Lebanese keen to avoid sectarian war - Justin Salhani - The Atlantic Post

In Lebanon, memory is still fresh of a vicious civil struggle that lasted 15 years and took the lives of over 100,000 people. Lebanese today fear a return to the violence and sectarian friction of the civil war that ended in 1990. This fear has been worsened by the war in neighboring Syria.

The Syrian civil war has stoked sectarian divisions in Lebanon, a small country on the Mediterranean that borders Syria and Israel, leading to some of the worst bouts of armed clashes in years.

Lebanon’s second biggest city Tripoli in the north has witnessed repeated skirmishes between supporters and opponents of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Select villages in the east Bekaa Valley have been subject to shelling from both the Syrian armed opposition and the al-Assad regime, and late last month followers of a radical Sunni Muslim cleric clashed with the Lebanese Armed Forces in the southern city of Sidon.

But despite the increase in tension and violent repercussions, many analysts believe Lebanon will, at least for now, avoid a return to the full-scale war of years past.

“You need two armed factions to wage war but in Lebanon we only have Hezbollah,” said retired Lebanese Army General Elias Hanna, referring to the Shi’a political party and militia the United States, and recently the European Union, have labeled as a terrorist organization.

Lebanon’s Sunni population has long felt frustrated at the political power exercised by Hezbollah. In 2008, Hezbollah and its allies took over the streets of West Beirut, easily pushing aside Sunni fighters primarily affiliated with former Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri’s Future Movement, after a dispute over Hezbollah’s telecommunications network. In 2011, the March 8 political bloc, of which Hezbollah is a member, brought down Hariri’s government.

“Lebanon’s sectarian balance is crucial for its political stability,” said Dr. Imad Salamey, professor of political science and international affairs at the Lebanese American University in Beirut. He added, “The Sunnis are currently confronting a major dilemma of how to be a part of the state and at the same time accept Hezbollah’s military situation.”

And while this frustration has been exacerbated by Hezbollah’s openness about its involvement in Syria, political analysts believe the situation in Lebanon is not yet ready to be pushed to the brink.

According to General Hanna, levels of strife and tension may result in more security incidents but Lebanon is “not ready to wage war.”

“The only pain was [Sunni cleric Ahmad] Al-Assir,” said a political analyst and journalist who asked his name be withheld to avoid being called in for questioning by local security agencies, referring to the Sidon-based sheikh who clashed with the Lebanese Armed Forces on June 23-24 and has since gone into hiding. The source, who has close ties with the Sunni street, said that only Tripoli in the north is still facing problems.

“Sunnis have no further interest in a clash with the army,” he said, adding that Hezbollah was trying to settle the situation in Sidon and had no interest in spurring tension in Tripoli.

Writing by email, Antoine Haddad, Secretary General of the secular Democratic Renewal Movement (DRM), agreed and said, “Lebanon’s current security situation is fragile. Mini-wars will continue on and off, here and there, in different regions, mainly Sunni, but I don’t expect a full-out war in the near future.”

But while the majority of analysts believe Lebanon will avoid civil war, a former Associated Press Beirut correspondent thinks otherwise.

“The Sunni-Shi’a war has started,” said Mohammed Salam, a journalist and political commentator, at his home in Beirut’s Tariq Jdideh neighborhood. “We are not happy about it but people don’t want to see it.” he said.

According to Salam, the current sectarian war stretches from central Iraq to the borders of Lebanon and could infiltrate should the Sunni opposition in Syria push Hezbollah back across the Lebanese border. Salam said groups like Jabhat al-Nusra, a Sunni Islamist militia fighting in Syria that the U.S. has labeled a terrorist organization, would follow Hezbollah across the border and, with the support of Lebanese Sunnis, fight them in Lebanon.

“In 2008, the Druze were victorious because they fought as a sect,” said Salam, referring to failed attempts by fighters affiliated with Hezbollah to storm the mountainous Shouf region where many Lebanese of the Druze faith, an offshoot of Shi’a Islam, reside. “This era has a Sunni flavor,” said Salam.

Haddad of the DRM said, “In the background, there is certainly a Sunni-Shi’a divide growing, not only in Lebanon but in the whole Middle East, but sectarianism doesn’t explain everything.”

“The picture in the Middle East cannot be reduced to a simple Sunni-Shi’a conflict. Shi’a in Iraq, Lebanon and Bahrain respond very unevenly to this appeal. Several Shi’a opinion leaders in these countries are highly outspoken against both the increase of sectarianism and the Iranian offensive regional strategy,” Haddad said.

Justin Salhani is The Atlantic Post’s Lebanon correspondent and is based in Beirut.