Voice of Sanity

The headlines from Tripoli reflect only partially the violence, the suffering and the insanity that have beset Lebanon's northern capital in recent weeks: “nearly 1'200 mortar shells and rocket-propelled grenades were fired in Tripoli between 9 pm Thursday and 7 am Friday”, reported The Daily Star, and also: “sniper fire killed at least four people in Tripoli on Saturday after another night of clashes.”

When Syria goes bad, Tripoli goes bad too. The epic battle, the geopolitical proxy war that devastates Syria week in and week out, is reenacted in Tripoli on a much smaller scale, but no less violently.

It would be too easy an analysis to reduce the fights between the Sunni neighborhood of Bab al-Tabbaneh and the Alawite community of Jabel Mohsen to a mere sectarian conflict. These are two god forsaken places that are economically deprived, with a high unemployment rate and a general feeling of “no future”. Unrest and clashes rarely start in posh areas. They have too much to lose.

It is the insane logic of “when you fight then money will flow” that dictates the pace of events in Tripoli. The people of Bab al-Tabbaneh and Jabel Mohsen seem like two boxers in the ring – blood soaked, bruised up, with their gloves off – cheered on by a cynical crowd of petrol billionaires, aspiring hegemons and Beirut back door tricksters. You have to fight to survive. And you must kill for this.

And yet, there is at least one voice of sanity left in Tripoli. That voice, a loud voice, an assertive voice, belongs to Heba Rachrach, a young woman of 23 years. Heba is a graphic art and visual communication students, as well as studying English literature. She is a musician too. Friends say that Heba plays a sharp electric guitar.

Voice of Sanity: Heba Rachrach

However it was through the piano that Heba has become a self made peace activist. “I was playing piano right after I woke up one morning last year”, Heba told me in an interview, “somehow feeling at ease, despite the fights between Jabal Mohsen and Bab al-Tabbaneh being at their peak. I live quite far from this area, but the noises that came from those neighborhoods were nevertheless loud.”

“But this never stopped me from living how I decided to live”, Heba went on. “One minute into my piano improvisation, a bomb dropped somewhere near me and the sound of it was recorded – to my luck. I kept playing and ignored the vicious sounds that I had heard.”

“Later that day, I decided to share what had happened with my friends, so I animated “Stop the violence in Tripoli”, a short video that included the recorded music and the sound of an explosion in the midst of it. Then I posted it on YouTube.”

So far, Heba's message has received a high number of views on the internet and a remarkable amount of exposure in the Lebanese media. Now it is time to amplify her scream for peace in Tripoli further.

“What is your hope?”, I asked Heba. “I hope”, she said, “that I can spread more awareness about Tripoli's situation and to show to all Lebanese, in fact to all people, that there are many other peace seekers like me around here.”

“And no”, Heba went on, “we don't walk our streets carrying weapons only, and Tripoli is not a war zone. I consider my video an achievement because I was able to get my thoughts out and to defend freedom of speech in a city where some think that fire is louder than education.”

“I like to think that I proved them wrong.”

However, how is one expected to believe that a short video and a passionate voice like Heba Rachrach's will make a difference in a world of Great Games where morality is absent? “It is with little rain drops that a big lake is filled”, Heba replied. And it is with a timid step that Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tensing had started their ascent to Mount Everest sixty years ago, one might add.

Thanks to Heba Rachrach, an alternative narrative from Tripoli finally has a voice. There is courage and love in the most desperate places.

Stop the violence in Tripoli. This beautiful city deserves better.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Total Resistance

Mleeta is easier to find than I have imagined. I take the Nabatieh exit on the Saida – Tyr coastal highway and later turn left in Habboush to follow signs that direct me to the “resistance landmark” in Mleeta. On a hilltop, at more than 1000 meters above sea level, a former Hezbollah military outpost had been turned into a theme park. It presents the conflict that the people of South Lebanon have fought over the years with Israel and the victorious role Hezbollah has played in it.

At the park's entrance, I am awaited by Dareen and Mhamad, both locals from the Mleeta area. I had been introduced to Dareen through a friend of mine who is a relative of her. Mhamad is Dareen's cousin; a math teacher who takes pride in his clear thinking and his logical arguments.

South Lebanese people are political analysts by definition. They not only talk about politics, they live politics, even geopolitics. Dareen and Mhamad are no exception. They have a first hand experience of the aftermath of World War II, the Cold War and the times before and after 9/11. It was during these very different historical periods when Israel – in their eyes – was made the tool of Western powers to control the Middle East and to subdue its people.

between land and heaven: resistance landmark, Mleeta

And it is on their land, in South Lebanon, where Israel has made its most prominent mark in the Middle East outside of Palestine. The Israeli army had made an incursion all the way to Beirut in 1982, occupying the southern part of a country torn and divided by a civil war. By 1984, the popular resistance in South Lebanon started acting under the name of Hezbollah, following the leadership of Sayyed Abbas Mousawi (killed in 1992), Imad Mughniyeh (killed in 2008), and Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, alive and very much adored.

By the year 2000, the south of Lebanon was free again, liberated by the force of its own people. To this day, Hezbollah remains heavily armed and they plan to keep it this way for the foreseeable future.

“After the 2006 summer war”, Mhamad says, “Israel knows that it can't defeat Hezbollah militarily.” Therefore, he explains, the Israelis work directly or indirectly on the political front to have Hezbollah disarmed through a political scheme made in Beirut. “Beirut is full of collaborators with Israel”, Mhamad goes on. “South Lebanon doesn't figure in these people's business plans. However in South Lebanon, we don't intend to fall into this Israeli trap.”

