Maronites and the two Michels

Here is one argument for why Lebanon’s Christians, and the Maronites in particular, should seriously consider surrendering the presidency. We can sum it up in just three words: the two Michels—as in Michel Aoun and Michel Sleiman.

With Aoun we have a familiar figure in Lebanese political tradition: a Maronite ravenous for presidential power who has illustrated better than most the destructiveness of his ambition. From the days that President Amin Gemayel appointed him to lead a transitional military government in 1988, until 2008, Aoun has dreamt of becoming our head of state. He dreamt of it in the darkest days of his exile at La Haute Maison, amid the open fields of an isolated hamlet in the distant periphery of Paris. He dreamt of it when he allied himself with Hezbollah after his return to Lebanon, imagining that the party’s weapons and Syrian patronage would impose him on his enemies.

And when they didn’t, Aoun still dreamt of Baabda. He concluded that even though Michel Sleiman had been elected in May 2008, it was Michel Aoun’s right to be president in place of the president. And here we are reminded of what the great French historian René Grousset once wrote of the Roman general and politician Pompey. Somehow, he also offered up a succinct, incisive portrait of Michel Aoun:

“What was it his ambition to attain in the Republic? A sort of moral presidency to which, after the services he had rendered, he had some right? To rule, with our without a formal title? Especially to accumulate honors, many honors, which would have satisfied his vanity and his irresolution, but which his secret mediocrity would have prevented him from turning into something redoubtable?”

Having won a lion’s share of ministers in the new government, Aoun may have succeeded in attaining a moral presidency and will now strive to rule without a formal title. But his secret mediocrity will get the better of him, as his attempts to display resolution will expose his innate recklessness. All that will be left is vanity, discolored by cynicism deriving from Aoun’s corrosive dissatisfaction.

Aoun’s rival, Michel Sleiman, has only a formal title and the honors accompanying it to hold up as a bulwark against irresolution. Hailed as a savior in 2008 at the pinnacle of his career, the president has left no vale of hesitation, of reversal, unvisited since that time. Having been handed two of the four sovereign ministries in Fouad Siniora’s government of July 2008, and those again and more in Saad Hariri’s government of December 2009, the president should have built himself sturdy political foundations. Instead, he has relegated himself to the status of political nonentity, the latest insult being his obligation to “share” the Interior Ministry with Aoun.

Perhaps the ultimate statement on the presidency was provided by Emile Lahoud. Though the man benefited from the backing of Syria, Hezbollah, and the intelligence services, he ended up toothless, reviled, a casualty of the impossible incongruities of presidential office. Sleiman is learning a similar lesson. To be potent, a president must be a Maronite chieftain and play the communal game hard-nosedly, without inhibition—isolating foes, picking fights to rally the partisans, driving opponents into minefields of disputation. But Sleiman, whose conceit compels him to disregard the fray, stands blankly, godfather to a government over which he has little influence.

This reality should invite a profound reassessment in the community. Is the Maronites’ continued insistence on retaining the presidency a source of strength or weakness? Not only has competition over the office become a source of inter-communal cannibalism, but the presidential institution has lost much of its punch. Worse, it has become a repository for those embodying the lowest common denominator of agreement among Lebanon’s diverse political actors, who must appeal to everyone because they threaten no one.

Recently, Maronite Patriarch Bechara al-Rai made an ill-considered statement on the matter. He called for the Taif Accord to be renegotiated in order to give the president more power. It didn’t seem to occur to the patriarch that amending Taif might well push the Muslim communities, quite legitimately, to demand that the accord be implemented in full, which would imply abolishing political confessionalism. And if Lebanon abolishes political confessionalism, then the presidency would no longer be reserved for Maronites.

It’s a pity that Rai and Maronite leaders in general refuse to address that possibility. Yet picture a system that gradually erodes confessionalism, or sectarianism, and that allows, at least in an interim period, for the different communities to rotate between the top posts. In that context we might envisage Lebanon as a real country rather than an assemblage of religious tribes. As spirited citizens of a nation rather than the fearful offspring of a dwindling minority, Maronites could begin reinventing themselves in a reinvigorated society.

