Lebanon - A Cause Of Regional Wars Or Catalyst For Regional Peace, To Be Decided Soon.

*** Saudi Arabia & The Rest Of The GCC, Plus Egypt, Jordan, Fatah And The March 14 Forces In Lebanon - Part Of The US-Led Alliance - Want Stability And Security In The Middle East & A 'Viable' Palestine State

*** The Iran-Led Axis Wants A Different ME

*** Israel Is Offering Assad A Deal Provided That He Leave The Tehran Axis And Does What He Says Will Not Be Possible - Abandoning All Those Groups, Like Hizbullah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Which Are Opposed To Peace With The Jewish State; Yet The Syrian Ruler Is Still Letting

The Israelis Think Some Deal Could Be Done

*** OPEC Summit In Riyadh Raises World Oil Demand Security Issue And Shuns Some Of Chavez Ideas

BEIRUT - Whatever will happen to Lebanon in the coming weeks will tell whether this country will have a conflict causing regional wars, a compromise which will only delay such wars, or an agreement which will be the catalyst for regional peace. Either way, the Middle East will be affected. Lebanon's offshore is said to hold 8 bn barrels of oil.

The environment in the whole region from Turkey to Pakistan has become extremely dangerous. With Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, the Palestinians, Egypt and the six Arab Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) states being in the middle, what will happen between Turkey and Iraqi Kurdistan will have almost immediate implications for the region (see rim5-IraqRegnlDangersNov19-07).

All these countries have problems which are inter-connected. This is because of a cold war between the Iran-led axis of anti-US forces in the Middle East - such as Syria's 'Alawite/Ba'thist regime which still insists on "Greater Syria" to include Lebanon and Palestine, Iran's Shi'ite offshoot in Lebanon Hizbullah, and Palestinian rejectionists such as Hamas, etc. - and a US-led alliance which includes the other states mentioned above.

In Pakistan, the Nov. 3 coup of President Pervez Musharraf has meant there will either be in a lengthy dictatorship - from the Western standpoint one of the least bad scenarios - or a Talibanisation of the country and a re-Talibanisation of Afghanistan. The best scenario for the US is a power-sharing deal between a Musharraf turned civilian and former PM Benazir Bhutto (see news20PakMusharrafCoupNov12-07).

Lebanon is one of the connected danger zones. The most immediate issue there is election of a new president to succeed Emile Lahoud, a puppet of the Syrian regime, whose term ends on Nov. 24. Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad has been urged by most world powers to stop interfering in the election process, with French President Nicolas Sarcozy's top aides having offered him partnership with the EU in return for leaving the Lebanese be. He promised to respond in the week from Nov. 5.

Assad's first response came on Nov. 10 through Ahmad Jebril, a puppet of the Syrian intelligence and head of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC), who told Lebanon's New TV another round of violence between the Lebanese and Palestinian rejectionists was in the offing. Part of the Iran-led axis, Jebril called the ruling "March 14" majority of Beirut "agents of Zionism and US imperialism". Jebril also predicted intra-Palestinian violence.

Assad's second response came on Nov. 11 from Hizbullah's Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, who said that - rather than electing a new president who will not be recognised by his group - Lahoud should come up with a "salvation initiative" to fill a power vacuum. In that he was confirming earlier indications from Damascus that Lebanon must have either a parallel government or "as security body" headed by its Army Commander Gen. Michel Suleiman - whom Assad promoted in 1998 to head the country's armed forces and thus succeed Lahoud in that post.

Nasrallah said things which proved a Syrian point that Lebanon had no choice other than being part of the Iran-led axis. He said Israel's recent military exercises near the Lebanese border were to prepare for a new war. He said Hizbullah's military maneouvres in southern Lebanon in response to the Israeli drills were designed to send out "a clear message" to the Jewish state that his fighters were ready for the war.

Addressing a rally in one of Beirut's Hizbullah-controlled suburbs, Nasrallah said: "The enemy has been conducting military maneouvres for months. The latest occurred a few weeks ago near the Lebanese border in which 50,000 Israeli officers and soldiers participated. These maneouvres are to prepare for an attack on Lebanon".

Nasrallah said: "No one in the world can disarm Hizbullah". He said Hizbullah had yet to play its role in re-shaping the Middle East. His speech shocked the Lebanese. It was a direct challenge to the US-led alliance to which the Beirut government belongs.