The Mleeta site is an amazing mixture of architecture, art and religion. Like a well planned military operation, nothing looks random. Everything is loaded with symbolism and follows a well crafted concept. In a vast circular area in the center of the landmark, Israeli military vehicles, bombs and guns, captured from the enemy, are exhibited. Helmets of Israeli soldiers are placed accurately next to these artifacts. The grandiose work of military art is called “the abyss”. It aims to represent the political and military swamp in which Israel supposedly has fallen in its confrontation with Hezbollah.

“Why were the Arab armies defeated by Israel in six days or less, but Hezbollah was not?”, I ask Mhamad when we leave the abyss. “It is the motivation”, he says. “Egyptian, Jordanian and Syrian soldiers never really believed in the corrupt politicians and the regimes that they were supposed to fight for. With Hezbollah, it is different. Resistance fighters battle for their land and their own people and they are ready to die for it.”

in the swamp: The Abyss, Mleeta

Usually people from South Lebanon speak with one voice when talking about politics. Not so when it comes to discussing the Arab Spring and the revolutions that have blown through the Arab world since 2011. While Dareen is congratulating the Egyptian people's success to topple Mubarak, Mhamad needs yet to see a revolution in Egypt. “The Muslim Brotherhood enjoys a better relationship with the USA than the old Mubarak regime”, he argues.

“And what about the people that had protested on Tahrir square in January and February of 2011?”, Dareen insists. Mhamad lets the mathematician speak: “200'000 protesters out of a population of 80 millions don't make a revolution. Even one million on Beirut Martyr's Square in 2005 didn't change Lebanon for the good.”

“Anyway,” and Mhamad closes this round of discussion with a final statement: “a revolution without Palestine as one of its main topics is not a real revolution.”

We walk down a bushy trail past places where Hezbollah fighters had fought and ordinary people had become martyrs. We enter a bunker system and arrive at hidden rooms that had served as sleeping quarters, field kitchens or communication centers. Leaving the cave, we step onto a platform with a magnificent outlook over South Lebanon, from the hills of Mleeta to the Mediterranean Sea.

Dareen is moved. “I bring my children to the resistance landmark every now and then, to teach them the history of our land and how we were able to make it our own. Watching Israeli soldiers occupying our land and Israeli planes bombing our villages has made me what I am: a devoted member of the resistance, no matter what they say about Hezbollah in London, Paris or Washington.”

We continue the trail and arrive at Sujud Bunker, a barricade from where Israel's Sujud outpost less than one kilometer away was monitored and fired at.

“What about Israel?”, I ask Mhamad. “What is Israel?”, he replies. “Why not having the Jewish state in Argentina, in Uganda – as it was once planned – or in Eastern Europe? Why here in Palestine, where Israel is like an alien element which is vehemently rejected by its surrounding body?”

Between 1945 and 1954, the liberal Lebanese thinker and journalist Michel Chiha had warned in many articles how the creation of Israel would overwhelm liberal impulses in the Arab world. “There is no other country”, Chiha also wrote, “that recruits its population this way, by giving strangers wherever they come from, and only because they are Jewish, the right to be citizens.”

In 2013, Mhamad gives more details to these early warnings: “Jews from Ethiopia – newcomers! - are more legitimate citizens of Israel and inhabitants of Palestine than Palestinians? Please!”

“And why was the Lebanese resistance able to kick Israel out while the Palestinians were not?”, I go on asking. Mhamad tries to say it diplomatically: “these days, Hamas fights in Syria alongside the rebels, against the best friend they ever had. That's why.”

Indeed, Syria seems to be a sore point for Hezbollah. How much should the Party of God engage itself in Syria? Dareen and Mhamad can't quite agree on this. Countering my argument that I had made in a previous article for Your Middle East – that Israel had a love for Assad – Mhamad tells me that Israel wants Assad to go. Why? “Because he always made sure that weapons would flow to the resistance to hold Israel at bay. His successors might not. And that's the main reason – to keep the weapons flowing – why Hezbollah fights in Syria in support of Assad.”

“Don't you have second thoughts about supporting Assad when looking at his human rights record?”, I challenge Mhamad.

“After I have seen a rebel commander cutting the heart out of a dead Syrian army soldiers and taking a bite? No!”

We stroll back to the main square of the resistance landmark, past various types of weapons that are displayed along the way. The most intriguing piece is the Kornet-E anti-tank guided missile system. Hezbollah used this weapon to stop and destroy Israeli tanks in the 2006 war. Even the Russian manufacturers were surprised that their product would work so lethally on the Merkavas.

“How does Hezbollah acquire all these arms”, I ask, “only through Assad?”. Mhamad offers a last piece of insight: “Go to Hamra street in Beirut”, he says, “and hang around with a black briefcase. You will find your supplier soon. But be sure that your briefcase is stuffed with nice green bills.”

Everything is for sale it seems, except Hezbollah. Or rather: except the resistance? The word “Hezbollah” is rarely mentioned in Mleeta. However, there are plenty of references to “resistance”. Hezbollah may be the party, the army, the organization. But resistance is the entire people of South Lebanon. And this is what makes Hezbollah strong.

Hezbollah is an organization, resistance are the people

Some contemptuously dub Mleeta “the Hezbollah Disneyland”. However, Mleeta is much less and much more than this. Less, because this is not a place of exuberant fantasies. Mleeta is the reality. More, because Mleeta is not a fun thing, but a serious reflection, with the occasional heroic exaggeration, on the experiences made by the people of South Lebanon. Everything is possible when you believe and fight for it. Elsewhere, they call this the American dream.