The presidency is no more a guarantor of Maronite strength than Michel Sleiman represents the highest aspirations of his coreligionists. How demoralizing that for months the community has been driven by the calculations of the two Michels over cabinet portfolios. If you missed that clash, it’s a good sign. It means you understand the triviality surrounding presidential maneuvering.

An economic vice squeezes Assad's patronage system

In his speech on Monday, President Bashar Al Assad made pointed reference to the dangers that Syria's burgeoning protest movement posed for the country's economy. What he didn't say, however, was that a prolonged economic crisis also threatened his regime. The crisis may be nearing the tipping point if one is to believe a report prepared in May by European Union diplomats based in Damascus.

The report paints a dire picture of what lies ahead economically for Syria. The diplomats do not make political predictions, but they do not need to. For an Assad regime fighting for survival, the economy is an Achilles heel, undermining the leadership's patronage power and its ability to keep onside a demoralised business class that is a pillar of the system.

The document warns that Syria's political predicament "could potentially lead to a long-term recession or even a collapse of the economy if the unrest continues". The European diplomats cite projections by the Institute of International Finance of a 3 per cent contraction in GDP this year. Liquidity has been running low, forcing the closure of companies, while the Damascus Securities Exchange, the report continues, has lost 20 per cent of its value since January.

Syria's tourism industry has been hit especially hard, with zero occupancy rates reported in major hotels for the foreseeable future. This is ominous for a sector that accounts for 15 per cent of GDP and employs, officially, 6 per cent of the workforce. Trade has also declined, even if the figures are sketchy. Internal trade has been interrupted by insecurity on the ground, while the transit trade from Turkey to the Gulf is estimated to have declined by 30 per cent. The demand for imports has also declined, eating into customs revenues.

The European diplomats are particularly troubled by prospects for inflation. In an effort to alleviate public displeasure, the Assad regime earlier this year raised public-sector salaries and pensions by around 25 per cent, effectively doing the same for those in the private sector. This, along with other recent governments commitments, represents an additional budgetary burden equivalent to $2.4 billion (Dh8.9 billion). The report predicts that the government will probably have to finance its deficit "through expansion of the monetary base (ie, printing money) as the availability and cost of international financing is set to be influenced by the lack of stability in Syria".

In plain English, the regime is pursuing clashing policies. On the one side it urgently needs to stabilise the Syrian pound, and on the other it may have to adopt inflationary measures that will most probably generate contrary dynamics. The regime has sought to cope with this contradiction by increasing the demand for pounds through higher interest rates on deposits. However, the diplomats warn that "the hike in interest rates will make credit more expensive which might discourage investment even further".

The authors point to "concern among influential Syrian business people and investors" with the turmoil and the possibility that the regime will impose more protectionist economic policies, reversing liberal reform. In other words, the regime may seek to use the economy as an instrument in its political struggle, which would be very damaging for investments, particularly from the private sector.

This points to a second disconnect in the Assads' approach to the unrest. The regime needs to maintain the loyalty of the business class, but few of its actions today will encourage business people to tie their fate to the president and his family in the long run. That is already increasingly apparent. Lebanon is awash with stories of Syrians having removed their funds from Syrian banks in order to place them in Lebanese institutions. Moreover, if investments plummet further in Syria, this will heighten unemployment, exacerbating social unrest.

The European economic report does not address patronage, which will be vital to the regime's staying power. The praetorian units of the Syrian army, notably the Republican Guard and the 4th Armoured Division, have long benefited from higher salaries and favours than their peers, even if one should not overestimate this in absolute terms. There have been stories of members of the elite corps having to take a second job to make ends meet. As for the regular army, opposition sources claimed in May that salaries had not been paid the previous month. The information has not been verified, but if true it would be serious, perhaps illustrating the liquidity shortfall.

As the regime feels the harder economic pinch, as pressures mount on the Syrian pound, and as the popular upheaval continues, there will be more stress on the army and the security forces. There is something deeply debilitating for a soldier or officer, even the most dedicated, to engage in mass repression and murder without respite. Numerous observers believe that the fatalities and arrests in Syria are much higher than those being publicised. If the regime's power of the purse deteriorates while the psychological load and fatigue felt by its security bulwarks intensify, the Assads will be more vulnerable.

