On the Simmering Southern Front
Hazem Saghieh Al-Hayat - 12/02/07//
After the South began to simmer again, going back to basics has become a necessity, as the fate of the entire Lebanese assembly rests on this front.
Perhaps we are still drinking from the fountain of the 'theory of implication' founded by late Khalil al-Wazir during the Palestinian revolution when it was launched from Jordan and Lebanon. According to this theory, an armed group would carry out a small operation that would provoke the usual massive Israeli retaliation, at which point, everything dissolves into chaos, where those unwilling to fight are dragged into fighting; and those who talk become silent.
Since we are unable to resist the temptation of fighting Israel, or proving our manhood, we sacrifice both man and stone to become rounds for the cannons and start outbidding one another in a race to break the record in the tally of martyrdom.
As a matter of fact, those calling for the closure of the southern front should not underestimate the difficulty of their objective, even if backed by the presence of international forces and a UN resolution.
This is because a domestically confused Hezbollah is looking for a way out at the frontiers, just as it did when, turning to the mainland, it faltered at the frontiers. This is in line with the nature of this entity that makes it incapable of existing in a normal state.
At the same time, confused Israel and the confused ruling Hebrew coalition, share the goal of Hezbollah, but are hoping for a victory over Hezbollah whose aim is to offer more martyrs through which it can control and hijack our lives.
Securing the borders becomes twice as difficult as the region edges closer toward a polarization marked by tension if not violence. This difficulty becomes tantamount to an impossibility when 'brothers' advocating total destruction realize that the hellish suffering of others is a means of quelling their own hell, making the success of the Mecca reconciliation in rescuing the Palestinians from inter-fighting a more pressing reason to throw the people of Lebanon into this hell.
In turn, Hezbollah critics are only abetting it and worsening their own difficult situation by disgracing it with accusations of escaping from the frontline and moving toward the mainland, as though they actually want Hezbollah to remain on the frontline, while the truth is that Hezbollah is required to physically stay away from the frontline and his critics to stay away from their stupid rhetoric.
Positions like those advocated by the abovementioned critics make it impossible to grasp the relation between the two wings of Hezbollah's comprehensive strategy, as they carry on with a fallacy that has proved to be extremely costly, and which tries to establish that they, too, are 'resisting' through other means!
In fact, closing the frontline, without any if or but, derives its importance not just from the catastrophic potential of confrontations, or from Lebanon's commitments to the outside world, but also from reasons that have to do with Lebanon itself, and others to do with the future of its people.
Lebanon, by definition, is the outcome and the embodiment of a compromise, shaped by the nature and disposition of its inhabitants. Keeping in mind that the contradiction between the Lebanese is not between some warmongers calling for a confrontation with regular armies and others calling for a guerilla warfare.
The required compromise is between those anxious to immediately jump into the fray, and those seeking to immediately avoid it.
The zeal of some of the former may lead them to provoke war, even if all Arabs and Muslims seek peace, and even on behalf of them all, thereby, essentially forming a military spearhead for an army that does not exist.
At the same time, some of the peace lovers don't care whether those around them in the Arab and Muslim area would seek peace or not.
Among the potential outcomes of such state of affairs, is that the only compromise possible is staying out of peace and war at the same time.
Perhaps some among the diligent may even add: to stay out of peace until the Palestinians make peace, and out of war until the Syrians go to war, considering that the Palestinians represent the original cause and that the Syrians represent a specific derivative of that cause; one Lebanon cannot isolate itself from.
Only formulas within this range possess the prerequisites for a compromise, and are the only formulas that seek the survival of Lebanon, not through dominance and oppression by the militarily stronger, but through the freedom of choice.
But there are other outcomes that may result from closing this front. It would deliver the Lebanese better and longer lives, they would immigrate less and become less impoverished, have better education and health care; our women will enjoy more freedoms, while we can create an atmosphere that will ease the fears of our sects from one another, and establish more appropriate circumstances, even on a relative scale, for our society to sort out peacefully its contradictions.
We must not forget that the price for heating up frontlines is exactly the price we are paying today, since we became the sole country in a state of military confrontation since 1973, and unique in being endowed with an army more powerful than the regular army and parallel to it.
The only daily translation for such state of affairs could be seen in the rising sectarian fears over battlefields of open fighting, the deepening of the religious darkness, and the inflammation of sentiments of tribalism, the looming of death and misery, mutilation and displacement, and fear and abjectness as our only horizon.
Here, there are two clear cut options.
|
