I thought that I would write up a little about the country of Lebanon this week, as there are happenings there of great historical significance. I have noticed that there have been many articles and blogs talking about the events of the last couple of weeks, with former Prime Minister Hariri being assassinated, the Lebanese people taking to the streets in protest of the Syrian occupation and the current Prime Minister dissolving the current government.
This is not a comprehensive analysis of Lebanese history, nor is it an attempt to bring out all of the relevant historical events that might have some bearing on what is going on over there right now. I am by no means an expert in this area. I just have an interest, and the current media seems content to bring out only the facts they seem to need in order to tell whatever story they want to spin.
Lebanon is a small country in the right place. It is about the size of Connecticut (and for us Oregonians would fit nicely on the west side in the Willamette valley to the coast) but has about 3.7 million people (so it's a might bit more crowded than the Willamette valley), but its location on the Mediterranean sea gives it a favorable status as a trading center. There are a few geographic regions that all stretch north to south (which, again, reminds me of western Oregon, although much drier). From west to east you have the coast, which is very Mediterranean, the Lebanon mountains, the Bekaa valley and the Anti-Lebanon mountains. The mountains are fairly rugged, and in past times have kept the coastal civilizations semi-isolated from the interior. The highest point in Lebanon is Qurnat as Sawda in the Lebanon mountains at 3088m (just over 10,000 feet). The Anti-Lebanon mountains are almost as high and form the border with Syria. The Bekaa valley is where much of the agriculture is, and where the bulk of the Syrian troops have been since the Taif accords were signed.
The area of Lebanon has a history dating back to ancient Phoenicia. You might have read some of that ancient people while you were skimming the Bible. David and Goliath and all that. The people there preceded the Israelites coming out of Egypt, and are thought by some historians to go back as far as 10,000 BC. They had excellent naval navigational skills and basically ruled the Mediterranean. They are also thought to have created the first alphabet.
Next we get into a long period of conquest by other civilizations. First the Assyrians, then Babylonians, Persians, and finally Alexander the Great came through. It is at this point that we see a decline in the Phoenician civilization as they were gradually Hellenized. In 64BC Pompey conquered Phoenicia and it became part of the Roman province of Syria. Because of all this conquering there are many great ancient temples, buildings and other sites dating back to the Greek and Roman periods. Lots of large stone edifices with large columns and stuff.
After the breakup of the Roman empire, Lebanon became part of the Byzantine empire and Christianity became prevalent, until the Muslims came in from the south, and were well received by the inhabitants, who didn't receive the Christianity of the Byzantines well. From this point Lebanon was a part of various Muslim dominated empires, but with Christians, Jews and Muslims living along side one another, often not in peace.
The last of these was the Ottoman empire, which captured the region in about 1515 and held it until WWI. It was in this time that the present form of Lebanon took its shape and was awarded an emerate by the Ottomans to Ahmad Maan about 100 years later.
I'll copy the next part from a history website as it's relevant, and says it better than I can:
When Ahmad Maan died, power passed to the Shihab family, who reigned until 1840, when internal power struggles brought the age of emirs to an end.
In 1842, the Ottomans divided Mount Lebanon into two administrative regions, one Druze and the other Maronite. That they immediately set to squabbling was anticipated and encouraged by the Ottomans, who practiced a 'divide and rule' policy. By 1845, there was open war, not only between Druze and Maronite, but also between peasants and their supposed feudal leaders.
The Ottomans, under pressure from Europe, created a single Lebanese administrative unit under an Ottoman Christian governor and the feudal system was abolished. The system worked, producing stability and economic prosperity until WWI, when Lebanon came under Turkish military rule and suffered a serious famine. Following the Allied victory in 1918, Lebanon came under French rule.
After WWII the Lebanese became independent from France, and for a time became, once again, a major trading center in the region. The problem was that the French had set up the government so that the Maronite Christians held power, and in a country where half the population is Muslim and there were lots of displaced Palestinians due to the conflicts in Israel, you are just asking for trouble. Leftist Muslims wanted power, Right wing Christians didn't want to give it up, and no-one really wanted the Palestinians there. In 1975 Civil war broke out.