P.S. It's raining when I drive back to Beirut, and the traffic is slow. I have time to contemplate the situation Hezbollah finds itself in 2013. To protect its core business, the defense of South Lebanon and its undisputed role as the principal defender of this territory, Hezbollah today feels the need to engage in foreign warfare. But as in the corporate world, foreign adventures bring along unpredictable risks.

Mleeta is unique. Hezbollah shouldn't jeopardize its legacy lightly.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Syrian Open – advantage Israel!

Has Israel officially entered the Syrian revolution when striking a military and research facility near Damascus last week? Not so fast.

Firstly, the Syrian revolution as it started out two years ago has become the proxy war in Syria. Syrian interests, and the aspirations of the Syrian people for legitimate governance that respects free speech and human rights, have become a sideshow in a greater war, the war for geopolitical supremacy in the Middle East.

Secondly, Israel will never officially enter a conflict in its neighborhood unless there is no way of denying its involvement. Israel's game is the game of ambiguous military actions, of intelligence operations and psychological warfare. The tacit cooperation that Arab countries have had with Israel over the years is one of the best kept secrets in the Middle East. The Great Satan is the great collaborator? A fact that is too outrageous to admit.

Israel was quick to make clear that its cross border foray was not aimed at the regime of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. And indeed: Israel's goals are different than one might think. Israel has nothing to gain from a regime change in Syria. They love Assad in Jerusalem! For almost 40 years, not a single bullet had been fired from Syria direction Israel. And this despite the fact that the Assad regime, father and son, had positioned itself as the last government of a neighboring country that held up the flag of resistance.

Egypt and Jordan were induced to sign peace treaties with Israel. And from the chaotic political situation in Beirut could never emerge a real threat to Israel. As Robert D. Kaplan recently wrote for Stratfor: “because the Arabs never really believed in their dysfunctional states, they didn't always fight very well in state-organized formations. But sub-state militaries like Hezbollah and Hamas have been more of a challenge (to Israel).”

In fact, it was Hezbollah that was on Israel's mind when striking in Damascus. Acting on intelligence – true or false – that weapons were en route to South Lebanon, Israel drew a red line. A red line that other stakeholders in the Syrian quagmire had drawn as well, for various reasons, but then shied away from actually enforcing it.

Israel knows that it can get away with almost anything in the Middle East. If matters should become too tricky there is always the big brother in Washington that will serve as the ultimate goal keeper.

Life is good in Israel. The unemployment rate is lower than in the United States and in Europe, despite high housing costs and the need for reform in health care and education. It seems that only outside observers are bothered by the fact that a few dozen kilometers away from the posh neighborhoods of Tel Aviv, there are people living in third world conditions. The Palestinians are passing their days under enormous stress, with only random access to water and electricity and a feeling of injustice that will never go away.

Israel is a colonizer, not a liberator. It would be foolish to think that Israel would enter the Syrian war zone on the side of Assad's opponents. It must have been sheer desperation that got the much followed @THE47_th tweeting from Homs: “Syrians undergoing their biggest debate ever: to cheer or not to cheer Israeli attack on Assad. ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? HELL YEAH”.

My friend from Homs, one is inclined to say, don't waste your tweets on Israel coming to your rescue. Israel never does anything for the sake of others. Your neighbor is the purest political realist, the most ardent disciple of Machiavelli there is. Israel only acts for the sake of its very own security environment.

The latest round in the perennial conflict that is the Middle East clearly goes to Israel. The amount of dilemma Israel's actions are able to create in the minds of others is almost funny to watch, if it were not that tragic. Should one praise Israel for bombing Assad's weapons' warehouse? Or should one condemn them, out of principle? Israel knows the psychological keyboard well and it plays it with competence.

Israel's raid on Damascus hit three targets with one strike. It showed that Syria cannot fully control its airspace (and that establishing a no fly zone over Syria would actually be possible); it cut off weapons' supply from Iran to Hezbollah, Israel's most feared enemy; and it discredited the Syrian opposition as collaborators of Israel in the Arab Street, when Assad's foes cheered Israel's military actions.

Israel deliberately added fuel to the fire in Syria. Netanyahu and his government don't care if the whole Middle East goes up in flames. In chaos, strong and focused actors thrive best.

At the end of the day, Israel prefers Assad to be in charge in Damascus, but it doesn't really mind who is sitting in the presidential palace – as long as the ruler of Syria is open for Israeli air strikes on his territory!

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Lebanon, the impossible state

After the resignation of Najib Mikati on March 22, 2013, Lebanon is without a government, again. In an attempt to avoid a descent into instability and potential conflict, Lebanon's political factions agreed to nominate Tamman Salam to succeed Mikati as prime minister. Since his nomination at the beginning of April, Salam is struggling to form a new government.

The questions have been asked before: what exactly is Lebanon and can Lebanon be governed? Reading John Agnew's "geopolitics: re-visioning world politics", and particularly the chapter dealing with different aspects of territorial states, one comes to an astonishing conclusion: Lebanon is not a state! This finding alone defines and affects every political struggle that Lebanon, and in fact many “states” in the Middle East, is facing.

