Wednesday, March 08, 2006

Hizballah needs to decide whether it is Lebanese!

I think Lebanon may gain a lot by being somehow hezbolla-ized. Many of the party leaders have a lot to learn from Nasrallah, in term of social awareness, charisma, disinterest in bribery, coherence and discipline in his ranks...
That brief statement was part of Why Discuss's response to the last entry, titled Hizbollah-ising the Lebanese State. It is nonsense. It is a useless counterargument because it completely misses the point.

Why Discuss would have us believe that this entire conflict is about Hassan Nasrallah's charisma, his social awareness, his disinterest in bribery, and the coherence and discipline of his ranks. So the Hiwar el Watani has come about because the March 14 forces simply could not bring themselves to accept such a political entity in the government and consequently, refused to cooperate. That type of counterargument, my dear friends, is unfortunately a typical format used most diligently by the nuisance of a commenter Victorino de la Vega. It deliberately eludes the point of the intitial argument in order to distract the reader and draw his or her attention somewhere else.

The point of contention between Hizballah and the overwhelming majority of Lebanese, is not over its bureaucracy, or the charisma of its leader, or the "coherence" (whatever that means) and "discipline" of its ranks. The point of contention is over Hizballah's military wing:

  • Hizballah has a para-military force of about 20,000 - 30,000 men (compared to Lebanon's 60,000-man Army) - most of which are reserves, but never-the-less well trained.

  • Hizballah has a global network of sleeper cells that are intended to carry out attacks and assassinations if and when they receive the orders to do so.

  • Hizballah's arsenal includes thousands of rockets that target Israeli settlements, towns and cities.

  • Hizballah funds Palestinian organizations

  • Hizballah is purportedly training the militia of Musa el Sadr in Iraq

  • Hizballah possesses intelligence services that work in Lebanon in order to "protect its flanks," and in doing so, spy on other Lebanese.
In reaction to the pressure exerted on Hizballah to disarm, it is common to hear the following from the Lebanese Shi'a population:

"baddun e ashtoulna sla7na" (they wanna take our weapons away). Well I would LOVE to ask the following question in response:

WHY THE HELL DO YOU NEED THESE WEAPONS???

or rather,

HOW DO YOU BENEFIT FROM THESE WEAPONS???

Okay, Prestige... and Pride... we understand - but how else?

Let me ask those Lebanese who defend Hizballah and its right to bear weapons: Why does Lebanon need sleeper cells in Argentina, Chile, Germany or the US? How are Hizballah's cells in those countries a benefit to Lebanon's national security? If you think that those cells, the rockets Hizballah has positioned in the South, and the men that Hizballah sends to train militias in Iraq are meant to protect Lebanon, you are a fool!

I lived in Lebanon throughout the 1990s. The level of coordination between Hizballah and Syria was SICKENING!!! I was there when the Israelis withdrew, and we all celebrated the fact that Lebanese land was liberated AND that we would no longer have to fight a war in the South. Do you know how it felt when Hizballah declared - OH WAIT, WE JUST REMEMBERED, WE STILL NEED TO LIBERATE THE SHEB'AA FARMS!

That was disgusting - and that was the beginning of the end of Hizballah's legitimacy in Lebanon.

HIZBALLAH NEEDS TO DECIDE WHETHER OR NOT IT IS LEBANESE. That is it! That is the decision that Nasrallah needs to make today. The Shia need to really ask themselves WHY THE HELL DO THEY NEED THOSE WEAPONS - AND HOW DOES IT BENEFIT THEM? The Shi'a should also ask themselves whether those weapons actually harm them.

If Hizballah's leadership decides that it is not Lebanese, then the Lebanese, led by the Shi'a population, should unite and either force it to become Lebanese or expel it from our country.

25 comments:

Anonymous said...

Raja,
I don't think Why-discuss's comment warranted such a passionate response. I am not familiar with why-discuss's history of comments, but what he says is true. Although I do not agree with Hizb's agenda at all, I wish March 14 people had more Nasrallesque qualities. We could use that. Nasrallah is a very bright and eloquent man. His followers know where he stands, know he won't budge and know that he has their interest at heart. Plus the Shi'a social programs are amazing. He is a Bush with much better morals - he sent his son to die and actually won his war. And he did free the South, I am sure they love him for it.
Yes they should disarm, yes he needs to be willing to negotiate with the rest of the parties and if he does not he is not Lebanese, yes we should not be distracted by silly counterarguements a la Victorino, yes March 14 are a good bunch of people after all... but let's give Nasrallah credit where it is due. Simply put, he does has great leadership skills.