Nasrallah said: "I urge Lahoud to...prevent the country from falling into a vacuum if there is no agreement" on a new president. He said Hizbullah and others in the opposition, part of the Iran-led axis, will not allow "the thieves and murderers" of the US-led alliance to rule Lebanon. He said Hizbullah will "never" accept a president elected by simple majority and without a two-thirds quorum of MPs, adding that if a consensus president could not be agreed on in the coming days, then the country should hold early parliamentary elections. (The Iran/Syria-backed "March 8" opposition has been unable for months to agree with the ruling "March 14" coalition on a consensus successor to Lahoud. Three scheduled sessions in parliament have been postponed because of the tussle, with the latest vote called for Nov. 21. Nasrallah thanked Lahoud for supporting "the resistance", having weakened the Army in favour of Hizbullah.

March 14 MPs say they may elect a president by simple majority if the feuding camps cannot agree on a consensus successor. The constitution allows MPs to elect a president, who must be a Maronite Christian, by simple majority, but only after a first session attended by two-thirds of MPs. Lahoud says he will not hand over power to the government if his term expires without a successor. Many now fear rival governments arising, as happened at the end of Lebanon's 1975-90 civil war, or violence on a large scale. Nasrallah labelled the government of Sunni PM Fou'ad Siniora "a bunch of thieves and murderers" backed by the US and Israel.

In an address marking Martyrs Day, Nasrallah said: "If the whole world came and tried, it would not be able to implement the clause concerning disarmament of the resistance in [UNSC] Resolution 1559". (R 1559, adopted in September 2004, calls for disarmament of all non-state elements in Lebanon and is one of the issues separating the Hizbullah-led opposition from the government, as Hizbullah and many Palestinian groups remain armed). Nasrallah touched on reports of potential violence in Beirut's Palestinian refugee camps - Burj al-Barajneh, Sabra and Shatila - near Hizbullah-controlled suburbs. (Jebril confirmed these reports in his Nov. 10 interview with New TV, conducted in his Damascus home). An armed clash did take place in the Burj al-Barajneh camp on Nov. 16, which reflected Fatah-PFLP-GC tensions, and people later predicted this could be the start of a new cycle of violence in Lebanon.

The Siniora cabinet on Nov. 10 had called for vigilance in the face of reports of new attempts by Neo-Salafi militants - allegedly a creation of the Syrian intelligence - to infiltrate the country's dozen Palestinian refugee camps. The Army recently crushed Fatah al-Islam (FaI), a Neo-Salafi group, at the Nahr el-Bared refugee camp in northern Lebanon. But FaI's leader Shaker al-Abssi - said to be working for Assef Shawkat, head of Syria's military intelligence and brother-in-law of President Assad - managed to escape. In his interview, Jebril hinted that Abssi would re-emerge to confront the Army somewhere else in Lebanon.

March 14 Hits Back: March 14 politician Fares S'aid, a Christian medical doctor, says the Iran-led axis through Hizbullah wants to keep owning Beirut's decision on war or peace with Israel and the US-led alliance. He says Assad wants civil war in Lebanon. But he predicts: "Unrest will occur outside Lebanon, even in Syria", saying the Christians are "alert against such plots".

Youth Minister Ahmad Fatfat said he never expected Nasrallah to "stoop so low". Others later in the week said Hizbullah was executing a coup ordered by the Iran-led axis, with Assad aiming to undermine a UN court which will try the killers of former PM Rafiq Hariri and other Lebanese VIPs. With Damascus implicated in those murders, such a trial could undermine Assad's regime.

Information Minister Ghazi Aridi on Nov. 12 said: "Nasrallah's speech has destroyed the Lebanese people's hope [to reach consensus]. Is the speech directed against [Parliament Speaker Nabih] Berri? Is it a message that goes beyond Lebanon? Have we reached a point where consensus cannot be reached to elect a new president?". Barri heads the Shi'ite Amal group "allied" to Hizbullah.

Democratic Gathering leader MP Walid Jumblatt said: "Someone who announced the death of all political initiatives aimed at resolving the...crisis, which he himself ignited. Someone appeared before us yesterday threatening as usual...and announced...the beginning of wars he hopes will change the region, and certainly through the Lebanese gate. Someone talked about thieves and murderers. It would be relevant to say the thieves and murderers are those who...hampered the establishment of an international court [for the Hariri murder]. Thieves and murderers are those who have besieged Beirut, closed parliament and paralysed constitutional institutions to spread the culture of poverty and hunger in parallel to the culture of death".

