Telephone network keeps Hezbollah one step ahead

Beirut: A sudden flare-up of street violence in Beirut appears to have broken an 18-month political impasse between the government and the opposition, led by Hezbollah.

"This is a turning point. There can be no more cohabitation between the government and the opposition. All trust is gone," said Amal Sa'ad Ghorayeb, a Lebanese political analyst and expert on Hezbollah. "The state is going to be the focus of the struggle, symbolically and practically as well."

The showdown was triggered by a dispute over Hezbollah's private telephone network, with the government declaring it illegal earlier this week.

The coming days could decide which vision of Lebanon ultimately triumphs - a liberal, Western-friendly, free-market economy and tourist hub catering to wealthy Arabs, or a key component of a regional alliance that seeks to confront Israel and thwart Western influence in the Middle East.

Stalemate

Many analysts predicted that the stalemate would continue as neither side could afford a confrontation that could lead to civil war.

Furthermore, the politics of Lebanon often is shaped by the broader interests of external powers - such as the United States, Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and France - all of which have invested political capital here in the struggle for dominance in the Middle East.

"The variables of the big players have not changed. So on one level nothing much has changed," said Paul Salem, Director of the Carnegie Endowment's Middle East Centre. But, he adds, the risk lies in the deliberate "testing of wills" and "drumming up the public" spilling out of control, leading to an escalation that the leaders on both sides are no longer able to control.

"It's a showdown. No one can back down," said a European diplomat.

It has been known for some time that Hezbollah has installed a private non-commercial fibre-optic land-line telephone network to provide secure communications between its leaders and the cadres.

The network stretches from Hezbollah's headquarters in the southern suburbs of Beirut to south Lebanon. Since the 2006 war with Israel, the system has spread further into the Bekaa Valley in the east and even into mainly Christian and Druze areas of the Mount Lebanon district, according to Marwan Hamade, Minister of Telecommunications and a close ally of Walid Junblatt, leader of Lebanon's Druze community.

"It has been installed with the support of the Iranians," he said. "It is Iran telecom, a totally parallel network to the state network."

On Tuesday, the government announced that Hezbollah's private network was "illegal and unconstitutional" and referred the file to the judiciary and the United Nations.

The UN Security Cabinet will discuss on Thursday the implementation of Resolution 1559, which includes a clause call to dismantle "all Lebanese and non-Lebanese armed groups", a reference to Hezbollah and Palestinian factions.