Growing Links Between Iran and Lebanon Still Run Through Damascus

By Marilyn Raschka

Although Lebanon is the focus of much of its attention, Iran has only a charge d'affaires heading its embassy in Beirut, and there are no direct flights linking Beirut and Tehran. An agreement to start direct Iran-Lebanon flights was negotiated two years ago, but never implemented.

There is a one-word explanation for the lack of direct contacts: Damascus. In terms of Iranian-Lebanese relations, all roads lead there and, literally, all flights begin there. That's just one of the perks of being the main power broker in Lebanon.

"The most important embassy has to be in Damascus, that's clear," said a journalist interviewed by the Washington Report. Issues of policy are dealt with in Damascus, while Iran's embassy in Beirut restricts itself to visa requests and other consular services.

Security comes into play as well. Even though Iran's Beirut embassy maintains a low profile, its communications-dish-studded building presents an easy target for Israeli air attack. Rumors have it that a move to several smaller locations is in the works.

Lebanon's Shi'i community was estimated to be 17 percent of the population at the time Lebanon gained its independence in 1943. It now is thought to be more than 50 percent, making it the majority sect knots to work out as well

The Arab-Israeli peace negotiations and armed Hezbollah resistance to the Israeli presence in south Lebanon are the most sensitive issues between the two countries. Iran continues to believe the negotiations have produced nothing, and maintains that the best way to liberation and a just peaceis to support the Islamic Resistance Frontin Lebanon, of which Hezbollah is the most active member. Lebanon would like to see Hezbollah restrained to strengthen Lebanon's hand in pursuing peace negotiations to secure Israeli withdrawal from the occupied south.

The Lebanese delegation to Iran, led by parliament speaker Nabih Berri, a Syrian-oriented Lebanese Shi'i leader, worked hard to explain this position. Iran's expressed position was that no differences would be allowed to harm Lebanon's unity which, according to Iranian President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, "is the most important immunity against the Israeli enemy and the best way to liberation."

But Iran's main power base in Lebanon continues to be Hezbollah. In addition to its heavily armed presence in the south, Hezbollah has since last summer's parliamentary elections earned itself six seats in the country's legislature—itself an expansion from the unofficial militia level to official participation in the government. This step toward legitimacy has, according to one press source, allowed Hezbollah to distance itself from ''the Iranian community" and express some independence.

So what was on the menu when Lebanese and Iranian leaders sat down together in Tehran? And how did the Lebanese digest the fare?

In a country which prefers to think of itself as a land of finely-balanced minorities. Nevertheless, a Lebanese government source who agreed to be interviewed insisted that the size of Lebanon's Shi'i community has little to do with Shi'i Iran's interest there.

"Lebanon is the head of a bridge Iran wants to build over Arab countries in the eastern Mediterranean," the source maintained. In the Israeli-occupied territories, Iran is Hamas' chief external supporter.

Today's growing official relations are a far but welcome cry from the days when Iranian relations with Lebanon were confined largely to Tehran's running of the Hezbollah militia's roughshod show in Lebanon. However, Shi'i Hezbollah militiamen in the areas adjacent to Israel's self-defined "security zone" in southern Lebanon have never been disarmed by the Lebanese army, and every Lebanese is uneasily aware of it.

"The most positive thing is the transitional nature of the relations with Iran," a newspaper source pointed out. "They are moving from unofficial [with militias] to the official."

Early 1993 saw a number of visits by Lebanese government officials and deputies to Tehran under the banner of strengthening ties. But there were some

The Menu in Tehran

Support for policy on deportees—The Lebanese delegation received nothing but praise and support for its refusal to allow Israel to use Lebanon as a port of deportation for the 400 Palestinian Muslims expelled in December. Iran's condemnation of Israel's deportation policy, and the deportees' own support for Lebanon's stand, made this item the easiest to deal with.

Assistance for reconstruction—Ayatollah Khamenei declared that Iran wanted to help Lebanon as much as possible. In fact, it is Iranian money that poured into Lebanon for social works that helped build Hezbollah's kingdom in the poorer Shi'i areas of Beirut, and in the south. But with increased Lebanese government assistance available some sources see a conflict looming. "Iranian assistance groups build popularity on the suffering of others," said one Lebanese government official. "If the Lebanese government takes over rebuilding (the social services), these religious groups will feel they've lost their chance."

There's already been a run-in over a proposed runway to be added to Beirut airport and other changes which would alter the Shi'i suburbs which border the airport. Accusations of "changing the ethnic color" of the area have been leveled at the government by some Shi'i leaders.

American factor—Well aware of Lebanon's appetite for good relations with the United States, Iran brought up its objections to U.S. attacks on Iraq with the visiting Lebanese delegation. This is part of Iran's policy of support for peoples under U.S. attack, even if Iran disagrees with regimes ruling them.

Iran would welcome a change in U.S. policy that would lead to friendlier relations with Washington. This would be of benefit to Lebanon which, in the past, has paid a heavier price than Iran itself for Iranian-U.S. tensions. A commemorative service was held at the present U.S. Embassy here in April on the 10th anniversary of the bombing of the U.S. Embassy, attributed to the Iran-connected Islamic Jihad organization. Just days before, the U.S. had reiterated its decision to keep Iran at the top of its list of countries that sponsor global terrorism.

Iran-watchers here warn the West against hysteria when it comes to Iranian-Lebanese relations. They argue that Lebanon in peace needs to strengthen ties with, everybody, especially regional powers. And good Iranian-Lebanese relations are not new. Even in the era of the shah, aid flowed to Lebanon's Shi'i community.

If the West feels nervous over Iran's interest in its co-religionists in Lebanon's Shi'i community, "think of how the Shi'i feel when the Vatican expresses interest in the country's Christians," challenged a Shi'i source.

Lebanon's geographically, and now politically, strategic Shi'i community is the obvious reason for "the ties that bind" the two countries. But the years of hostage taking also played a role. "We entered into very special relations with Iran to get the hostages out," said a high-ranking Lebanese official as he argued for U.S. cancellation of the six-year-old U.S. State Department ban against American travel in Lebanon, and an eight-year revocation of Lebanese airlines' landing rights in the U.S. There are no flights between Lebanon and the U.S. Nor are there flights between Lebanon and Iran. But somehow trade continues in both directions. Along with traditional Iranian carpets and caviar comes ideology and rhetoric. And alongside a model of Jerusalem's Dome of the Rock on the airport road, a Diet Pepsi sign competes for the attention of even the most fundamentalist Shi'i.