|
|
|
|
Iran pulls Syria's strings over
Lebanon
By Safa Haeri
PARIS - One day after the assassination of
former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri in Beirut on
February 16, Syrian Prime Minister Naji al-Otari
flew to Tehran and proposed the formation of an
alliance between the Islamic Republic of Iran and
the Arab Republic of Syria, aimed at thwarting
threats from the United States against the two
states.
"We are ready to help Syria on all
grounds to confront threats," Iranian Vice
President Mohammad Reza Aref told his Syrian
guest. "Our Syrian brothers are facing specific
threats and we hope they can benefit from our
experience. We are ready to give them any help
necessary," Aref said. He stopped short of
specifying what kind of assistance Tehran could
bring Syria as the two countries are badly
isolated in the international scene, are extremely
unpopular at home and have weak armies, equipped
with aging weapons.
Most Iranian and Arab analysts
have described the proposal as "a hoax", comparing
it to a blind person offering his services to another
blind person, as there was nothing Iran could do
for Syria and vice versa as the proposed alliance
is in total contradiction with the sentiments of
the majority of the Lebanese people, who are
calling for the withdrawal of Syrian forces from
their country, and there are no common interests
between Tehran and Damascus, contrary to what the
officials of the two countries pretend.
Qasem Sho'leh Sa'di, a lawyer, university
professor and outspoken Iranian political
dissident, commented, "The Arab-Israeli conflict
has nothing to do with our interests. The day
Israel gets out of the Golan Heights, Syria would
immediately recognize the Jewish state. As for the
Palestinians, they are already talking to the
Israelis, not speaking of the Jordanians and the
Egyptians, who have already established formal
diplomatic relations with Tel Aviv. The question
is, why should Iran take the side of the
terrorists? Why should Iran deny the existence of
Israel? Why should Iran continue hostilities with
the United States and sacrifice our own
interests?"
But as the
assassination of Hariri unexpectedly united most
of Lebanon's antagonist factions, mostly
the Christians, Sunnis, Druze and Shi'ites, in
an anti-Syrian national uprising, and
international pressures increased, spearhead by Washington
and Paris, urging President Bashar al-Assad to take
out his 14,000-15,000 soldiers from the neighboring
nation, Iran rushed to help Syria by activating
the Lebanese Hezbollah, or the Party of God.
The Shi'ite-based organization was
created by the Islamic Republic in 1982, in essence to
fight anti-Iranian operations mounted by Iraq in
the region, but also as a tool responding to one
of the principles of the Islamic Republic: the
annihilation of the Jewish state and ending the
presence in the region of its Western supporters,
mainly the US - objectives that also responded to
Syrian goals.
Armed, financed and trained
by both Iran and Syria, the Hezbollah enjoys
enviable popularity both in Lebanon and throughout
the Arab world because of its unabated fight
against the Israelis, to the point that it is
credited as the "single Arab movement that forced
the mighty Tsahal [Israeli army] to withdraw in
June 2000 from the areas it had occupied in parts
of southern Lebanon since 1982".
It was
also Hezbollah that put an end to the presence of US
Marine Corps and French forces in the country
by killing more than 240 Americans in their
barracks in Beirut in 1983 and 120 French soldiers
in deadly suicidal attacks against their garrison.
The movement also adopted the tactic of
taking Western hostages, through a number of
freelance hostage-taking cells, such as the
Revolutionary Justice Organization and the
Organization of the Oppressed Earth, which seized
US church envoy Terry Waite in 1987 and held him
for 1,760 days.
Earlier, Iran had a
contingent of some 2,000 Revolutionary Guards,
based in the Bekaa Valley, which had been sent to
Lebanon in 1982 to aid the resistance against
Israel.
Hezbollah's popularity with the
poor Lebanese Shi'ite community, which makes up
almost 40% of Lebanon's 3 million people, but also
other communities, was confirmed in the 1992
parliamentary elections when Hezbollah won eight
seats in parliament, and where it now has 12
seats.
Another factor adding to the
prestige of Hezbollah is that it has never fought
other Lebanese forces, concentrating its military
activities against the Jewish state, hence its
popularity with radical Palestinian and other Arab
movements.
Iran and Syria established
a "strategic alliance" in 1980 after Damascus,
alone among all other Arab countries, took the side
of non-Arab Tehran when it was attacked by the
now-toppled Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, then
Syria's staunchest enemy, due primarily to the
bitter hostility between the two opposing factions
of the Ba'ath Party in power in Damascus and
Baghdad.
Against this "solidarity", Syria
received hefty financial, material, political and
moral support from the ruling Iranian ayatollahs,
including millions of dollars in discounted oil
and aid. But the Syrians never "returned the
gift", as Damascus sided with the Arabs every time
Tehran was at loggerheads with an Arab state, as
seen in the dispute opposing Iran rather than the
United Arab Emirates over the three Iranian
islands of Abou Musa and the Greater and Lesser
Tunbs, situated strategically at the entrance of
the Persian Gulf.