What is a territorial state? According to Agnew's geopolitical theory, a territorial state has exclusive power within its territory as represented by the concept of sovereignty; it is a political entity where domestic and foreign affairs are essentially separated realms in which different rules obtain; and finally: the boundaries of a territorial state define the boundaries of society such that the latter is totally contained by the former.

Looking at Lebanon, one can discard all three of these assumptions. The exclusive power within its territory is a mere wish for Lebanon. Israeli airplanes violate the Lebanese airspace almost daily; Israel still occupies parts of Lebanon such as the Shebaa Farms and Ghajar. Out in the Mediterranean Sea, the sea boundaries urgently need demarcation amid the discovery of gas fields and claims by Israel that these resources are on their side of an unmarked border. Already Israel has begun to exploit these gas fields, while Lebanon is still discussing how to go about this project.

In addition, the whole of Lebanon is actually claimed by Syria, which only in the last years seemed to accept the idea of an independent Lebanon. Meanwhile, Syria is forced to mind its own business, having sunk into a civil war, with increasing violations of the Lebanese border by all sides of the conflict.

disputed: oil and gas from the Mediterranean

Domestic and foreign policy are clearly one and the same in Lebanon, at least at the level of the political class pretending to govern Lebanon. With a central power not existing and thus failing to protect the different sub-national communities in Lebanon, these communities look to foreign supporters to give them protection in the domestic ring. That is why Lebanese politicians are constantly on the road, to consult with their mentors and to secure their support. These politicians know the 5-star hotels in Paris or their own private mansions in Jeddah much better than the road from Beirut to Tripoli or the Roman ruins of Baalbek.

So is the containment of the Lebanese society within the boundaries of the Lebanese state? There are approximately four million people living in Lebanon, but more Lebanese are living outside the country, with estimates ranging from five millions to fifteen millions (but the latter number seems inflated and includes probably everybody who quotes Kibbeh as favorite dish). In addition to the Lebanese citizens, there is a big number of Palestinians living inside Lebanon, in camps that have become the end solution of what was thought to be a transitional stage. With Syrian refugees fleeing the war in their country, there are new arrivals to Lebanon every day. The territory called Lebanon is not the society and the society is not Lebanon.

Lebanon's non-existing sovereignty of its state culminates in all matters related to Lebanese citizens working abroad. Lebanon is reliant on exporting labor, in order to keep the unemployment rate in Lebanon as low as possible. At the same time, the money these workers are sending back to Lebanon is an important economical factor. However, these dependencies make Lebanon – again – vulnerable to outside pressure. During the Syria crisis, Qatar and other Gulf countries threatened, on many occasions, to expel Lebanese foreign workers should Lebanon not come more in line with their policies in Syria. Clearly, Lebanon is not the keeper of its own fate.

Is there a Lebanese society at all? Or is it rather a collection of countless religious communities, with a layer of clan structures on top of it, which together form the entity known as Lebanon? As Michael Young argues in his book "the Ghosts of Martyr Square", it is precisely this net of communities that make Lebanon the most liberal state in the Middle East, because all together these communities are more powerful than the state - the main barrier to personal freedom in the Middle East. But this personal freedom comes with a price: the power of the communities has deadlocked the state system on so many levels and occasions that it is in dire need of reform.

The idea of a powerful central state has always been a hard sell in Lebanon. For Michel Chiha, the liberal thinker and journalist, and one of the fathers of the Lebanese constitution, the mission of the state was to preserve the diversity of the society. The state should refrain from interfering with the communities and certainly not intervene in economical matters. A popular slogan, used by the Phalange party during the Lebanese civil war, was: “the strength of Lebanon lies in its weakness.” One might deplore that Lebanon is part of the Middle East: in a less perilous environment, Michel Chiha's theories could have been a guarantee for peace and stability.

A core feature of state power is its ability to grant civil rights to its citizens. As all issues of life and death in Lebanon, affairs like marriage, divorce and inheritance have been outsourced to the religious communities (or actually, they have never been insourced by a Lebanese state). You are born, you marry, you divorce, you die and you inherit under Shia, Sunni or Christian law - different rules for people with the same nationality. Everywhere you go, your religion goes with you, whether you like it or not.

The movement for a civil marriage in Lebanon has not gained much momentum until now. This is somewhat surprising since, according to a 2005 survey, a remarkable 34% of Lebanese privilege their national identity over their confessional identity (in Jordan: 23%, in Morocco: 7%). In 2013, these numbers tend to be more in favor of the confessional identity. Events in the Middle East in the last two years have led to a relapse into religious factionalism instead of giving way to an overarching understanding of a civil society and a democratic state.

Recently, a brave Lebanese couple put up with all the paperwork and the political pressure to actually push through with the first ever civil marriage in Lebanon. Only a cynic is now waiting for the first civil divorce.

The legitimacy of modern states largely rests on "infrastructural power": the state's provision of public goods and services to the people living within the boundaries of the territorial state. With the ability to provide centrally and territorially organized services, the state delivers something other organizations cannot. In return for the infrastructure provided by the state authorities, the people grant power to these authorities and allow them to govern. It is a typicaldo ut des situation. The territorial state is no longer entirely the creation and in the service of state élites, but acts in the name of the people and for the people.

windmill project: infrastructural power

What Lebanon desperately needs is indeed infrastructure. It needs infrastructure for handling the ever growing mobility and traffic. It needs telecommunication infrastructure; and it needs electricity, uncut. Everyday Lebanon is losing millions of dollars because of the lacking or wanting infrastructure! People in the Beirut area spend hours in nerve wrecking traffic jams instead of being productively at work. A working high speed Internet would further enhance and exploit the creativity and the business-minded attitude of the Lebanese. And the perennial power cuts slow down every effort to get things done and are a daily reminder of the failures of the Lebanese system.

