Shaping Lebanon's Future

Bilal Saab writes at the Saban Center/Brookings, here

"...One factor that facilitated the “March 14” bloc’s victory was the gerrymandered electoral law bequeathed by Syria. Lebanese politicians from across the spectrum, and whatever their views of Syria, were happy to operate within the electoral law......Still the governing coalition was also the author of some of its own misfortunes. Led by Saad Hariri, the son of the murdered former Prime Minister, the “March 14” bloc also thwarted the aspirations of all Lebanese calling for a free, democratic and sovereign Lebanon through internal feuding and its inability to come to an accommodation with the opposition.... The problem for the United States is that its experiences in Lebanon have more often than not been unrewarding due to U.S. blunders and miscalculations..... for the United States, Lebanon is also the perfect battlefield for settling scores with its adversaries, namely Iran and Syria. As such, Lebanon is where U.S. idealism and realpolitik meet and often conflict. The result is a shattered country torn between two divergent trends of U.S. foreign policy...."