Look at who holds the South Lebanon trigger

Tony Badran
NOW Lebanon
03 August '10

(This was written and posted by Tony Badran just before the LAF border attack. In general, he is very on topic, and this is excellent background material as to what may or may not develop. Y.)

On the eve of last Friday’s mini-Arab summit in Lebanon, the United States quietly, but noticeably, renewed a 2007 Executive Order designating parties deemed to be undermining Lebanese sovereignty.

The renewal was a welcome reminder of the problems overshadowed by the photo-op in Baabda that included President Michel Sleiman, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. However, it did not compensate for the lack of active American involvement in Lebanon’s affairs, nor its substitution with an “over the horizon” policy allowing local and regional actors to take the lead in addressing initiatives potentially damaging to Washington’s interests.

In his message to Congress about the renewal of EO 13441, President Barack Obama identified the major source of Lebanon’s destabilization and the undermining of its sovereignty: continued arms smuggling to Hezbollah, including, of course, that carried out by Syria. This helped refocus the issue amid all the surreal statements about Syria’s role in safeguarding Lebanon’s stability at the Baabda summit.

This clarification also served to refocus, at least conceptually, the priorities of US policy toward Syria and Lebanon. Syria is, understandably, nowhere near the top of the list of the Obama administration’s main concerns. However, this has led to ill-advised steps, one being the introduction of myriad American interlocutors with Damascus, which has led to a muddling of policy priorities.

(Read full article)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.