Therefore, Lebanon: forget about forming a new government that balances the various political and religious groups. Cut the never ending hours of useless political discussions down to zero. Stop leading the wrong discussions. Lebanon doesn't need politicians who see Lebanon as a self-service shop, for them and for their constituency. Lebanon needs independent, yet determined leading figures who go to church on Friday or on Sunday, and then mean business for Lebanon for the rest of the week. Lebanon needs people sitting on the board of LEB Corp. because of their vision and their deeds, not because of their religion or their foreign backers.

Only when there is infrastructural power coming out of Beirut - and when it is flowing to all places in Lebanon - will people understand that paying taxes is not a waste of money but a good investment. Lebanon doesn't need a shaky Democracy, it needs a stable Technocracy!

Hezbollah is undisputed in South Lebanon not only because it succeeded in resisting Israel. The party also provides the people of Southern Lebanon and the Bekaa with roads, bridges, schools, hospitals and public housing - which are destroyed by Israel in every new war which only increases the infrastructural power of Hezbollah when they rebuild it. This type of power is needed for all of Lebanon and it should be easy to realize.

Or does Lebanon need a nod from Saudi Arabia to build a subway from the Casino du Liban to Downtown Beirut? Does it need a Syrian OK, or a Russian OK for that matter, to build a plant of wind turbines in the ever windy Tripoli area? Do you have to ask the mullahs in Tehran when you want to boost the speed of the Internet in Tyre to 20MB/sec? Or does a Lebanese leader have to go to Washington, Paris or London to get the green light for enforcing emission reduced cars on Lebanese roads? If you need to do all of this, we might better call the idea of a Lebanon a day. We might sell parts of it to Iran, some to Syria and some to Saudi Arabia and leave Beirut for the Americans, to have them make a Disneyland Middle East out of it, shopping malls and fancy clubs included. But then, Lebanon is history.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Lebanon: Host and Hostage to Syria's War

Two years of war in Syria and there is no end in sight. Announced dead on many occasions, the regime of Bashar al-Assad has demonstrated more staying power than expected. The swift regime changes that had taken place in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya led some to the wrong assumption that Assad would soon be history as well.

The forces opposed to Assad keep displaying an almost unbelievable disunity, considering the enormous task at their hands. Uncoordinated and fragmented into many fighting groups, the opposition can win battles, but cannot win the war. To win against a regime that fights with its back to the wall, Assad's foes would need an overarching strategy, both on the military and on the political front. Instead, they keep bombing here and striking there, while a political opposition body speaking with one voice has yet to be constituted.

The longer the war in Syria goes on, the more Lebanon is drawn into this war. Basically, Lebanon is a patchwork of different fabrics, stitched and held together by a vague notion of being superior to its Middle Eastern neighbors. However in the spring of 2013, the patchwork of Lebanon is under severe stress, and the seams begin to burst.

On the one hand, the Lebanese anti and pro Assad camps emulate the events in Syria on a local stage, most visible in Lebanon's northern city Tripoli. Last week's clashes between the various factions have again caused victims on both sides of the front line. In Beirut and in Southern Lebanon, Syria is on everybody's mind as well: Hezbollah sends their fighters to Syria in order to support Assad on the battle field; Lebanese President Sleiman orders the army to stop all armed men en route to Syria; and Prime Minister Mikati resigns after disputes related to Syria within his government, leaving Lebanon heels over head once again.

a vague notion of superiority: Lebanon's patchwork

On the other hand, Syrian opposition forces use Lebanon as their retreat area, where they train, regroup and collect their breath. The Syrian presence in Lebanon today reminds him of the situation in Lebanon some 40 years ago, says Daoud, a reporter and media expert from Beirut, to whom I talk via Twitter and email. In the 1960s and 1970s, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) used Lebanon as their base of operations to fight Israel. The Lebanese state was too weak and too divided to keep the actions of the Palestinians and the Israelis on Lebanese soil under control.

The consequences were disastrous: Lebanon blew up in a civil war in 1975, Israel occupied parts of Lebanon until the year 2000, and Syria was invited to come to the rescue of some parties of the Lebanese civil war. Syrian troops would only leave Lebanon in 2005, after the assassination of Lebanon's Prime Minister Rafic Hariri and the ensuing so called Cedar Revolution.

Could the same scenario play out today? Could Lebanon again be host and hostage to foreign forces? With a powerful Lebanese state still being an illusion, the conditions for a strong foreign influence in Lebanon remain in place. Marie-Joëlle Zahar argues in “Lebanon – after the Cedar Revolution” that “when the state fails to credibly protect sub-national communities, these communities have two options to acquire the means to defend themselves against perceived threats: build up their military strength or enter into alliance with stronger powers that can protect them”. With Hezbollah heavily armed and aligned with Iran; with Sunni movements supported and guided by Saudi Arabia and Qatar – and with many other groups having similar arrangements – both options are a fact and a factor in Lebanon: yesterday, today and tomorrow.

However herein lies one of the problems of Lebanon: when potent protectors of Lebanese factions come under pressure on their home turf, as it is the case with Syria and Iran, the consequences are felt within the Lebanese system.