It is difficult to see how the Mr Al Assad and his acolytes will be able to put Syria's genie back into the bottle. They know that time is of the essence, that popular resistance must be overcome swiftly in order to avert a meltdown. But they are working at cross-purposes. Syria's economic health requires social health and confidence. Massacring one's own population is not ideal for securing that outcome.

Many Christians are blind on Assad rule

Last week I happened to catch a program on OTV, the Aounist television channel. The topic was Syria and at one stage the host described how he had seen footage of people recently demonstrating in the city of Hama. A sign held up by a protester read “We will not forget Hama 1982,” or some similar phrase. For the host this illustrated the “vengeful intentions” of the Syrian uprising.

It was revealing that the presenter should have interpreted the perfectly creditable remembrance of an episode of mass murder, one in which tens of thousands of innocent people are estimated to have lost their lives, as something reprehensible. What the Aounists believe, as do quite a few Lebanese Christians with them, is that if the Alawite-dominated Assad regime falls, this will play out to the advantage of the Sunnis, and more specifically of Sunni Islamists.

Throughout his political career, Michel Aoun has been adept at making bad choices. He sided with Saddam Hussein just before the Iraqi leader became an international pariah in 1990. He flirted with Syria and its envoys before returning to Lebanon in 2005, only to see the Syrians withdraw their army in April after the assassination of Rafik Hariri, the former prime minister. In pursuit of the presidency in 2006 and 2007, Aoun allied himself with Hezbollah against the parliamentary majority whose support he needed to win office, on the assumption that the party, along with Syria, would impose his election. They didn’t, and during the 2009 elections Aoun was unable to secure a parliamentary majority with his partners, actually losing Christian votes when compared to the results four years earlier.

Today, Aoun and his followers may be on the verge of making a far more critical mistake: They are wagering that Syrian President Bashar Assad will crush the ever larger demonstrations against his authority. Indeed, they are hopeful that this will happen. However, in the process they are setting themselves up, and Christians in general, for a potentially decisive, long-term rupture with Lebanon’s Sunnis, but also down the road with a post-Assad government in Syria.

Aoun is not alone responsible for this situation. However, he merits the greater blame for allowing his entourage to articulate most forcefully the foolish notion that Christians have an interest in allying themselves with other Middle Eastern minorities, against the Sunnis. It has been alarming to hear a sizable number of Lebanese Christians expressing fear that the Assads’ defeat would spell disaster for their community. They forget that no one has done as much as the Syrian regime to undermine Lebanese Christian power in the past decades.

It should be obvious by now to those watching the unrest in Syria that those hostile to Assad rule have mostly avoided resorting to sectarian symbolism. Rather, sectarian violence has been largely the work of the Assads’ praetorian units and security forces. Not many people, inside Syria or out, believe the regime’s narrative that the protests are the work of armed Sunni Islamists, nor have the Assads’ propaganda outlets provided any convincing evidence. An inept Information Ministry spokeswoman was fired for pointing out that the thousands of refugees flowing into Turkey from Jisr al-Shoughour were merely visiting family members across the border. But her bankruptcy, both professional and moral, only reflected that of the leaders she served.

And yet there are those Lebanese Christians buying into the Syrian government’s fabrications. Aounist spokespersons will pen stories in foreign publications echoing uncritically the disinformation peddled by Damascus. They seem incapable of reading the Syrian unrest in political, as opposed to sectarian, terms. For them it’s about religion, about the Sunni menace, not about a multi-sectarian population striving for emancipation from a despotic clique. In defense of Christian interests, they deem it justifiable to endorse scoundrels.

You would have expected the Christians to learn from their coreligionists in Iraq. The fate of Iraqi Christians is often cited by the Lebanese as an example of the dire future awaiting them and their Syrian brethren if the Assads disappear. How odd, for the real lesson offered up by Iraq’s Christians was that siding with Saddam Hussein against a majority of the Iraqi population was an existential blunder.