Jumblatt, leader of the Druze community, said: "Thieves and murderers are those who make inciting speeches at every fateful moment...on behalf of the Syrian...[ruler] who...makes believe he is not thwarting political solutions in the country". He said the thieves and murderers were those who wanted a president who rejected international resolutions and a state which owned the decision of war and peace and monopolised weapons, adding: "This contradicts the vision of thieves and murderers who hide themselves under the name of resistance to turn Lebanon into an arena [for regional conflicts] to serve the thieves and murderers of the Syrian regime and their Iranian partners. Thieves and murderers are those who set up their own phone networks and link them to their security zones...those who steal electricity and do not pay their bills" - referring to Nasrallah's opposition privatisation of Lebanon's two mobile-phone networks.

Minister Fatfat accused Nasrallah of protecting the murderers of the March 14 figures who had been killed in the past two years, adding: "With his speech, Nasrallah has protected those who have assassinated our March 14 allies. He has not only protected them through his alliances but also through his security zones. What Nasrallah did was a stab in the back of Berri. It was an attempt to thwart all efforts to reach consensus... He is the one protecting the killers".

Telecommunications Minister Marwan Hamadeh said: "We are not murderers, he (Nasrallah) is the one protecting murderers. The one who establishes illegal phone networks, the one who does not pay electricity bills and the one who protects hashish in certain Lebanese regions does not have the right to talk about thieves".

Democratic Gathering MP Akram Chehayeb said: "the [Shi'ite] guide of the Lebanese republic appeared yesterday, clinging to his weapons and rockets, classifying people as usual and threatening... [Nasrallah] is eager to change the face of history as a show of victory for Iran, immunity for Syria and destruction of Lebanon".

In a Nov. 13 call to PM Siniora, President Bush renewed US support to the March 14 forces, saying: "They should be able to elect a government free of any external interference, especially from Syria. He reconfirmed our position that elections must happen on time and according to Lebanon's constitution". Bush says Syria is destabilising Lebanon, a charge Syria keeps denying.

Lebanon was in the week visited by officials from big powers. The first was French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, followed on Nov. 15-16 by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and on Nov. 17 by Italian Foreign Minister Massimo d'Alema and US Assistant Secretary of State David Welsh.

Al-Akhbar (close to Hizbullah) and as-Safir (close to Syria) on Nov. 5 said Hizbullah had staged one of its largest exercises ever south of the Litani River, the first since the end of the July/August 2006 war with Israel. Al-Akhbar said Nasrallah personally directed the exercise and quoted him as saying: "I hope both friend and foe will realise the resistance is totally ready to confront all kinds of Israeli threats".

Italy, France, Spain and Germany form the bulk of an enlarged UN force (UNIFIL) which deployed in South Lebanon after the 2006 war. UNIFIL spokeswoman Yasmina Bouziane on Nov. 5 said: "All of the 28 troop-contributing states concerned remain resolved and committed more than ever to continue their contribution to UNIFIL's mission to help ensure security and stability". She said the Hizbullah-claimed exercise had been denied by Beirut, adding: "The position of the Lebanese authorities is corroborated by reports of UNIFIL units on the ground. The Lebanese Armed Forces have the primary responsibility for security in South Lebanon, including ensuring that the area between the Blue Line and the Litani River is free of any unauthorised armed personnel, assets and weapons".

PM Siniora on Nov. 5 said the Hizbullah exercises were only a "simulation on paper". He added: "What happened is nothing but an indoor simulation exercise which was never implemented on the ground".

Apart from the 13,500 UNIFIL soldiers, the area south of the Litani is patrolled by 15,000 Lebanese Army troops, in accordance with UNSC Resolution 1701, which ended the hostilities in August 2006. The Daily Star on Nov. 6 quoted a "senior Lebanese Army source" as saying there was no such thing as "unarmed" military exercises, but added that the Hizbullah drills, while officially unconfirmed, fell under the category of "movements of citizens around the South". He said: "It does not mean anything to us unless it is armed and poses a threat to security. Any activity or movement cannot be termed manoeuvres. They (Hizbullah) may choose to call them manoeuvres, but we don't".