Why Lebanon won’t make peace with Israel so long as Hezbollah is around
Discussions about countries making peace with Israel come in the wake of the United Arab Emirates agreeing to normalize relations with the Jewish state.
By SETH J. FRANTZMANHezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah gives a televised speech following Tuesday's blast in Beirut's port area, Lebanon August 7, 2020 in this still picture taken from a video(photo credit: AL-MANAR/HANDOUT VIA REUTERS)
Lebanese President Michel Aoun made a cryptic comment over the weekend when asked about Lebanon and Israel making peace. “That depends,” Asia Times quoted him as saying. “We have problems with Israel, and we have to resolve them first.”This was taken to mean that such a peace was possible. It isn’t.Discussions about countries making peace with Israel come in the wake of the United Arab Emirates agreeing to normalize relations with the Jewish state. For Lebanon, things are much more complex than for the Gulf monarchies. Beirut’s complex politics mitigate against any peace because most of the groups in the country would have to be on board with the concept, and key players are not.Aoun is a Christian former general who holds the presidency thanks to a deal with Iranian-backed Hezbollah. The presidency is reserved for Christians, but the Christian community, in general, has not been linked in alliance with Hezbollah over the years.Aoun changed all that by dividing the Christian community, which is made up of a diverse plethora of groups including Maronites, Orthodox, Armenians and others. He chose Hezbollah for a variety of reasons, but it illustrates the increasing stranglehold the terrorist group has on Lebanon.As long as Hezbollah remains in Lebanon with its massive terrorist army, there will be no peace with Israel. Hezbollah has only increased in power in recent years. In the 1980s and ’90s, it was a terrorist group posing as an insurgency “resisting” Israel. When Israel left in 2000, it reinvented itself, occupying southern Lebanon as a de facto state within a state.In 2005, when Hezbollah, working with the Syrian regime, allegedly killed former Lebanese prime minister Rafic Hariri, it appeared to literally get away with murder. This caused a protest movement that ejected Syria from Lebanon. Hezbollah, angry to see its power reduced, launched a war on Israel in 2006.In the wake of that war, it grew in power and occupied Beirut in 2008 clashes. A series of assassinations, perhaps linked to Hezbollah, also killed off men like Pierre Gemayel and Samir Kassir, who were critical of Syria.Since the period between 2006 and 2008, Lebanon has come even more under the grasp of Hezbollah. It traffics missiles from Iran. It seeks to build precision-guided munitions factories. It sent fighters to fight in Syria’s civil war. It conducts Lebanon’s foreign policy. It imports items illegally via the seaport and airport. It stockpiles munitions.No state in the world has a situation involving a group like Hezbollah, with members of parliament and a large extralegal terrorist army running part of the country outside the control of the armed forces. Hezbollah even kept the opposition from obtaining the presidency between 2014 and 2016.
FOR ALL these reasons, any peace with Lebanon is impossible. Hezbollah takes orders from Iran, which is the foremost anti-Israel voice in the region besides Turkey. Together, these two countries want to influence Lebanon. The allies of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf who are in Lebanon, which tend to be the Sunni Arab parties, are not strong enough to make peace.The Christians who oppose Aoun, such as the Kataeb Party, already tried a flirtation with Israel in the ’70s and ’80s during the Lebanese Civil War. Fighters for the South Lebanon Army, which aided Israel up until 2000, recall the IDF’s rapid withdrawal and how they had to flee. This bitter experience means they would not likely go this route again. They would prefer more influence from France; they also fear jihadists being empowered by instability.But, like Israel, it is not just those voices. The rise of Hezbollah and extremist groups, as well as the civil war and the role of the Palestinian groups in Lebanon, made sure the country could never have peace with the Jewish state. Lebanon has gone from being occupied by Palestinian groups in the 1970s to being occupied by Hezbollah today.Insofar as it may have practical people who could foresee discussions with Israel, those voices will be outranked by the Iranians who work with Hezbollah.In some ways, the irony of Lebanon is that as a country with diversity, clinging to the Mediterranean, it has much in common with Israel. Intellectually and architecturally, it has European influences that in some respects matched the ways and norms of Tel Aviv in the ’20s and ’30s.For Lebanon to achieve peace with Israel, the Iranian regime would have to either accept this logic, or it would have to decline or implode, leaving Hezbollah alone.The Syrian regime would also have to agree to the concept of peace with Israel. As we know, the Syrian regime held intense discussions about a deal with Israel in the ’90s and 2000s. However, the current Syrian regime is embattled and also more under Iran’s influence, making such an attempt more difficult.Bizarrely, Lebanon, which has much in common with Israel in many ways, may be the last country in the region to make peace with its southern, Jewish neighbor.The only thing that might be expected from Lebanon is some US-brokered discussions about delimitation of rights to offshore energy blocs, which is an issue both countries care about.