The safety and security of minorities cannot possibly reside in taking a stance against their fellow countrymen – especially joining with another minority in stifling the legitimate aspirations of a majority. The wheel of fortune turns. That is why the only solid protection for Arab Christians lies in transcending their minority status by reinforcing links with other communities, and between communities, while preserving their own individuality and ensuring that the rights of all are respected within a consensual, democratic context.

It is difficult to see how Bashar Assad’s regime will survive what is going on in Syria today. His regime may last for awhile, or it may collapse more rapidly than we imagine, but Syria is not going back to where it was three months ago. In the framework of domestic Lebanese communal relations, how should Christians prepare for this eventuality? Praying for the Assads to crush the revolt is morally outrageous and politically shortsighted. By the same token, cynically gambling on a Sunni victory in Syria makes no sense, because the revolt may proudly impose itself as a non-sectarian phenomenon.

A third alternative seems more promising. The Christians of Lebanon may be on the verge of a rare and valuable moment in their modern history, one in which they can contribute to forging a historical reconciliation between a democratic Syria and a democratic Lebanon. Rather than playing religious politics, they should think in terms of values – those of liberty, of pluralism, of representative government – and define their behavior now and in the future by such values.

This may sound terribly naïve. However, Michel Aoun and his supporters conveniently forget that they once portrayed their confrontation with the Assad regime in precisely those terms. The best safeguard for minority rights in the Arab world is democracy and the rule of law, within free societies. It is not, and cannot ever be, a dictatorship that readily exterminates its own people.

Echoes of Arkan in Syria

What is Syria’s leadership up to as it mounts a nation-wide armed onslaught against its own people? The simple answer, and it would be an accurate one, is that it is engaged in mass repression. However, we may be missing something more subtle, and more specific. The angry condemnation of the Assad regime’s brutality last week by senior Turkish officials could provide us with a clue as to what this is.

In recent weeks, the brunt of the onslaught has been conducted by predominantly Alawite units under the orders of Maher al-Assad, the brother of President Bashar al-Assad and commander of the regime’s praetorian guard. Action has taken place along two lines. After earlier concentrating its attacks on Tal Kalakh and Arida, located along the northern Lebanese border, the military shifted its attention to Jisr al-Shughur, near the Turkish border. At the same time, the Syrian army and security forces have pursued operations in a parallel corridor along the Homs-Aleppo road. The latest assaults have been directed against Maaret al-Naaman, between Hama and Aleppo.

According to eyewitnesses, the pattern of aggression lately has been similar. The army surrounds and bombards a town or village, or shoots at protesters, accusing the inhabitants of being members of “armed groups.” In a number of localities, the population, mainly Sunnis, has chosen to flee or has been forced out, before soldiers and security agents enter, accompanied by Alawite gangs unleashed primarily to sow terror. In Jisr al-Shughur, for example, refugees have reported rape, theft and the burning of crops.

If this sounds vaguely familiar, then perhaps you have a good memory for the tactics used during the wars of the former Yugoslavia. At the time the Serb-dominated Yugoslav army and the regime of Slobodan Milosevic sponsored a number of paramilitary groups, most notoriously the Serb Volunteer Guard under Zeljko Raznatovic, better known as Arkan. Working in conjunction with the army, these groups were responsible for ethnically cleansing swathes of Croatia and Bosnia in order to create a contiguous Serb-majority territory.

Might we be witnessing something similar in select parts of Syria? It’s very difficult to say. However, look at a map of northwestern Syria where the Alawites are concentrated, particularly the mountain range known as Jabal al-Nusayriyya, or Jabal al-Alawiyeen, that runs in a north-south direction from the Turkish border to the foothills above Lebanon’s Akkar plain. If you draw a meridian from Tal Kalakh to Jisr al-Shughur, it runs along the eastern edge of that range, where the plain begins and stretches further east toward Homs and Hama. To consolidate the Alawite heartland, the Assad regime needs to hold that meridian, particularly its northern and southern hinges at Tal Kalakh to Jisr al-Shughur, as well as a third hinge at Arida.