As a first step in the
latest crisis in Lebanon, Iran launched a
regionwide campaign in support of Syria, using
its state-controlled public media, including the
24-hour Arabic service al-Alam (The World) run by
Iranian Radio and Television that enjoys a large
audience in the Arab world, by pretending that the
anti-Syrian demonstrations were a joint plot
hatched by the Americans and the Zionists.
But as the momentum against
the Syrian occupation gathered speed, bringing
down the government of pro-Syrian premier Omar
Karameh and destabilizing Emile Lahoud,
the Christian president appointed by Damascus,
while other nations including Russia, Germany, Egypt and,
more significant, Saudi Arabia also joined
the international pressure on Damascus, Assad, in an
unprecedented move, addressed the Syrian
parliament and announced his decision "gradually"
to withdraw his forces from Lebanon by
concentrating them in the Bekaa Valley on the
Lebanese-Syria border, "according to the Taif
Accord of 1989".
Signed by 62 lawmakers,
half of them Christians and the other Muslim, that
US-Saudi agreement - in which the slain
Hariri played an important role - ended 15 years
of fratricide and devastating civil war in
Lebanon, calling for the formation of a government
of national unity and disarming all the warring
factions except Hezbollah.
The accord also
invited Syria to send in some token forces for a
period of two years to help Lebanon reconstruct
its national army and police, re-establish the
rule of law and form a viable state apparatus.
Fifteen years later, Syria, profiting
from an international consensus, had turned
Lebanon into a vassal state, naming all key
officials, including the presidents and prime ministers, and
running the army and the security services, much like some
of the former Soviet Union's so-called
"independent" nations that, though they were
integral parts of the Soviet empire, enjoyed a
presence at the United Nations.
Assad's promise, aimed at satisfying Washington, Paris
and Riyadh, also contained threats, assuring that
the withdrawal did not mean Syria would be absent
from Lebanon, analysts have pointed out. In his
address, he said the protesters in Beirut did not
represent Lebanon, and tried to stain them with
links to Israel.
At a press conference on
Sunday, Hasan Nasrullah, the Iranian-backed
general secretary of Hezbollah, warmly thanked
Syria for its "generous and courageous" assistance
to Lebanon and the Lebanese people, saying the
Lebanese "must not forget the valuable sacrifices
Syria provided Lebanon".
He condemned "all
attempts at humiliating and belittling" Syria, a
country that ended the civil war, "brought back
stability and helped restoration of the state
machinery, great achievements and sacrifices that
it should be thanked for". He also called for
massive rallies in Beirut to show loyalty to
Damascus.
However, he described
Assad's decision to withdraw Syrian forces as
"responding to the interests" of both countries, adding
that he would reject the US-French-sponsored
United Nations Security Council Resolution 1559
urging Syria to take out all its forces from
Lebanon, saying that the resolution was "an
inadmissible interference in Lebanon's internal
affairs".
"We
shall not forget that the goal
of the United States and Israel is creating chaos
in Lebanon," he said, and vowed that regardless of
international pressures, Hezbollah would not lay
down its weapons. "The resistance will not give up
its arms, because Lebanon needs the Hezbollah as a
tool for its defense against Israel," Nasrullah
said.
Hasan Hashemian, an
Iranian journalist and university professor
specializing in Arab affairs, commented, "Assad's
declaration has broken the so-far-united front of the Lebanese
opposition to the Syrian presence in the country,
with, on the one hand, those who insist on the
total withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon,
and on the other, those who understand the present
conditions and are ready for gradual cooperation
with Damascus.
"On the front of the Arab
world, the statement was welcomed by Egypt and
Saudi Arabia, the country where Hariri made most
of his fortune and had a close relationship with
the Saudi ruling family, which had bestowed Saudi
nationality on the assassinated prime minister. As
from now, Cairo and Riyadh will try to help Assad
by softening the effects of the 1559 resolution,"
he said.
"Finally," Hashemian added, "it
is possible that Paris, Berlin and Moscow will
give Assad the benefit of the doubt, refusing
politely to go along with Washington in insisting
on Syria's immediate and total withdrawal from all
Lebanese territory."
By helping to defuse
the situation in Lebanon without appearing on the
scene, thanks to the role, weight and popularity
of its Hezbollah protege on the one hand, and by
helping its Syrian ally to come out of the
Lebanese quagmire more or less unharmed on the
other, Iran has scored a great diplomatic victory.
Not only has Iran displayed the scope
of its political resources in the region, it has
also proved that it holds most of the regional
strings and that all roads lead to Tehran.
Strategists in the United States and Israel in
charge of the "Iranian problem" should review
carefully the events of the past three weeks. This
would help them greatly in their appreciation and
calculus concerning ongoing issues with Tehran,
and above all Iran's controversial nuclear
activities.
Safa Haeri is a
Paris-based Iranian journalist covering the Middle
East and Central Asia.
(Copyright 2005
Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please
contact us for information on sales, syndication and republishing.) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
All material on this
website is copyright and may not be republished in any form without written
permission.
© Copyright 1999 - 2005 Asia Times
Online Ltd.
|
|
Head
Office: Rm 202, Hau Fook Mansion, No. 8 Hau Fook St., Kowloon, Hong
Kong
Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
|
Asian Sex Gazette Middle East Sex News
|
|
|