The next 20 or so years involved a lot of civil war and high profile hostage taking. On the one hand you had the Muslims and Christians fighting over the government, and Syria coming in (at the Lebanese president's invitation). At the same time you have the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) making occasional attacks into Israel, so that Israel invaded a few times in order to eliminate the Palestinians living in Lebanon. After the second of these Israeli invasions, in 1982, the UN sent a peacekeeping force to prevent more bloodshed on either front.
This is where one of those watershed moments in the history of US involvement in the Middle east comes into play. That anyone in this scenario would drive a truck with explosives, on a suicide mission, into a building with peacekeepers, was probably quite a shock to Americans. So the bombing of the US compound in 1983, killing 241 US marines and 60 French soldiers was our first high profile exposure to what has become a regular fixture in our coverage of events in the Middle east.
Skipping some here. By the turn of the decade, Israel had retreated most of the way (leaving a DMZ at the border), and Syria had established control over most of the country.
Except for another Israeli invasion in the mid nineties, where they bombed several villages and killed many Palestinians, as well as thousands of Lebanese, the Syrians have had a measure of control over the government, due to the Taif agreements in the early nineties, and internal strife has been muted. However, the Lebanese have expressed their desire that now that things are relatively peaceful, that the Syrians pick up and go, which they have not. Last year the United Nations passed Resolution 1559 calling for Syria to withdraw from Lebanon and end all influence in Lebanese affairs.
So far Syria has not complied with the resolution, but with Iraqi elections and the assassination of Hariri, the Lebanese people have decided to take a more aggressive approach, and the US has put more political pressure on the Syrians to oblige. Syria still maintains that it is there because the Lebanese government asked it to be (although that was a long time ago) and because the government has yet to implement all of the constitutional reforms of the Taif accord. Now you all can tell me if you think Syria has any place advising another country on constitutional reforms.
Really, with all the joint - Christian and Muslim - protests going on I don't find it hard to believe that the Christians and Muslims can get along in a truly democratic situation. The government and power structures that the French left behind (another great job by the CESM) created a situation where the Christians had the power and the Muslims didn't. If the government is a fair democracy I see both groups getting along for the most part. They've each lived in the region of Lebanon for centuries, and the original civil war was, as is usually the case, more nuanced than just "Christians vs. Muslims."
The government of Lebanon, as provided by a loose constitution created in 1923 (amended in 1992, Taif accords), is a democracy, with three branches. The Judicial branch in this system is pretty weak, as it cannot provide for not judicial review of legislative acts, but can hear accusations against the president and Prime Minister. The Legislature is a single body with 128 seats, elected by popular vote on the basis of proportional representation, but divided equally among Christians and Muslims (there are 64 of each in the body). They serve 4 year terms.
The Legislature elects the President (currently Emile Lahud), who serves a 6 year term, and the president appoints the PM and the deputy PM.
Interestingly, by agreement, the president is a Maronite Christian, the PM is a Sunni Muslim and the Speaker of the legislature is a Shiite. I don't know if this will change, because as of last week, PM Omar Karami stepped down and declared the government dissolved. One hopes that the Lebanese will have some free and fair elections soon and not change the system, as it was generally thought that most elected officials were in Syria's back pocket.
Things are looking up, as the protests and demonstrations against the pro-Syrian government have been peaceful, with Christians and Muslims marching side by side in some cases. There have even been some reverberations in Syria. Also note the interview with Syrian opposition leader Farid Ghadry I noted below.
President Lahoud is giving the legislature 48 hours to pick a new Prime Minister, but some are calling for a "neutral" transition government ahead of elections due by the end of May.
This whole event has caused two bickering siblings to put aside differences:
In a rare display of unity, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called for the immediate withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon and the holding of free and fair elections there.Here is a nice timeline of events in the Daily Star. Hat tip to PublisPundit.
No comments:
Post a Comment