At the same time, over the decades Alawites have migrated into the plain, moving to areas around the mainly Sunni agglomerations of Homs and Hama, as well as to other places in Syria. It makes sense for the regime, in order to maintain its power, to regain control of the Homs-to-Aleppo passage. However, it is also true that if the Assads are thinking in sectarian geographical terms, this passage would be the first line of Alawite defense along an Alawite-Sunni fault line.

A good argument could be made that the policy of the Syrian regime has little to do with any scheme to establish an Alawite mini-state, the presumed outcome of any ethnic cleansing campaign. After all, dominating Arida and Tal Kalakh, like Jisr al-Shughur, may just be efforts to seal off potentially dangerous border transmission points to and from Sunni districts in neighboring Lebanon and Turkey.

But that only begs three other questions: Why has the Assad regime so heightened sectarian animosities by playing on alleged Sunni-Alawite differences, when anti-regime demonstrations have sought to avoid sectarianism altogether? Why has the behavior of the Syrian army, security agencies and irregular forces in some areas been plainly designed to cause panic specifically among Sunnis, thereby displacing populations and ensuring they would not soon return? And why has the regime, by most accounts, been arming Alawite villages?

In the statements of Turkish politicians last week, as well as those of American officials, there was palpable alarm with the potential sectarian consequences of the Assad regime’s measures to eradicate dissent. The Turks are understandably worried that if Syria were to break up into ethnic mini-states, Turkey would face not only the prospect of an Alawite entity across from the province of Hatay – which the Syrians call Alexandretta, where an estimated 300,000 to 400,000 Alawites live – they would also have to deal with the real possibility that Syria’s Kurds would go their own way, with dangerous repercussions for Turkey’s management of its own Kurdish minority.

While the Assad regime may not be pursuing a broad ethnic cleansing strategy, in and around Jisr al-Shughur and Tal Kalakh specifically it is doing something suspiciously similar. The plan beyond that, especially in the plains of Homs, Hama and Aleppo, may conceivably involve a two-stage process: first, to try to neutralize the situation on the ground through offensive action in areas with a large Sunni urban presence; and if that fails and the regime’s survival is threatened, to lay the groundwork for a defensive strategy leading to the eventual consolidation of a territory in which Alawites can protect themselves.

There are plenty of problems with this theory. Alawites are spread throughout Syria, and there are very substantial Sunni populations in Syria’s coastal cities that would, presumably, be integrated into any Alawite statelet. For now nothing suggests that the Assads have given up on re-imposing their writ over all of Syria. However, quite a few incidents in the northeast also suggest that the regime is calculating in sectarian terms and pursuing a sectarian strategy. Only time, and the continuation of the uprising, will elucidate the Assads’ endgame.

With allies like these, Beirut will not be able to rule itself

Syria's President Bashar al Assad may be struggling with problems at home, but he still has pull in Beirut. On Monday, Lebanon's prime minister designate, Najib Miqati, finally formed a government after a five-month delay. Syria's fingerprints were all over it.

Confirming this, Mr al Assad immediately called Lebanese President Michel Suleiman to congratulate him, and did the same with Nabih Berri, the parliament speaker. Last week, in a meeting with the Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, the Syrian president had signalled his desire to see a new government soon. This sense of urgency pushed Mr Berri to break the logjam by conceding a Shiite seat to the Sunnis.

What is it that suddenly altered the mood in Damascus? After all, the Syrian leadership had not previously applied pressure on Mr Miqati and its friends in Beirut, strongly suggesting that it welcomed a Lebanese vacuum. One can only speculate, but the widening revolt in Syria and the regime's growing regional and international isolation, particularly its divorce from states such as Turkey and Qatar, were surely factors. With so much shifting around Mr al Assad and his acolytes, they apparently concluded that it was preferable to employ Lebanon as a tool in their confrontation with the outside, by forming a favourable government, rather than exploiting the void in the country.

