Last week’s Israeli airstrike that killed six Hezbollah fighters and an Iranian Revolutionary Guard general in Syria’s Golan Heights has revived fears of a new Lebanese-Israeli war that would torpedo the current security status quo which is backed by international powers.
The Israeli raid has also refocused attention on the flaws that have been plaguing the Lebanese state for years since some internal parties opted to depart from legitimate authority by unilaterally taking crucial decisions and linking Lebanese developments to the explosive regional conflicts.
Most senior Lebanese government officials and politicians contacted by The Daily Star have agreed that the Israeli strike against a Hezbollah convoy in the Syrian town of Qunaitra fell within the rules of a security, military and intelligence game between the two sides.
However, senior sources in the March 14 coalition said the Qunaitra incident has renewed old questions about Hezbollah’s continued military intervention in Syria, adding that the party’s pretext of defending religious shrines in the neighboring country against terrorist and takfiri groups had brought these organizations to Lebanon and threatened to stir up sectarian strife.
“Hezbollah’s fighting on the side of the [Syrian] regime is threatening to start a war with Israel,” the sources said.
They urged Hezbollah to take “a bold decision” that would give priority to the country’s supreme national interests over Syrian or Iranian interests by withdrawing its fighters from Syria.
The sources said, however, that the choice to withdraw Hezbollah from Syria or ignite the southern Lebanese front against Israel was in the hands of Tehran, and that neither the Shiite party nor the Lebanese state had the final say in such decisions.
“Therefore, attention will be focused on Iran’s position in this respect, especially since Iran realizes that the Israeli strike reflected [the Jewish state’s] displeasure with the progress in the negotiations between it and Western powers over the nuclear issue,” the sources said.
In the meantime, a Lebanese political leader warned that the coming days would be fraught with regional developments and their repercussions on Lebanon as the region enters a dangerous crossroads threatening the international borders that have existed since 1916 in line with the Sykes-Picot agreement.
Based on the outcome of contacts he had held with leading Lebanese figures and foreign diplomats, the leader said that Hezbollah would not respond quickly to the Israeli raid, adding that the “resistance axis” – Iran, Syria and Hezbollah – would probably leave the retaliation decision to the Syrian regime.
He added that the new complication in the already complex situation in the region and commitment by some internal Lebanese political parties to foreign agendas have dispelled hopes pinned on intra-Muslim and intra-Christian dialogues to break the 8-month-old presidential deadlock.
The expectations from these bilateral dialogues do not go beyond defusing sectarian tensions and a partial implementation of a government security plan [in the Bekaa Valley], the leader said.
He disclosed that three dialogue sessions held by the Future Movement and Hezbollah have focused on ways to tackle the security situation and bolster stability in the country, without addressing the presidential election.
He added that Lebanon was one of the states in the region most affected by the faltering nuclear negotiations amid Tehran’s growing concerns over the U.S. administration’s failure to comply with its pledge to lift sanctions on Iran before the signing of the final agreement with the West, and its reluctance to recognize the Islamic Republic’s rising role in the Middle East, namely in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.
Consequently, the political leader said the intra-Muslim dialogue between the Future Movement and Hezbollah and the intra-Christian dialogue between the Lebanese Forces and the Free Patriotic Movement were only meant to mark time, cover up the presidential vacuum and safeguard the security situation.
Some visitors to Western capitals said that officials in European and Western countries have advised Lebanese leaders to maintain the current status quo, at least at the security level, while waiting for developments in the next two months related to the Iranian nuclear file, Arab and international conferences over Syria and ongoing initiatives designed to end the presidential void in Lebanon.
According to these visitors, the French initiative, undertaken by French presidential envoy Jean-Francois Girault, and other initiatives to break the presidential deadlock, would eventually yield positive results.
They hinted that Egypt, by virtue of its balanced relations with all the internal and external parties, might play an important role in the Lebanese crisis in the next stage.
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