Anonymous said...

A great man once said "There is no wrong and right... there is only right and right - all that matters is your viewpoint." ;-)

I feel that lately that great man has started feeling that he is very right and Hizbollah are very wrong!
Instead of wanting to accomodating for their viewpoint to see what the Lebanese can work out and how to disarm them while preserving their dignity the great man wants to raise the pressure on them and corner them and confront them and treat them as he enemy!

Oh well ... that's just my two Liras.

Pat.

Anonymous said...

I do not know if tourist guide maps are the way to go. I am sure there are more substantial documents and they need to be reviewed and the decision needs to be scientific and done by the UN.

If they are Lebanese, then March 14 should accept it without being biased about Hizb's weapons and if it is the other way around then Hizb should accept because they need to lose their weapons anyway. If the farms are Lebanese... I think Israel can be pressured into leaving in return for Hizb giving up their weapons.

I know this sounds very idealistic. But this is what the obvious logical way to go about this. March 14 have no glimpse of hope of Hizb disarming until they deal with the Sheba'a farms. And if they are convinced they are syrian then why dont they go ahead and prove it. And if they are not, then they should work on Israel withdrawing, not on Hizballah disarming and then Hizb would have no excuses anymore.

If you ask me, March 14 need to be working a little harder. I agree with Doha, this is an easy issue to solve...WHY THE HELL IS IT TURNING INTO SUCH A BIG FUSS?

Jamal said...

"Hizballah has a para-military force of about 20,000 - 30,000 men (compared to Lebanon's 60,000-man Army) - most of which are reserves, but never-the-less well trained.


Hizballah has a global network of sleeper cells that are intended to carry out attacks and assassinations if and when they receive the orders to do so.


Hizballah's arsenal includes thousands of rockets that target Israeli settlements, towns and cities.


Hizballah funds Palestinian organizations


Hizballah is purportedly training the militia of Musa el Sadr in Iraq


Hizballah possesses intelligence services that work in Lebanon in order to "protect its flanks," and in doing so, spy on other Lebanese."

This is exactly why Lebanon shouldn't want HA to Disarm, this gives us an iota of military strength in a very troubled region.
I think we should work on bringing HA into the army in a way that the decision making is 100% Lebanese. There is no way Lebanon should get rid of this strength card. At least not now, and definitely not for free.

Jamal said...

Hummbumm- No i'm saying, if the US wants us to get rid of Hezbollah make it worth our troubles. $40 billion to wipe out our debt would be a start. not a couple of joke loans.

Ms Levantine said...

Posts on HA always seem to generate more heat than light. Raja, maybe you should define what you think being Lebanese mean, and then we could all decide who is and who is not (including ourselves).

Raja said...

Ms. Levantine,

in a strictly military sense, "being Lebanese" means placing the interests of Lebanon's national security above all other considerations - be they Islamic, Syrian, Iranian or Palestinian.

Ms Levantine said...

But Raja, according to HA this is exactly what they doing, they are protecting Lebanon against Israel and fighting to liberate every inch of our land. And all the members of March 14 at one time or another voted in parliement to support that. Don't you think we need another approach to deal with HA?

Dr Victorino de la Vega said...

« Hizballah needs to decide whether it is Lebanese! » [Raja]
« Interestingly enough, Raja, Al-Nahar [a 100% Saudi-owned ubber-partisan newspaper] news today leaked accounts of what happened yesterday…Saad replied that he already talked with Jumblatt over the phone and Jumblatt has reiterated his commitment to dialogue… » [Doha]

Yeah sure!
You guys sound like journalistic characters in a Soviet version of “Back to the Future”:
“Interestingly, The Pravda’s disinterested investigative journalists leaked Comrade Stalin’s bold reply to our reactionary foe: he had already talked to comrade Molotov on the phone, and Molotov had reiterated his commitment to constructive dialogue with all Soviet satellites”

Today, as Wahhabism replaces Marxism, notorious war criminals such as Jumblatt and Geagea are quietly walking in the shoes of the former communist leaders of Hungary and Czechoslovakia…

Raja said...

I tried to show all of you that HA is much bigger than Lebanon. It is a transnational religious organization with its major source of funding from Iran.

Lebanon is its host. It will accomodate Lebanon so long as Lebanon is a usefull host. Its eyes are set on Iran, Palestine, Europe and the US.

It is a regional para-military player with international reach.