This does not bode well. Mr Miqati insisted that his cabinet would represent all Lebanese, a reminder that the March 14 coalition led by the caretaker prime minister, Saad Hariri, has refused to join. That Mr Miqati is not a national-unity government will create tensions in a country pathologically wedded to political balance. Aside from Syria, those bolstering the new team are Hizbollah and Michel Aoun, whose hostility to March 14 is profound. Mr Miqati and his "centrist" allies in the government - Mr Suleiman and Mr Jumblatt - will labour to ensure that their partners do not settle political scores.

Mr Berri's decision, and more important that of Hassan Nasrallah, Hizbollah's secretary general, to accept a smaller Shiite share of ministers was not fortuitous. It facilitated Mr Miqati's task, therefore aiding the Assad regime. The lower Shiite profile also was destined to achieve two other objectives: it allows Mr Miqati to say that his government is not controlled by Hizbollah, lending it Sunni legitimacy inside Lebanon while also reassuring Arab states and the international community. And, more perniciously, it places the onus of failure on the prime minister, even if Hizbollah knows that it will have great sway over cabinet decisions despite having few ministers.

Hizbollah has two priorities. The party wants a clear policy statement by the government officially sanctioning its weapons; and it wants the state to take its distance from the Special Tribunal for Lebanon dealing with the assassination in 2005 of Rafiq Hariri, the former prime minister. The tribunal is expected to issue an indictment within three months, and there have been indications that Hizbollah members will be accused of involvement. Indeed, the collapse of Saad Hariri's government in January was a consequence of domestic differences over how to address the indictment.

However, Hizbollah also has a more overarching ambition. The party anxiously realises that Syria's regime is facing an existential threat, and that its collapse would transform power relations in the Levant to Iran's detriment, and therefore its own. It has no ready solution to this predicament, but Hizbollah will strive more than ever to anchor itself in the institutions of the Lebanese state, and to dominate them and marginalise its political adversaries in order to resist potentially disadvantageous change. That is why Mr Miqati's government will hit turbulence, especially over whatever affects Hizbollah's future.

The prime minister can already anticipate three major headaches. The first is that Hizbollah will push for the government not to cooperate with the special tribunal. It's difficult to see how Mr Miqati, against the wishes of Syria, Hizbollah and Mr Aoun, will be able to resist this demand, despite his worries that it could place Lebanon on a collision course with the United Nations Security Council, which established the institution. Even Mr Jumblatt has little room to manoeuvre on the tribunal, having repeatedly denounced it as a "politicised" body.

Mr Miqati was also obliged to accept an appointee of Suleiman Franjieh, a prominent Syrian ally, as defence minister. This will further discredit the Lebanese army in the eyes of the United States and many in the international community. American military assistance will almost certainly dry up. Equally worrisome is that several countries participating in the UN force in southern Lebanon believe the army to be under the influence of Hizbollah. This impression, not altogether unjustified, could well determine their continued commitment to maintaining troops in Lebanon, when some contingents have already expressed an intention to leave.

A third problem for Mr Miqati will be internal political discord. The foes of March 14 today have wide latitude to dismantle the political, security and financial edifice the coalition put in place after the Syrian withdrawal in 2005. While Mr Miqati will try to limit the damages, such measures will provoke a backlash from March 14, particularly the partisans of Mr Hariri, the dominant Lebanese Sunni figure. These conflicts, at a time of crisis in Syria and volatility in the region, could destabilise Lebanon in dangerous ways.

That's not to mention the myriad other challenges Mr Miqati will wrestle with - above all a potentially serious decline in economic confidence and the strains following from the state's support for the Assad regime, when most Lebanese Sunnis sympathise with the Syrian opposition. Lebanon's new government may mean the country is out of the frying pan, but nothing suggests it will avoid the fire.

March 14 may regret boycotting Mikati

There is no doubt that President Bashar Assad’s regime played an essential role in accelerating the formation of the Lebanese government.

Only a Syrian nod could have compelled President Michel Sleiman to approve a Cabinet lineup that will thoroughly marginalize him, and could have made Speaker Nabih Berri surrender a Shiite seat to the Sunni community.

Despite this, we have to wonder whether March 14 did well not to participate in the new team.