With the perennial clashes between the Alawite neighborhood of Jabal Mohsen and the Sunni neighborhood of Bab al-Tabbeneh, the bad news from Tripoli keep coming. “Tripoli today is not the same Tripoli that it was one month ago, and certainly not the Tripoli that it was three years ago.” Hanna, who hails from Tripoli, but now spends his week working in Beirut, is straight forward in his assessment. “Huge ideological changes have turned Tripoli into a more Islamic city. It quite feels like Tripoli is not in Lebanon anymore”, Hanna goes on. “Fighters belonging to the Free Syrian Army keep coming in and youngsters from Tripoli are leaving the city to fight against the regime in Syria.”

Is anyone trying the stop the downfall of Tripoli? No, says Hanna, and blames the Tripolitan society for remaining silent on everything that happens to their city. Gunman wandering the streets, Salafists becoming decision makers in Tripoli: the city breaks down violently, the population suffers silently.

Hezbollah was undoubtedly the strongest party in Lebanon in the past decade, having thick ties to Assad in Syria and the Mullahs in Iran. In its modus operandi, Hezbollah behaves like a heavy weight boxing champion on an off day. Hezbollah doesn't hit first, but is ready to react decisively to any provocation coming their way.

But more and more, the Hezbollah monopoly on weapons is challenged. Groups from the Sunni side of the Lebanese spectrum have also started to arm themselves, explains Daoud, in anticipation of things to happen. This mutual arming may lead to mutual deterrence. However, it may also lead to violent skirmishes, even to a destructive war. Events in Syria can spark many matches in Lebanon.

Is there a battle between Hezbollah and Jabhat al-Nusra (the Jihadist group very active in Syria) looming on the horizon? “Not so fast”, tells me Amani, “this will only happen with the Nusra Front starting the fight”. Amani is from South Lebanon; “resistance is my religion” is her Twitter account's motto. “And maybe”, Amani carries on, “Hezbollah wouldn't even take up the fight against the Nusra Front, but rather would have the Lebanese army facing them”. However to some people in Lebanon, the distinction between Hezbollah and the Lebanese army is only a theory.

a heavyweight boxer on an off day: Hezbollah

Syria's future is not in Syrian hands anymore. For Ziad, who is a regular contributor for Your Middle East from Beirut, the geopolitical dimension of the Syrian conflict is obvious. “Think of the situation in Syria as a tug of war between many different blocs, with many different goals, performed in the Syrian theater”, Ziad says. “This is called the international game of geopolitical chess, and Syria and Lebanon are only pawns in this game.”

Indeed! “Syria” has a multitude of dimensions. And many of them are circling around Iran. It is the USA vs. Iran and the proxy war to stop Tehran's nuclear program; it is Saudi Arabia vs. Iran and the war for supremacy in the Muslim world; and it is a revenge for Iraq which the USA had occupied ten years ago but Iran has won in the meantime. Now, it is time to stop Iran in Syria. The struggle of the Syrian people for democracy and a life without an oppressive regime has been reduced to a mere side note in a country pushed and shoved by foreign interests.

Lebanese sometimes tell the following story: When God created the mountains, the plains and the rivers of Lebanon, the desert countries became envious. God then said that he would allocate two neighbors to Lebanon which will make the life of the Lebanese miserable. And so it happened: Lebanon became the stage of conflicts of third parties.

Lebanese like to portray their country in this way. Lebanese like to see themselves as victims of evil forces envious of their beautiful country. They like to fade out their part in the story. In Lebanon, the central state, the main barrier to personal freedom in the Middle East, is deliberately kept weak. But this freedom comes with a price. “Before the 1975 civil war”, writes Marie-Joëlle Zahar, “the Lebanese state was perceived as unable to deter and now is increasingly perceived as unable or unwilling to assure. The difference is significant in that the state is now seen as a direct threat to some of its citizens.” This does not bode well for stability in Lebanon. With or without Syria.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here

IRAN AND USA: LOGICAL ALLIES IN A WRESTLING MATCH

1989 was a year full of historical events. The fall of the Berlin wall; the massacre on Beijing's Tianamen square; the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan: these milestones all highlighted the end of an era and the dawning of a new world order.

However for Iran, a different event was more important in 1989. When Iranian heavy weight wrestler Ali Reza Soleimani beat the American wrestling icon Bruce Baumgartner for the title of world champion, it was a much needed lift for the Iranian collective soul. Iran was heavily reeling from eight years of war with Iraq that had ended in 1988. Saddam Hussein's war machine, fueled and serviced by the Reagan administration, had brought devastation and the loss of innumerable lives upon Iran.

Soleimani's victory made him an instant hero in a country where wrestling is more than a sport. Iran's cultural heritage, its politics and its religion are all bound up in this sport, writes Dominic Byrne, who describes the meaning of wrestling for Iran in an article published in the New Statesman. Varzesh-e Bastani, as the original form of wrestling is called in Persian language, combines elements of the pre-Islamic Iranian culture with the spirituality of Sufism. An ideal wrestler is expected to be pure and truthful, promoting inner strength through outer strength, emanating from a strong body. An Iranian fighter literally embodies “Jihad”, the Islamic concept so often misunderstood in Western readings.

Throughout its history, wrestling was used in Iran for political goals. Both the Shahs of the Pahlavi dynasty and the Mullahs of the Islamic revolution capitalized on the sport's popularity, emphasizing either the pre-Islamic tradition or the Sufi mindset of the sport.

when Iran beat the USA: Soleimani - Baumgartner, 1989

In international sports, Iran has had much success in the past when competing in wrestling tournaments. Up to the London games of 2012, Iranian wrestlers have won 38 Olympic medals, eight of which in gold. Only a few nations have done better. Among them the United States, winning a total of 129 medals over the years. Clearly, successes on the wrestling mat have done a lot for the Iranian and American people to feel good about themselves.

