When someone challenges you by throwing down the gauntlet, it is an invitation to confrontation and conflict. And that’s exactly what Hezbollah’s Chairman did when he publicly acknowledged, on live television, the involvement of members of his organization in the arms smuggling network operating between Egypt and Gaza.
Why didn’t Hezbollah ignore the Egyptian accusations and deny any connection with the accused individuals? Why this bold honesty and transparency in threatening the authority of the Egyptian state and its territorial integrity?
Even if we assume that Hezbollah has given up trying to play the role of the illuminating moon in the dark night of inter-Arab relations, why did its Chairman insist on taking up the matter personally, when he could have assigned one of his deputies to justify to the public the “honor “ in illegal arms smuggling? Several answers come to mind, none of which I find satisfactory, including the involvement of Hezbollah in an Iranian conspiracy to destabilize Egypt, and the theory proposed by Israeli President yesterday, that Hezbollah seeks to fan the flames of sectarianism between Sunnis and Shiites throughout the Middle East. These interpretations lack logical persuasive force.
The most probable explanation for the involvement of Hezbollah in the Egypt–Gaza theater stems from the increasing difficulty it is having within the Lebanese political field of legitimizing the continued maintenance of its weapons and militia. The result has been a complicated and highly risky gamble of engaging on new fronts, however limited and symbolic, to continue to justify the need for keeping its armed militia in Lebanon.
Hezbollah’s dilemma first emerged when the Israelis withdrew from southern Lebanon. The issue of Shebaa Farms was not sufficient to justify their continued armament, as it is still a disputed territory between Syria and Lebanon. In addition, a consensus view developed that Israel’s withdrawal from Shebaa would most likely be the result of negotiations similar to those that resulted in its withdrawal from the Egyptian territory of Taba. There was also the question of the heavy price paid by Lebanon as a result of Hezbollah’s continued attacks on Israel.
At a time when public opinion both in Lebanon and abroad called for the empowerment of the Lebanese government and the consolidation of its authority in the south, Hezbollah tried to change the subject and foreground the issue of Lebanese prisoners in Israel. And in that context, it launched an operation to kidnap Israeli soldiers and ignited the war with Israel in the summer of 2006.
Although Hezbollah fought bravely and inflicted surprising losses on the Israeli military, the losses borne by Lebanon and its citizens were devastating. As a result, Hezbollah’s difficulties deepened and it was no longer able to justify actions that would incur additional Lebanese losses. Many Lebanese, Arab and international parties seized upon the post-war backlash against Hezbollah to call for the disarming of Lebanese militias, beginning with Hezbollah’s, and to restore decision making about questions of war and peace firmly back into the control of the Lebanese government. Hezbollah responded with a series of actions designed to prevent the Lebanese government from being able to consolidate its authority, finally culminating in a dramatic escalation of hostilities leading to Hezbollah’s military occupation of west Beirut. The engagement enabled Hezbollah to intimidate and coerce the government into accepting its demands. However, it came at a heavy price in the loss of confidence of many, both in Lebanon and abroad, who had until then viewed Hezbollah as a legitimate resistance movement, defending the sovereignty of Lebanon by fighting Israeli occupation.
Today, by racing to adopt the arms smuggling operations as their own, and by throwing the gauntlet at the feet of the Egyptian regime, Hezbollah is trying to breakout of this impasse by seeking new fronts through which to claim legitimacy and to avoid facing the truth that its arms and militia have now become tools to intimidate and coerce the Lebanese government and significant segments of Lebanese society. After losing their legitimating role in southern Lebanon, Hezbollah has now become a burden on the state and society and simply another factor in sectarian politics and partisanship.
This points to political designs that are larger than relatively minor matters like arms smuggling, and which seek to redefine the resistance and elevate it to a holy status, above states and boundaries, territorial integrity and national interests. The resistance fighter is held to enjoy rights above all others and to be above reproach, even if his resistance ignites civil wars and the disintegration of societies into religious and sectarian factions, and causes the collapse of the state and the disintegration of civic order and stability.
Above and beyond all of these issues, the resistance fighter is held to be righteous even if the exercise of his righteousness wreaks destruction on his people and lends weight to his enemies, serving their purpose by strengthening their resolve. He is righteous even if he is ignorant or reckless, even if he is sick or seeks power that he is not competent to exercise, lacking the requisite strength of character, social standing or heritage.
The Palestinian catastrophe of 1948 paved the way for the Arab armies to seize power through military coups and establish new regimes that proved to be abject dictatorships that failed at both war and development. And so it seems that the new Palestinian catastrophe has paved the way in the Middle East for non-state actors to overrun countries and societies. The significance of Hamas’s takeover of Gaza and Hezbollah’s occupation of west Beirut should not be underestimated. The outbreak of Jihadist wars in Somalia, Yemen, Algeria, and, outside the Arab world in Afghanistan and Pakistan, are not directly related to the Palestinian cause, but they carry much of the same DNA.
If this is in fact true, then we are now living in the age of militarized militias seeking to take over and control countries, cross international borders at will, and hold entire societies hostage. What has happened throughout the Middle East up till now is only the tip of the iceberg and what lies beneath are endless depths full of predators with limitless funds and rapacious ideologies, because what is permitted for the resistance fighter is not allowed for any others, regardless of the obvious lessons to be learned, the inevitable consequences of their actions, and the ratio of benefits and costs. What is important is that we continue to resist, and T.V will take care of the rest.
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