From the moment that Saad Hariri’s government was brought down last January, the March 14 parties took an uncompromising position on Najib Mikati, the prime minister designate. Hariri, justifiably, felt betrayed by Mikati and there was much talk of a “coup.” Syria, Hezbollah and their allies did stage a coup, but a constitutional coup within the confines of state institutions.

Mikati, whether by persuasion or compulsion, won over a majority of parliamentarians, which should have been a lesson to March 14: If institutions could be used against the coalition, March 14 could use institutions in its own favor. When you denounce a coup, your duty is to obstruct it.

Instead, the order came down that March 14 was to stand aside and isolate Mikati. There were exceptions. The former prime minister, Fouad Siniora, kept a low-key line open. The former president, Amin Gemayel, tried to find common ground with the prime minister designate.

However, to distance himself from the endeavor, Hariri flew to France. March 14 made unrealistic demands on Mikati, asking him to clarify in writing his position on Hezbollah’s arms and on the Special Tribunal for Lebanon. When he refused, this was portrayed as a lack of seriousness about integrating March 14 into the government.

Was that true? Had March 14 declared from the outset that it would participate in the government on condition that it be granted veto power, things might have been different. The veto provision had earlier been respected for March 8 and the Aounists, and March 14’s share in Parliament justified it.

Mikati would have resisted at first, but as his efforts to put together a government floundered, he might have reassessed in order to expand his margin of maneuver, accepting the conditions set by March 14. But had he persisted in his refusal, that would only have weakened him further, confirming that he was beholden to Hezbollah and Syria, damaging him among Sunnis.

Assume that March 14 did the right thing at the time. Did it do the right thing in not reconsidering its attitude once the situation in Syria began unraveling? Suddenly, the issue was no longer whether Najib Mikati would gain legitimacy if March 14 took part in his government.

It was no longer whether Hezbollah had staged a coup, since the signs, after weeks of deadlock over the Cabinet, were that the momentum of such a coup had been slowed by uncertainty in Syria. The issue was whether March 14 would be in the government or out at a critical juncture in Lebanon’s history, with the Assad regime facing an existential challenge. March 14 did not even debate the question.

So where are we today? Instead of adapting to developments in the region, March 14 is still locked into a very parochial reading of the political situation. It has criticized the government for being a Syrian creation, bolstered by Hezbollah.

Undeniably it is. No less true is that Damascus, through this government, intends to enlist Lebanon in the Syrian confrontation with the international community. The country is in for a bumpy ride in the months ahead, which will impact on the economy and on financial confidence in negative ways.

March 14 may welcome such circumstances for discrediting the Mikati government. However, this is short-sighted. The state, whose promotion March 14 has claimed as its principal concern, benefits not at all when the welfare of the Lebanese becomes a weapon in domestic disputes.

Nor is it obvious what national project March 14 offers in contrast to that of the current majority. During the months of stalemate the March 14 leadership did little to exploit the political bankruptcy on the other side, whereby alleged reformers haggled like fishwives over their share of ministers and lucrative portfolios.

The conventional wisdom is that the Mikati government is not long for this world; March 14 spokespersons have linked its longevity to that of the Assads in Syria. That may be true, but the Assads could linger for some time.

The view displays great passivity on the part of the former majority, giving a wide berth to Hezbollah and the Aounists to dismantle what March 14 spent years patiently building up. Remarkably, at the very moment when Syria’s allies and sympathizers appear most vulnerable, March 14 has managed to hand the reins of government over to them.

As the Lebanese look ahead, what they see is worrisome. On the one side a government bound to increase Lebanon’s misery, with a core of revanchist Aounists and an armed organization whose overriding preoccupation is to turn the country into a sandbag to protect its weapons and preserve its autonomy.

And on the other side, a coalition without a persuasive vision for a sovereign Lebanese state, whose paramount figure has been absent for weeks (reportedly because of death threats), which is presently wagering on the failure of the new government, regardless of how the Lebanese might suffer from this.

In this context, a government of national unity, no matter how mediocre, would have been better in carrying Lebanon through this period of transformation in Syria, and in managing the aftermath. We missed that opportunity and now we have a government that is infinitely worse, one that may not vanish as soon as we think.

Michael Young on France24

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