In Lebanon, Last in Line for Peace But First for Punishment

by Marilyn Raschka

When Hezbollah uses the word “damn” in reference to U.S.-Israeli relations, it’s old hat. When U.S. political pundits use the word “damn” in public rather than in private while discussing Israeli-American relations, it’s at least an eye-opener, even if not yet a trend-setter.Following the Israeli elections, former Bush administration White House Middle East adviser Richard Haas, interviewed on National Public Radio (NPR), answered the question, “Do we throw our weight around [with the new Israeli government]?” with, “Damn right!” He argued that the U.S. has transferred “so much wealth [to Israel] to make it secure and comfortable“ that they owe us. Haas ended his answer: “We don’t ask for a lot. We oppose settlements. We ask them to support peace.”

I heard the pundit’s “damn” sitting comfortably in my kitchen in Wisconsin listening to NPR in June. I saw Hezbollah’s “damn” (spelled “dam”) on a banner in the town of Nabatiyeh in April on a trip back to Lebanon that uncomfortably coincided with Israel’s “Grapes of Wrath” operation. The banner, ungrammatical but nevertheless articulate, read: DAM ON YOU AMERICAN BLACK PEACE.

Nabatiyeh is a major Shi’i market town in southern Lebanon with a fair share of Hezbollah supporters. It also has suffered more than its fair share of Israeli attacks over the years. Israel uses Nabatiyeh as one of those flash-card words that brings to the media’s mind a nest of Party of God types. The image has served Israel well in justifying repeated visitations of death and destruction.

I had driven to the town just after the April 26 U.S.-brokered cease-fire and a week after the gruesome deaths of some 100 civilians who had taken refuge in a U.N. troop area in Qana, near Tyre. Sections of the road to Nabatiyeh were torn up from the bombardment of the coast road. After warning south Lebanese civilians to flee their homes, the Israeli army had done its damnest to make sure leaving was as dangerous as possible. Right on the main street of Nabatiyyeh was Exhibit A, a shop that had been rocketed by Israeli gunners from a hill overlooking the town. Called ELITEC, this shop had sold appliances and TVs. Chances of it being a Hezbollah stronghold were remote, somewhere beyond zilch. When I asked after the owner, they told me he had gone to the mosque to pray. What would you say to God after American weapons in Israeli hands had wiped out your place of business, inventory and livelihood?

Following Binyamin Netanyahu’s victory, I could almost hear another long distance damn, this one from an ambassador friend of mine in the Middle East who has invested much of his personal time, as has his country, in furthering the peace process. In the middle of April’s Grapes of Wrath, he had been sent on a new missiongo to Hebron for the departure of Israeli troops and the handing over of Hebron to the Palestinian authorities.

In its post-Israeli election coverage, NPR ran an interview with a Jewish settler in Hebron who expressed these opinions: “Bibi knows that he was voted in because people weren’t happy with the direction that Oslo was taking us. Can I say that he is able to go back on things? You know that there are a lot of problems involved but we know that the direction isn’t going to be the same direction.”

The interviewer commented, “One of the things she hopes he will go back on is the planned withdrawal of most of the Israeli troops from Hebron.” In April a contingent of U.N. observers from Norway arrived in Hebron to oversee the promised redeployment, which originally was to have taken place before the end of 1995. If Netanyahu translates his campaign rhetoric into action, however, those Jewish settlers will get their way and the U.N. observers could be waiting in Hebron for a long time.

Much of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s victory was due to the overwhelming support he got from the religious right—Israeli’s own parties of God. In Lebanon, since the all-out Israeli assault, it has been the government and ordinary people who have stood up for the Party of God, defending its attacks on Israel’s illegal presence in Lebanon. The Lebanese were outraged at Israel’s bombardment of civilian communities, including Beirut suburbs, and on the city’s electricity installations. In recent months, for the first time in over a decade, the city had been basking in 24-hour electricity. Suddenly, with Israel’s air attacks on its power-generating facilities, Beirut was reduced once again to a few hours of power a day.

Hezbollah set up aid collection spots everywhere throughout Beirut including, for the first time ever, the city’s Christian sector. Donations were generous and went toward relief aid for displaced families.

Some 400,000 people had fled their homes. As thousands headed for Beirut the Lebanese government declared that all public schools would be closed to classes and opened for the displaced. School desks were shoved into corners to make room for refugee families and their bundles. Chalk was soon creating a blackboard record of their children’s frustrations and fears.

The Lebanese were furious that the school year would be disrupted or even canceled because of Peres’ desire to look more hawkish by carrying out a military campaign to further his political one.

But now the deaths in Qana and other villages, the disruption to education and even the electrical outages are water under the bridge. What does Lebanon have to look forward to with Binyamin Netanyahu at Israel’s helm?

Will the “damn right” stance be mothballed until after the November election or even longer?

Former White House adviser Haas, now a political pundit, predicted a honeymoon period for Clinton and Netanyahu. For the Middle East he suggested that if there were a potential explosion it would be over Lebanon: “Hezbollah is going to continue to challenge Israel and Bibi’s government, with the generals in it, is going to hit back much harder and differently,” he said.

U.S. pressure on Syria to phase out the delivery of arms to Hezbollah will now fall on even deafer ears. As for God’s party itself, Hezbollah issued a communiqué in Beirut saying the new order in Israel would inspire its members to fight even harder.

Just days before the Israeli election, a Hezbollah attack killed four Israeli soldiers inside Lebanon. According to the former oral and now written understanding between Hezbollah and Israel, such attacks will not reap retaliation as long they take place in the Israeli-occupied areas of Lebanon and as long as civilians from either side are not targeted.

Will the new prime minister abide by this understanding? Hezbollah is likely to test it.

Western investors interested in Lebanon’s multibillion-dollar reconstruction programs may turn even more skittish than they have been. And for the thousands of Americans who look forward to the repeal of the State Department ban on travel to Lebanon, Netanyahu’s victory promises more violence and further extensions of the 1987 edict.

On my way to Damascus to visit my ambassador friend I was verbally accosted by a Lebanese army officer on the border between Lebanon and Syria. Israel’s Grapes of Wrath had triggered his wrath. His criticism boiled up, and down, to this: Why can’t your government play fair? Why do they always see us as the terrorists? Who is occupying whose land?

The way I see it, Lebanon occupies the last place in the line to receive peace but appears to be right up front for punishment. Damn!