Is 'Pax Syriana' Nearing an End in Lebanon?

With Syria dramatizing the pullout of its intelligence contingents from Beirut airport, from Hizbullah's strongholds in the city's southern suburbs and from the Christian-populated province north of the capital, the Beirut office of the Agence France Press posed the question whether Syria's ostensible peacemaking role in Lebanon is really nearing an end. This is the English language text of the analysis by AFP's Salim Yassine, a grandson of Lebanon's late Prime Minister Sami Solh, as it was distributed for Monday morning newspapers in Beirut, the rest of the Middle East and in Europe: "After a decade of relative stability following its civil war, Lebanon is once again at the centre of tensions involving its neighbors, mainly the Israeli-Syrian dispute and the Palestinian refugee problem. "Israel's pullout from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation in 2000 left the Lebanese Shiite Muslim militant Hizbullah on the border with Israel, as Beirut continues to refuse to deploy the army there. "Technically, Lebanon and Israel are still in a state of war with on-again-off-again eruptions of violence keeping their common border as the last active Arab-Israeli warfront since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war. "Lebanon's four million people remain a mosaic of communities, the only Arab country where the Muslims -- despite being the majority – have theoretically accepted to share power on an equal footing with the Christians. "Amid the clash of civilizations after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, Lebanon tried to remain an example of a "dialogue of cultures" and an antithesis of states in the region where a single religious sect dominates. "After the end of the 1975-1990 civil war, Lebanon witnessed a period of relative calm, but Syria's dominance of its smaller neighbor's affairs cost Beirut sovereignty and mismanagement that incurred a gigantic debt of 35 billion dollars. "Pax Syriana," or Syrian-managed peace in Lebanon, blew up on September 2 when the U.N. Security Council adopted Resolution 1559 calling for an end to foreign military presence and interference in Lebanon -- in a clear message to Syria which maintains 14,000 troops in the country. "The resolution, sponsored by the United States and France, also demanded that militias in Lebanon be disarmed, an unmistakable reference to Hizbullah and the country's Palestinian refugee camps. "But just a day after the resolution was adopted, Syria imposed the extension of the mandate of its protege, Lebanese President Emile Lahoud, through a constitutional amendment boycotted by various opposition groups. "The three-year extension of Lahoud's mandate was followed by deep political divisions that witnessed the resignation of Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and one of his cabinet ministers, Marwan Hamadeh of Economy, was later targeted by a car bombing assassination attempt. "The U..N intervention in Lebanon's affairs seemed to have awakened the specters that once provoked a civil war in the country: the Israeli, Palestinian and Syrian interventions. "Beirut and Damascus rejected Resolution 1559, which they saw as a U.S.-Israeli plot disguised behind the slogan of "war on terror" to disband groups fighting against Israel and impose the permanent settlement of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. "For the time being, political and confessional disputes in Lebanon have remained under control. "But as pro and anti-Syria Lebanese politicians are increasingly trading accusations of 'treason,' tensions may threaten the 1943 National Convention for peaceful coexistence which granted independence to the Lebanese, with Christians accepting not to seek Western protection and the Muslims to avoid Arab domination." End of Yassine's article.(AFP-Naharnet)