Lebanon is only its host and a valuable source of manpower. Shebaa means nothing to it if it is liberated. Shebaa farms is valuable to Hizballah only because it gives it a reason to continue with its operations.

Please stop being so naive!

Ms Levantine said...

Raja and Doha, we are Lebanese, we are not naive, we are paranoid and world specialist in conspiracy theories. We all know that once the Shebaa farms are liberated, HA will want to liberate the 7 villages, and then Jerusalem... and that eventually they will become more formidable once the Iranians have nuclear weapons. We all agree here that HA needs to change. My point is that it is not by accusing them of not being Lebanese when they claim to have liberated the country that we are going to achieve our goals. It is hard to argue that if you are pro-Syrian and pro-Iranian you are anti-Lebanese, but if you are pro-KSA/USA/France you are a worthy patriot. As far as I am concerned in both case you are not Lebanese. Before we change HA we need to change the rules of the sectarian game. Not being able to do it has been our major failure in the past year.

Jamal said...

raja- yours is one point of view. The other point of view is that you need HA to put Lebanon in a position of strength and sees it as naive to think that you can depend on the US or UN or our Arab Brothers for protection because that route has been tried before and all we got was suffering.

Either way, the central government's job is to build a strong economy,a strong army , and strong social programs over all the Lebanese territory and that is how you render HA obsolete.
That is how I would do it, not through a confrontation without any clear strategy. That is just very dangerous.

Dr Victorino de la Vega said...

« …not through a confrontation without any clear strategy. That is just very dangerous »… and dangerously close to the Cheney/Al-Saud masterplan to turn Lebanon into some kind strategic beachhead cum recreational bordello for warmongering US marines and their idiotic/goateed Salafist friends

Anonymous said...

de la vega,

Perhaps you ought to get a new theme going, no? You have been pursuing the same tired old theme for way too long. I think I speak for many when I say, you have become quite boring. In fact, I doubt many people are still actually reading your posts.

A new idea..you can do it!
And I am here to help. Let's have you start by you posting three full sentences that do not include the words: Wahabi, Salafist, or Harrirista.

FGA

Anonymous said...

Wasnt the evil guy in the Grandizer TV Series called Vega?

Anonymous said...

You all seem to be missing the point here. Yeah HA gets its support from Iran and Syria, yeah its agenda is obviously not Lebanese. We can say the same when the Maronites invited the Syrians into Lebanon in the first place or when every sect sided with some international power during the civil war. HA really gets its support from the hundreds of thousands of Shia that live in Lebanon. You think they would be anything without this support. If you ask an average shia why they support HA they give a very plain and simple answer... "you think we want to go back to living like we did before the civil war, a bunch mtwele walking around as servants." You really should stop looking at Hassan Nasrallah to disarm HA, he never will. Like every other Lebanese political or religious figure his power is based on a confessional system and as long as the shia feel insecure about their political power they will always want to have HA. Lets be honest here HA, Syria and Iran put together have no way of defending against an Israeli invasion. HA is only there to cause some damage to a few Israeli towns. YAY!! they nuked us but at least we killed a couple of their cats. The real issue here is the shia in Lebanon and once their fear of pre-civil war political, social, and cultural treatment has been diffused maybe they wouldn’t need a group like HA to protect them. Maybe they will start thinking like Lebanese. I’m not trying to say that the shia are the only ones that think religion before country. The whole country is that way. It’s sad sometimes I think I’m the only Lebanese out there. The problem with Lebanon is not Syria or America or Israel or Iran. The problem with Lebanon is that there are no Lebanese.

Adam

Lira = 1500 said...

Just a friendly reminder Adam:

The Syrians infiltrated the Lebanese borders since the early 70's with thousands of Palestinian guerillas.

The Palestinian guerillas started the war agaisnt the Christians.

The Muslim street supported the Palestinian guerillas.

The Christians were cornered thus they called for Syria.

Anonymous said...

Lira,
Why the explanation on why the Syrians were "invited"? I am curious....

Raja said...

Adam,

thanks for your well-written contribution to this entry. I believe that you do touch upon one significant dimension of what is going on in Beirut

Why Discuss,

both Jordan and Egypt have signed peace deals with Israel. Have you heard of Israeli jets flying other either country? have you heard of Israeli artillery pounding villages in either country? have you heard of Israeli settlers claiming land in either of those countries?

Raja said...

Amazing point, hummbumm... let's rearm all the sects in Lebanon and have them promise that the barrels of their guns will always point outside the country!

