"It is the beginning of a serious line up that threatens a showdown. Can it be resolved at this stage? Yes. The openings are possible for resolving it, but they are openings that are extreme.
"Will Hezbollah back down for free? The answer is no. Will the government back down for free? The answer is no. But Nasrallah has left an opening that leaves the possibility of communication.
"He did not discount the government all out. He clearly indicated that the government [during the crackdown] was under the influence of Walid Jumblatt. In other words he exonerated Fouad Siniora, the prime minister, although in a humiliating way.
"My impression is that he left a minute, publically microscopic but for the knowing, an opening that needs to be capitalised on by Saad Hariri. Jumblatt is out of the picture now.
"What remains to be seen is if Hariri can match Nasrallah's high ground.
"The prime minister does not have a parliamentary base. His potential role is to facilitate between the sides what may come. We will find out what that next move is when Hariri talks.
"We are talking about the outcome of a battle when we have just seen one side of the fight. We need to see the other side to see what arsenal is on the table.
"Whether this role left open by Nasrallah can be activated depends on what Hariri does."
2 comments:
The events of the last two days have changed the political landscape in a major and dramatic way. The 'military' backbone of M14 is broken. Strategically, the M14 is no longer in a position to dictate course of events no matter how much support it gets from Bush, Sarkozy, Olmert, or Saudi Arabia. Another strategic battle has been lost by the forces aligned with the Bush Administation.
THe political narrative on the ground is changing. Hariri and co were counting on a rallye of Sunnis. It did not happen. In fact, many Sunnis traditionally with Hariri are moving away. The Government ill advised move to defang the Resistance was a major miscalculation. Not only it failed to misread the Resistance but also misread the mood in the street. Though there is a lot of tension between Sunnis and Shiites in Beirut, the issue of the resistance is off limits. Siniura and co failed to recognize that. Today, on all medias one can see prominent Sunni figures, clerics for that matter, taking pointed positions against the government. THe Mufti in his ill conceived appeal to Arabs to stand by Sunnis in Lebanon against fellow Lebanese Shiites backfired and demeaned the position of the Mufti. Things have been unraveling very quickly. The end may be closer than many think and certainly it wont please the Bush administration, which will have another feather of failure in its cap!
Its truly remarkable that in all the tension of a possible civil war none of us really knew what a shaky pack of cards the m14 militias were built on. So much for all that Jordanian training!
I knew Hizballah would win but never thought the whole of Beirut would fall in 8hrs.
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