But then a shock announcement was made in February 2013: the International Olympic committee (IOC) plans to delete wrestling from the Olympic program, starting in 2020. A final decision will be taken in September of this year in Buenos Aries where the IOC will hold its next congress.

Away from the sport stadiums, the USA and Iran are entangled in a political wrestling match since the 1950s - in a match that seems to have no end. In 1953, a coup d'état, orchestrated by the United Kingdom and the United States, removed the democratically elected government of Prime Minister Mohamed Mossadegh. He was replaced with Shah Reza Pahlavi who was deemed more submissive to Western interests in Iran.

In 1979, and after the Shah had to cede power to the revolutionary Ayatollah Khomenei, Iranian activists stormed the American embassy in Tehran. They took 52 diplomats hostage, holding them for 444 days. Since the Tehran hostage crisis the relationship between the USA and Iran has gone only downhill. It culminated with Argo winning the Oscar for best movie in 2013, announced right out of the White House by First Lady Michelle Obama.

In the last 34 years, the USA have tried to control and subdue, to clinch and joint lock an unruly Iranian regime. Consecutive governments in Washington have piled up a mountain of sanctions, from the Iran-Iraq Arms Nonproliferation Act in 1992 to the Iran Freedom and Counter-Proliferation Act of 2012. And yet, Iran has still not surrendered.

Do the United States know with whom they are dealing? For geopolitical analyst Robert D. Kaplan, Iran is a natural nation, with a greater degree of institutionalization than almost everywhere in the Middle East. Iran possesses the key geography of the Middle East – situated between the Indian Ocean and the Caspian Sea, with abundant energy resources – making it fundamental to global geopolitics. The Mullahs of Iran, as suffocating and repressive their rule may be, have read Hegel and Marx and understand the purpose of history. Unlike Syria, Libya and Algeria, Iran is not a colonial product, with borderlines drawn in Paris and London. The Iranians know this and they show it.

Like wrestling, the nuclear program is a cornerstone of Iran's national pride. And just like the sanctions that try to stop it, the program has become an end in itself. The Iranians have fought for too long, and against all obstacles, to develop their own nuclear technology. They can't just walk away and give it up. Why should they? All the more since the program keeps not only the Iranians happy. Intelligence services and armies worldwide have used the argument of the Iranian nuclear program possibly morphing into a nuclear bomb to justify billions of dollars spent on analytical teams, intelligence operations and procurement drives. The defense industry has concluded thousands of contracts to arm Iran's opponents to the teeth, in anticipation of an Iran having the nuclear option in its arsenal.

No one is more afraid of a nuclear Iran than Saudi Arabia. In a recent study by Shibley Telhami from the University of Maryland, the Saudis expressed concern opposite an even peaceful use of Iranian nuclear technology. This would likely enhance Iran's economic power and provide further opportunities to expand Tehran's influence.

nuclear right, national pride: manifestation in Iran

Israel on the other hand could live with a deal allowing Iran the peaceful development of nuclear technology. The Israelis can even understand an Iran seeking nuclear armament – unless Netanyahu and foes are in an election battle. On the Charlie Rose Show of November 2011, defense minister Ehud Barak explained this surprising confession rather convincingly. With the Americans sitting in Afghanistan, so Barak, in Iraq (at the time of the interview) and in Bahrain; with the Russians in the north and the Pakistani in the east, both nuclear powers; and with the experience of having seen Muammar Gaddafi go down only a few years after he had renounced nuclear weapons, the Iranians would actually act quite rationally should they acquire the best defense they can get. Ehud Barak, Israel's former Chief of General Staff, certainly knows a great deal about a rough security environment.

For now, both Saudi Arabia and Israel are relying on Washington to protect them from a future Iranian aggression. Thus, the United States have their hands full with tightening the sanctions on Iran, sending money to Israel and arms to Saudi Arabia, while at the same time trying to alleviate the effects of the sequester on their defense budget. Within the 5+1 formula, the Americans have just met Iran in Almaty for nuclear talks, and will meet them again in Istanbul the coming weekend and in Almaty in April 2013.

And in the middle of this, the USA talk wrestling with Iran. Thanks to the IOC's announcement, the two countries have finally found a common ground and a common goal. “Arm in arm”, as Press TV and Fox News have reported in a rare unisono, Iran and the USA want to combat the IOC's decision. Wrestling must remain on the Olympic menu. To discuss their joint strategies, delegations of both countries have held talks in Tehran last month and are scheduled to convene again in May, in New York City.

Should the Iranian - American wrestling initiative transcend into a deal on the political front, ending the standoff in the nuclear issue, the International Olympic Committee has to be the frontrunner candidate for this year's Peace Nobel Prize. After all, the United States and Iran, with their deeply rooted sense of being morally superior nations, are logical allies for controlling the Middle East. They just don't behave this way. For now.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Marching in Marrakech

The flight from Europe is short on this February afternoon in 2013 and yet, when I leave the airport in Marrakech, the scenery has completely changed. Instead of snow and temperatures below zero, I find a desert town bathing in light. The colors of Africa are mixed with the laid back bustle of an Arab city.

