories of Hezbollah fighters getting ready for a new war. Some Lebanese are renting second apartments in neighbourhoods far from possible areas of conflict.
Saudi Arabia, France and the United States in recent weeks have issued warnings to their citizens in Lebanon or scaled back some embassy operations, citing security. Applications for Lebanese passports have increased 30 per cent in recent weeks, according to local media reports.
"I don't know where I would go - I have nephews in different countries. If the war breaks out, I will go to them," Khadija Hamadeh, a 47-year-old Lebanese woman, said at a passport office in the southern district of Beirut. Hamadeh clutched a paper ticket, waiting for the number on it - 97 - to be called for her first-ever passport application.
"I'm tired," she said. "And I really couldn't stand another war."
This week, followers of a senior Hezbollah figure, Emad Mughnieh, who was killed in a bombing in Syria's capital, Damascus, will end the traditional 40 days of mourning.
Hezbollah blamed Israel for Mughnieh's killing and pledged "open war" to avenge him. Israel has placed its armed forces on high alert.
Because of the ambiguous outcome of Israel's 2006 battle with Hezbollah, many regional analysts say Israel's response in any renewed fighting would reach beyond Hezbollah's southern stronghold and hit targets all over Lebanon, and in Syria, which supports the movement.
"This is a very risky time, and people's worries, unfortunately, are justified," said Paul Salem, director of the Carnegie Middle East Centre in Beirut. Lebanon has been in internal political crisis since the February 14, 2005, assassination of a former permier Rafik Hariri.
The country has been without a president since November, owing to rivalries between the US-allied government and the Syrian-backed opposition, led by Hezbollah.
US officials accuse Syria of prolonging Lebanon's political stalemate in part to try to stave off an international tribunal in Hariri's bombing death. Opposition leaders, in turn, accuse the United States of wanting the deadlock to continue to prevent a less sympathetic figure from becoming president.
In recent weeks, Saudi Arabia and the United States have pushed other governments in the region to isolate Syria as punishment for Lebanon's continuing political crisis. Hariri was a close friend of the Saudi royal family, which granted him Saudi citizenship.
When President Bush toured the Middle East in January, Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz won US agreement to dispatch the USS Cole and two other ships to the Lebanese coast. Senior Pentagon and State Department officials said the Cole will stay just off the coast, except for brief missions elsewhere, until Lebanon elects a president.
King Abdullah, once considered Syria's closest ally among the Saudis, dispatched Foreign Minister Saud Al Faisal in February to Washington, Paris, London, Berlin and Moscow to ask for a united stand on Lebanon and continued pressure against Syria, said US and Saudi officials, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The Saudi intelligence chief, meanwhile, went to Beijing and Gulf countries to seek cooperation, the officials said.
But many analysts see strong tensions continuing. The polarisation is now "extreme," said Ahmad Yousuf, Director of the Institute for Arab Research and Studies, a Cairo-based centre affiliated with the Arab League.
"I don't have the impression any of these actors in Lebanon are willing to end action until their interests" in the country are addressed.
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