Jamal said...

humm and raja-
I don't know how i ended up being the HA mouthpiece, but i'll play along :o)
The HA experience proved to be an effective "defensive" formula against a specific threat. We do need a defense formula to stop Syrian Mukhabarat activity, and all spying activity for that matter. Can this group that we called "lebanese forces" provide that? If yes, then they are more than welcome to do it. Anything to provide security for the Lebanese and save lifes. As long as it can prove through its work ethic and record that they are solely interested in defending Lebanon from said threat.

Now ultimately, and I hope for it to happen ASAP, all this is the government's job to do. It takes time to build a strong government, let's not forget we've been out of occupation for less than a year, and we are not yet fully independent. It takes time to get to a strong state. We are a lot closer today than we were a year ago. What we need is a clear step-by-step strategy to reach that strong state and not political bickering and score settling.

"Expelling" HA today without a clear drawn out road map to the strong modern state is like taking an Advil to cure your cancer. It will do us absolutely no good. They have expressed a will to disarm as part of a defense strategy, let's take them up on that and develop the capable army meanwhile. There is no harm in waiting 3-5 years even 10 years for such action if it will bring all parties together.


All the slogan filled speeches and the demagogical rallies, sound and look pretty, but all they accomplish is a confrontation between a Lebanese team and a Lebanese team, sure one team might win, but that will not build a nation.

The birth of the Lebanon we ALL want will take time , it will not happen overnight. It will take a lot of hard work. But we all have to put hand in hand and do it together; if not, we don't deserve a nation.

Anonymous said...

just a small remark

everyone agree on disarming the hezbollah, but what differs is the method.

"let's rearm all the sects in Lebanon and have them promise that the barrels of their guns will always point outside the country! "

raja, do u want also the israelians and syrians to come back to disarm the hezbollah in the last extrem?
*ironical*

lebanon doesnt have any mean to disarm it by force, and therefore extreminising the speeches in order to push them to disarm is bullshit.
better to get to a point of mutual comprehension, and through negociation

we have to differenciate short term goal and long term goal.

short term, removing the threat, but not disarming directly , talking , having a dialog

long term, having a strong state that would finally face its social , security etc... responsibilities in order to remove the popular basement of many milicias that are acting in lebanon without or without guns.

the last question would be who to trust to achieve such goal and whose acting toward this objectives and i m sorry, when i see the future having on its side geagea and joumblatt, 2 warlords i m thinking they are not well placed to do such job

Anonymous said...

Raja,

I'm really sick if this statement repeated over and over again, as we haven't learned anything from the past yet. WTF is 'lebanese'? Is there some pure blood lebanese??! This is so childish.
Or is it a representation issue? In that matter Hizbullah is the most lebanese representing the largest sect in lebanon.
Or is about external connections and working for the ousiders benifits? Then Jumby, mini-hariri in that term and simply americans (not to say traiters)!!

I couldn't see a bad/verified thing in the list you provided!!

And jumby/mini-hariri should decide whether they work for lebanon or not.

They should decide 'WHETHER OR NOT THEY ARE LEBANESE'. Putting it in you childish way, although I don't like to say that way!!!
And the final lines:
"If Hizballah's leadership decides that it is not Lebanese, then the Lebanese, led by the Shi'a population, should unite and either force it to become Lebanese or expel it from our country"

Those are really funny naive words (sorry). As if it is black and white issue and at certain time hizbullah will declare 'I'm not lebanese'!! Yeah, just tell me how this can happen!!
A peice of advise dear raja: "try not to listen to much to US Media" it is teaching you rubbish.

Regards!

Raja said...

mohamad,

I am not going to try and convince you, because it is impossible to convince a Lebanese with words. Lebanese believe what their families tell them first, because the truth in Lebanon has nothing to do with rationality and everything to do with loyalties.

See things as you wish, my friend. I am too blind to change your mind.... not only do I watch American TV, but our loyalties (and hence our truths) are different!

Hizballah, which is effectively a state within a state, and gets funding as well as direction from Iran, is purely Lebanese. 3ala rasi ou 3ayni!

Anonymous said...

I think the year was 2000 when Jumblatt declared from Qatar that Shebaa Farms are not Lebanese. But, then he felt the heat from both Syria and the Hizb. He got a stern warnning from the Syrians and the Hizb before returning home.
Jumblatt all along knows that Shebaa is a pressure ticket in the hands of Syria. Syria has no regards for shebaa citizens what so ever. Just like the Golan Hieghts. A Druze friend one time told me the Golan looks like Europe compared to what Hafez had there.