How can we implement UN resolution 1559?

Posted on October 24, 2008 and written in March 12, 2005

Note: The UN has declared in October 2008 that resolution 1559 has been satisfied! Mind you that this report was written in 2005. 15 years later, the State of Lebanon is in shambel and totally bankrupt, politically, economically and financially.

The Prime Minister Omar Karame was forced to resign under popular pressure and then was re-appointed by a majority of the deputies. Karame asserted that he will refuse to form a government unless it includes the opposition parties because this volatile state of affairs demands a unified front in order to proceed with the investigations, divulge the truth of the assassins of Rafic Hariri, prepare for a fair election for the chamber of representatives and the execution of all the articles in the Taif agreement.  

The opposition insists on its terms for participation in the government and the critical condition is the resignation of all the heads of intelligence and security services which President Lahoud refuses to accept.

We are practically beyond the phase of Syrian troops withdrawal and intelligence units across the borders of Lebanon because they are executing the articles of 1559 in a timely fashion.

So what about Lebanon?  

The Syrian might get off the pressures of resolution 1559 by satisfying the articles attached to its part of withdrawing all its troops out of Lebanon but what about Lebanon?  How could Lebanon disarm Hezbollah and the Palestinian refugee camps?  

President Lahoud refused 1559 in a lengthy television talk and refused to personally accept the preconditioned demands of the opposition on the basis that it will confirm that we have a presidential political system instead of a parliamentary one as the new Constitution was agreed upon in Taef.  

In the new Constitution the real power is in the government as a whole and thus the President acceptance of the pre conditions would be unconstitutional.  

The opposition responded by organizing a large gathering of over a million from most religious sects and from the four corners of the country.  This gathering was a practical response from a unified Lebanon on their demands for “freedom, self determination and independence” from any foreign tutelage, meaning from “Syria” and Not from colonial powers States.

Certainly, the articles in the UN resolution 1559, especially those related to Lebanon, cannot be resolved in the near future but they do give directions to every Lebanese government in the future to continue discussions with Hezbollah and the Palestinian Authority in order to reach a satisfactory resolution.

This resolution is reason enough for every Lebanese government to confront the “Arab” and international community to press Israel into providing the guarantees for non aggression against Lebanon and facilitating the application of the remaining articles of 1559 resolution by speeding up the creation of the independent Palestinian State, Israel to withdraw from the Shabaa area in South Lebanon an from the Golan Heights in Syria.  

These are long term values for resolution 1559 that President Lahoud has to grasp.

One of the main opposition leaders, Deputy Walid Jumblatt, is adamant on the necessity of evicting the President since he is a de facto head of all the intelligence and security services responsible for the reign of humiliation that Lebanon had to succumb to.

Jumblatt claims that the prolongation of the presidency term for another 3 years is the crux of the problems; either the President resigns or there will be no unified front in any government and no reprieve for any political stability.

Jumblatt is keen at repeating his father’s feat of deposing President Bechara Khoury in 1953.  Former prime minister and an opposition leader in exile in Paris, General Michel Aoun, wants to return after all the Syrian troops are out of Lebanon and personally to participate in the election.

A few politicians have voiced their desires for the heads of the intelligence and security services to resign by themselves and allow the dialogue between the President and the opposition forces to resume because they are the remaining cards in the President hands.  

We are caught in a vicious circle between the notions that the people has spoken and how the Constitution could be applied for the continuation of power transfer.

Saying that the people has spoken is not completely correct: there is another large chunk in the population that do not agree with the opposition stands, although everybody has been raising the Lebanese flag and chanting the national anthem.

I think we are in big trouble for years to come.

The euphoric show of the opposition cannot last after the Syrian withdrawal and Hezbollah is not about to let down the President who has supported them through the difficult resistance period.  

Any how, Hezbollah is not about to trust the rhetoric of the opposition that they are ready to participate in dialogue without preconditions.  May be another round of civil war is not highly probable but the international involvement and pressures do not augur well in the coming months.

The fact is the international community did get involved before in our affairs and retracted from their commitments after their first failures and gave up easily.  

The UN and the USA undersigned the Taif agreement and promised substantial economic and political contributions to set Lebanon on its feet.  Unfortunately, they forgot Lebanon completely for 15 years.

The international community did not help Lebanon in its development and reconstruction plans and left Lebanon under the Syrian tutelage who shouldered the burden of reunifying and rearming the Lebanese army.  

The bottom line is the Lebanese people who paid dearly for every semblance of a regular and routine life for the return of electricity, telephone communication, the airport, the highways and the reconstruction of Downtown Beirut.

The only interests of the US in Lebanon are directly linked to its predicaments in Iraq.

France has lost its prestige as a colonial undertaker in Lebanon and Syria and will not recover without the direct support of the USA; which means never!  

The people are dreaming of a stable life within months:  how about many years before the new world powers sort out their interests and settle for what kind of tiny and complicated Lebanon they can suffer to live with.

Note 2: For the next 15 years, the 6 civil war militia/mafia “leaders” ruled and controlled Lebanon. And they never budged from retaining power. The chief of the Parliament Nabih Berri is still dominating the Parliament for 23 years, and I consider him as the chief Caponi of the mafia.