Tony Badran
NOW Lebanon
13 July '10
The recent tension in South Lebanon, choreographed by Hezbollah against UNIFIL under the guise of spontaneous protests by villagers, has been used by the party to reassert its equation of “the Resistance, the people, and the army”— the three mutually-reinforcing pillars which, Hezbollah maintains, are alone responsible for safeguarding the country’s security. The core premise of this mantra, however, has its origins in Iran’s Islamic revolutionary doctrine.
After its military assault in May 2008 against western Beirut and the Druze-controlled mountains, followed by the Doha Accord, Hezbollah imposed this line on public discourse and the current government’s policy statement. The party has, since, elevated the formula to the status of sole acceptable blueprint for Lebanon’s so-called “defense strategy.” In a May 25 speech, Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah held that this equation was the basis of Lebanon’s strength, and he accused anyone who undermined it of “working intentionally to expose Lebanon to Israeli aggression.”
During the 1990s, the Lebanese political class robotically regurgitated Syrian-imposed slogans, and Hezbollah is reproducing the same phenomenon today with the “Resistance, people, army” mantra, thereby aborting any domestic debate about its armed status. As such, Nasrallah pointed to Michel Sleiman’s endorsement of the formulation, which the president offered on Hezbollah’s Al-Manar TV no less. The Druze leader Walid Jumblatt has also performed the required ritualistic profession of this mandatory article of faith.
The absence of any reference to the “state” in this formula, and its substitution with the category of “people” is not accidental. It is useful in this regard to recall a peculiar March 2007 encounter between Jumblatt, when he was still hostile to Hezbollah, with the correspondent of the Iranian Arabic-language Al-Alam TV in New York. In response to a question about Hezbollah’s 2006 “victory” against Israel, Jumblatt replied that he had publicly asked to whom Nasrallah would offer this alleged victory, then added that Nasrallah’s response was “to the Lebanese people and the Arabic and Islamic umma.” Jumblatt said that he would have preferred for the victory to be offered to the Lebanese “state,” as the state alone must have the right to take the decision of making war or peace.
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