Jemaa al Fna, a big square in the middle of the old city, is the center of Marrakech. After sunset, it feels like the center of the universe. The square is filled with musicians, snake charmers and tattoo artists, entertaining tourists and locals alike. A thin layer of smoke lingers over Jemaa al Fna, coming from the many food stalls that offer grilled meat and the traditional Harira soup to an ever hungry audience.

However, Jemaa al Fna is in mourning. On April 28, 2011, the Argana café on the upper left corner of the square was the site of a terrorist attack that killed 17 people, 15 of them foreigners. The café has not opened again and is still under construction. It is an ugly wound in Marrakech's flesh, a reminder of a world where destiny can turn to tragedy in a fraction of a second.

The Marrakech bombing came at a time when the popular uprisings in the Arab world were in their infant stages. Tunisia's Ben Ali had left the country, Mubarak was in jail and Gaddafi was fighting for his survival. “Syria” had just begun. It came at a time when the Moroccan King, Mohammed VI, must have been very worried about the future of his country and his dynasty. Till today, some people claim that the bombing was a government plot to demonstrate to the Moroccan people how ugly things can be when all order is lost. However, this rumor seems quite far fetched.

Marrakech Souk: "Prix Démocratique"

Marrakech is famous for its crafts, for furniture, pottery and copper lamps. I take a taxi to the industrial area of Sidi Ghanem where many shops cater to mostly European customers. The shop owners I talk to while I march the streets of Sidi Ghanem are mostly happy with the way business is running in 2013. Business owners like it calm, and that is the situation in Morocco today, at least to the outside observer. Thus, tourism is thriving.

In 2011, the King had no choice but to introduce political reforms in order to contain revolutionary unrest that was present in Morocco as well. A new constitution was quickly drafted and general elections were held, bringing the Islamist Party of Justice and Development (PJD) into the government. But since the elections in November of 2011, the drive towards reforms has considerably slowed down. Some observers call the relationship between the PJD and the King a cohabitation: the PJD enjoys being in some sort of power, and the King's intention is only to relinquish as much power as absolutely necessary.

Many of the shop owners in Sidi Ghanem are French, selling Moroccan handicraft to visitors from Europe. The local market is rather small. Moroccans prefer more “shiny” interior design, not the colors of the desert – red, brown and dark yellow in different shades - one shop owner tells me. That said, this trend has been slightly reversed in recent years. Moroccans have encountered Moroccan design in Europe and now ask for it back home.

One of the native shop owners in Sidi Ghanem is Mohamed. He is a master potter and holds King Mohammed VI in highest esteem. Besides his shop, Mohamed heads a project that already has enabled 600 unemployed youths to leave the streets and start a training as a potter, with a diploma in two years. The project is funded by the King and Mohamed is proud to display a photo with him and the King in his shop.

Under the late Hassan II, the King's father, having his portrait in every public place was mandatory. Under Mohammed VI, this law has been eased. Nevertheless, most shop owners prefer to have a portrait of the King in their shops, in different styles and settings: the King as a fashion model, posing by the pool; the King with his family; and the King depicted as an object of art, in a black and white portrait Banksy-style.

Object of Art: King Mohammed VI

“I am doing fine”, admits Mohamed, “I have my shop and the pottery project, I hardly pay taxes and the gas is cheap.” Other Moroccans are less optimistic about their future. A recent survey I read about in Morocco's French language newspaper “Le Matin” shows that 70% of the Moroccan people fear an increased rate of unemployment for 2013. And more than 80% of the Moroccan households think that they won't be able to save any money this year. Overall, the level of confidence of the Moroccan households was lower at the end of 2012 than in 2011. With announcing his reforms, the King had raised the expectations for an improvement of the economic situation. Expectations that haven't been fulfilled until now. The high level of unemployed people keeps being a social and political time bomb in Morocco.

Maybe women can do a better job in moving Morocco forward. Since 2009, Marrakech has a female mayor, Fatima Zahra Mansouri, and she is getting great reviews. “Her predecessor was a thief”, says Mohamed, the master potter, “and we are happy to have Fatima now”. She is from the neighborhood of Sidi Ghanem and still is very visible there, even as a mayor who also holds a seat in the Moroccan national parliament in Rabat. With Mansouri, corruption has disappeared from the city hall of Marrakech. Mansouri, who is 37, is also perfect for business. Hamid Bentahar, the chairman of the Marrakech Tourism Council, is glad to have her at the top of Marrakech's political ladder. “To have a young woman who is mayor has been very attractive for tourism”, he is quoted in a article recently published in Time.

Where is Morocco heading from here? So far, the King has mastered the course of his country with carefully crafted reforms, enough to calm the masses and to secure the ongoing love of most of his people. Without revenues from an oil and gas sector, which in some Arab countries are used to ward off any democratic ambitions, Mohammed VI must slowly but surely move towards a more accountable system. This will eventually end up in a parliamentary monarchy where his function is reduced to a mere representative position.

However, the king may not be safe just yet. Particularly young Moroccans have already well integrated the vocabulary of the winds of change blowing through Tunisia and Egypt. One young rug seller calls the price he offers me a “prix démocratique”, meaning a price that leaves everybody satisfied. A Moroccan citizen I ask about the inertia that has beset Morocco's political system in 2012, tells me that this might be the strategy of the Islamist party. The PJD deliberately does nothing while publicly deploring that their hands are tied because of the King's still existing all encompassing grip on decisions. That way, they aim to increase the pressure on the King to give up more of his rights. The PJD's strategy might work, but only if the King goes along with it. The future of Morocco, and the peaceful transition into a new political system, depends very much on a monarch being able to do what is best for his country.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.