Hezbollah fighting Israel leaves Lebanese divided
By Associated Press
July 15, 2006
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Heroic fighters to some, dangerous militia to others. Hezbollah, the group that began the latest round of bloody fighting with Israel, has deepened a longtime divide in Lebanon.
While Hezbollah supporters celebrated in the streets, other Lebanese were furious at being dragged into a costly confrontation with the Jewish state.
"I don't support Hezbollah's operation at all, because it gives a pretext for Israeli aggression on Lebanon," said Ibrahim al-Hajj, 50, a Christian Maronite who owns a shoe store in the southern village of Qleia. "As long as Hezbollah has its weapons and acts according to its leader's whims, there is pretext for Israel to keep on destroying Lebanon."
The divisions have paralyzed the Lebanese Cabinet, which includes two Hezbollah ministers but is dominated by politicians critical of Syria, the Shiite Muslim's group longtime backer. Emergency sessions this week were torn by bickering over how to respond to Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers that provoked Israel's assault.
"The government is helpless," said former President Amin Gemayel, a longtime critic of Hezbollah. "Hezbollah took a unilateral action, but its repercussions will affect the entire country."
The Cabinet this week managed only to agree on a statement insisting the government did not condone Hezbollah's actions. Ministers from Hezbollah and Amal, another Shiite movement, rejected an assertion that Lebanon should control its entire territory.
Israel has long pressed Lebanon to disarm Hezbollah and send troops to the southern border with Israel, where the guerrillas have near autonomy. But the government has refused, in part because it views Hezbollah as a legitimate resistance group.
Also, the guerrillas remain popular for their role in pushing Israel to withdraw from its self-declared security zone in southern Lebanon in 2000, ending an 18-year occupation.
With the political divisions in mind, Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah warned domestic opponents against "acting in a way that encourages the enemy against Lebanon."
Israeli raids have sent thousands fleeing southern Beirut, stirring up memories of Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war. A taxi driver kept up a tirade against Hezbollah as he drove through the capital's near empty streets.
"Why did you do it now, Sayyed Nasrallah?" he asked, refusing to give his name, fearing repercussions. "Why now? Couldn't you have waited a couple of months? Just two months until the tourists had left? Is this resistance? Ruining your country?"
As in everything else in this country, the split is mostly along sectarian lines, with Shiites largely supporting Hezbollah's action and Sunnis, Christians and Druse, a Muslim sect originating in Lebanon and Syria, mostly opposing it. Lebanon's Sunni leadership turned heavily anti-Syrian after the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri last year, an attack many Lebanese blamed on Syria.
The divide, however, is not clear-cut.
"Even if all our homes are destroyed, we will continue to support the resistance," said Mohsem Musulmani, a grocer in the southern port of Sidon, a predominantly Sunni city. "The resistance will always be the pride of the Arab and Islamic nation."
Chibli Mallat, a professor of international law, wrote in an editorial published by the Daily Star on Friday that "Hezbollah cannot go it alone and expect the government and the country as a whole to accept the sacrifices that all are suffering,"
"Moderates among us will be unable to prevent this divisiveness from developing into an unbridgeable gulf within the nation," he said.
