Worse than civil war

The assassination on Tuesday of Pierre Gemayel, Lebanon’s industry minister, was another brutal blow of the axe to the cedar tree that gave its name to the nation’s so-called ‘revolution’ last year. That uprising was triggered by another death — the murder of the former Lebanese prime minister, Rafik Hariri in February 2005 — and forced the resignation of the pro-Syrian government of the time. The shooting of the 34-year-old Gemayel, a scion of the country’s leading Christian family and an outspoken opponent of Syrian influence, shows how desperately fragile Lebanon’s gains have been and, frankly, how illusory were its claims to independence after the 2005 uprising.

It is no surprise that Gemayel’s murder has spawned fears of a return to civil war, and it was certainly a savagely aimed intervention in Lebanese high politics. At the heart of the turmoil besetting Fuad Siniora’s government is its determination to expedite the UN plan for an international trial of suspects in the Hariri assassination. Syria is militantly opposed to this tribunal, patently fearful of what it might uncover. Six pro-Syrian Shia cabinet ministers have already resigned from Siniora’s government, and — with Gemayel gone — it would need only the loss of two more to force its collapse under the rules of the Lebanese constitution. Meanwhile, Hezbollah, which continues to run a state-within-a-state in southern Lebanon, is planning huge street demonstrations. A lethal and well-orchestrated strategy of destabilisation is being enacted.

As Baghdad burns and Kabul falters, it has become increasingly fashionable for Western observers to shake their heads in sorrow, shrug, and categorise outrages such as Gemayel’s death as regrettable episodes in yet another quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing.  To do so is a huge strategic error. This assassination was much more than the potential flashpoint of renewed civil war.