- L’assassinio di Gemayal è il
quinto da quello del ministro Hariri; la maggior parte delle vittime erano
critiche verso la Siria, in una minor parte verso Hezbollah. - E’ difficile vedere cosa la
Siria e Hezbollah potrebbero guadagnare da questa uccisione. La Siria è in
una posizione regionale più forte rispetto agli anni precedenti.
L’amministrazione Bush è stata costretta a negoziazioni con Damasco per
far fronte alla crisi irachena. L’Iran è anch’esso in una posizione più
forte strategicamente e la sua alleanza con Hezbollah ha fatto emergere la
sua vittoria politica nella guerra di questa estate con Israele. - Perché la Siria (e Hezbollah)
dovrebbero mettere a rischio la loro posizione favorevole uccidendo un
politico maronita, anche dal momento che Hezbollah aveva minacciato
dimostrazioni di massa per buttare giù l’intesa politica post-Rivoluzione
del Cedro in favore di un’altra che fosse in linea con il suo maggior
potere (e quello della Siria)?
L’unico che potrebbe guadagnarci è il governo israeliano.
Israele è stato infatti il perdente della guerra con Hezbollah, almeno
politicamente e strategicamente. I leaders del paese hanno minacciato una nuova
serie di combattimenti ancor prima di ritirare le truppe dal sud del Libano.
L’ascesa di Hezbollah dopo la guerra è stato il segno più visibile
dell’apparente debolezza militare israeliana e dell’errore strategico.
- Da una parte, questo assassinio
rivolgerà contro di sé il caos che Hezbollah stava cercando di creare per
rafforzare la propria posizione.
Invece, questa organizzazione è ora forzata alla difensiva e deve
reagire in una nuova dinamica in cui i cristiani (con l’eccezione della
fazione di Aoun che si è staccata) e i sunniti sono più uniti che mai nel
desiderio di bloccare il controllo di Hezbollah sul sistema politico. - In secondo luogo, se il
Libano finisse in una Guerra civile, Hezbollah verrebbe in effetti
neutralizzato, e Israele potrebbe contare sui maroniti e magari sui sunniti
per attaccare Hezbollah senza che riceva una condanna internazionale come
durante la guerra. - Terzo, i sospetti contro la
Siria hanno già arrestato il processo di normalizzazione del regime di
Assad con l’Europa e gli Usa che aveva lo scopo di portarla sul tavolo
della discussione sull’Irak. Allo stesso modo, se si aggravasse la crisi,
precluderebbe la possibilità che l’amministrazione Bush forzi Israele a
negoziare un accordo per le Alture del Golan nel futuro prossimo. - La famiglia Gemayel e la
comunità maronita era sì alleata di Israele una volta, ma lo era una
generazione fa.
La alleanza infatti fu abbandonata una volta chiaro che i
giorni di Isreale in Libano erano contati.
Playing with death in Lebanon
By Mark LeVine
In the wake of the latest political assassination to rock Lebanon – last week’s
shooting of Pierre Gemayel, a scion of one of the foremost Christian Maronite
political families – suspicion fell on the Syrians, and perhaps Hezbollah, as
the most likely culprits.
There is some logic to this view, given Syria‘s likely
involvement in the assassination in February 2005 of former prime minister
Rafik Hariri. Gemayal’s is
the fifth assassination since Hariri’s; most every victim was critical of the
Syrians, and to a lesser extent Hezbollah.
But even if we grant that Syria was behind Hariri’s assassination, and there is
very good evidence to support this assessment, it is hard to see what Syria or Hezbollah gains from
Gemayel’s killing. Syria is in a stronger regional position than it has been in
years. The administration of US President George W Bush has been forced to eat
crow and contemplate negotiations with Damascus to gain its help in easing the
insurgency in Iraq. Syria’s main sponsor, Iran, is similarly in its strongest
geostrategic position in decades, and its ally Hezbollah emerged as the
political winner of this summer’s war with Israel.
So why would Syria risk
upsetting this favorable balance by killing a Maronite politician when
Hezbollah had already bolted the government and was threatening massive
demonstrations to bring down the post-Cedar Revolution political arrangement in
favor of one that would better reflect its – and thus Syria’s – increasing
power? The same question can be asked of those who would link
Hezbollah to the Gemayel assassination, which sapped the energy out of its
latest political machinations.
Of
course, even if neither Syria nor Hezbollah had much to gain from Gemayel’s
assassination, it’s not hard to imagine Bashar al-Assad or Hassan Nasrallah
miscalculating the impact of such an act, as the Syrian president might well
have done if he in fact ordered Hariri’s assassination, and the Hezbollah
leadership admitted doing when they kidnapped two Israeli soldiers this past
July on the assumption that Israel‘s response would
be in keeping with the rules of the game then in place.
But
before we look to who might have miscalculated in ordering the hit on Gemayel
it’s worth asking who actually benefits from his assassination. And from this
perspective the one party
that clearly benefits from Gemayel’s murder is the Israeli government.
Israel was the main loser in the summer war, at least politically and
strategically. The country’s leaders began threatening a new round of fighting
even before they began pulling troops out of the south of Lebanon. Hezbollah’s postwar ascendence was the most visible
and troubling sign of Israel’s seemingly unprecedented military weakness and
strategic blundering.
Pulling off an assassination like this,
which is by no means beyond Israel’s ability, would serve several goals. First, it would turn the chaos
that Hezbollah was trying to create in the Lebanese political system against it.
Instead of Hezbollah managing the postwar chaos to strengthen its position, the movement is now forced on
to the defensive and must react to a new dynamic in which Christians (with the
exception of the breakaway Michel Aoun faction) and Sunnis are more united than
ever in their desire to block Hezbollah’s takeover of the system.
Second, if Lebanon descends into civil war, which is a frightening if
still distant possibility, Hezbollah
would in effect be neutralized, and Israel could rely on Maronites and perhaps Sunnis to attack
Hezbollah without Israel facing the international condemnation it received during the war.
Third, suspicion against
Syria – and Druze leader Walid
Jumblatt has publicly accused Damascus of being behind
the assassination – has
already stopped the momentum towards normalization with the Assad regime by Europe and the United States in order to bring it on board in Iraq. As important, if the crisis deepens, it will
foreclose the possibility that the Bush administration (now under the tutelage of
the only American diplomat to stand up to Israel since Dwight Eisenhower, James
Baker) would force Israel
to negotiate a deal for the Golan Heights in the near future.
It is true that the
Gemayel family and Maronite community more broadly was once aligned to Israel;
but that was a generation ago. The Maronites proved unable to maintain
power in Lebanon or serve Israel’s interests. Pierre Gemayel’s uncle, Bachir,
was assassinated days before he was to assume the country’s presidency in 1982,
and his father, Amine, was unable to cement a peace treaty with Israel because
of Syrian pressure. The
unofficial alliance was abandoned once it was clear that Israel’s days in
Lebanon were numbered.
Participating, or otherwise benefiting from the killing of an old ally at a
moment when the blame would be placed on one’s enemies may seem far-fetched, but
at least as far back as the great Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu "to
mystify, mislead and surprise the enemy" has been one of the most
well-regarded axioms of warfare. The death of Pierre Gemayel could well push
Lebanon to the brink of civil war and lead to further alienation of Syria and
Hezbollah from the international community. This might well be the unintended
consequence of actions taken by either party; but if the question is to be
asked "Who benefits from Pierre Gemayel’s assassination?", it is hard
not to include the Israeli government among the parties which have the most to
gain from the scenario now unfolding in Beirut.
Mark LeVine, PhD, is a professor in the department of history,
University of California-Irvine.