Lebanon was seriously destabilised in 2005 with the assassination of Rafik Hariri, leading to a corrupt investigation called The Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL). The STL accused several pro-Syrian Lebanese military officers and had them detained for several years without charge. Nevertheless this accusation of Syria's involvement led to Syria withdrawing from Lebanon without too much public protest and violence. This withdrawal of Syria is part of the strategy laid out in black and white in the section Securing the Northern Border of the A Clean Break document written for Benjamin Netanyhau in 1996. The same group of Zionazis were influential in the USA, particularly on and after 9/11. Indeed, on 9/11 Netanyahu,live on TV, said the attacks on the Twin Towers would be good for Israel.
But now the same STL is about to accuse Hezbollah of killing Hariri. Hezbollah denies the allegation, which prompted Hezbollah to hold a press conference last month to implicate Israel, showing video secretly captured from Israel's spy planes and drones as they flew over Lebanon, and detailed the presence of Israeli Air Force planes over Beirut on the day of Hariri's assassination. Since that conference Hariri's son, the current PM of Lebanon, has publicly stated that he now believes that Syria is innocent of all charges of its involvement in his father's assassination, and that if Hezbollah is accused by the STL then it was not Hezbollah itself but rogue agents within Hezbollah, possibly working for Israel. This is a diplomatic and roundabout way of accusing Israel, for if it was not Syria or Hezbollah, and with the known history of Israeli operations in Lebanon (as detailed by Hezbollah in the aformentioned press conference), then who else could it be?
But the allegation that Hezbollah killed Hariri is potentially more dangerous, in that it could drive the Lebanese public to turn on Hezbollah, who in turn could begin to attack Israel for making false allegations. Even if Lebanon does not turn Hezbollah, Hezbollah could be provoked into some form retaliation over the accusations from the corrupt STL. And if Hezbollah fires the first shot then Israel has the moral high ground and will probably use it to more devastating effect than in 2006, which in turn will probably drag Iran into the violence. And if Iran is overtly involved then the USA will rub its hands with glee and get stuck in.
If the Lebanese do turn on Hezbollah and expels them then Lebanon would be free of both Syria and Hezbollah.
The section entitled Securing the Northern Border of A Clean Break reads,
Securing the Northern Border
Syria challenges Israel on Lebanese soil. An effective approach, and one with which America can sympathize, would be if Israel seized the strategic initiative along its northern borders by engaging Hizballah, Syria, and Iran, as the principal agents of aggression in Lebanon, including by:
* striking Syria’s drug-money and counterfeiting infrastructure in Lebanon, all of which focuses on Razi Qanan.
* paralleling Syria’s behavior by establishing the precedent that Syrian territory is not immune to attacks emanating from Lebanon by Israeli proxy forces.
* striking Syrian military targets in Lebanon, and should that prove insufficient, striking at select targets in Syria proper.
Israel also can take this opportunity to remind the world of the nature of the Syrian regime. Syria repeatedly breaks its word. It violated numerous agreements with the Turks, and has betrayed the United States by continuing to occupy Lebanon in violation of the Taef agreement in 1989. Instead, Syria staged a sham election, installed a quisling regime, and forced Lebanon to sign a "Brotherhood Agreement" in 1991, that terminated Lebanese sovereignty. And Syria has begun colonizing Lebanon with hundreds of thousands of Syrians, while killing tens of thousands of its own citizens at a time, as it did in only three days in 1983 in Hama.
Under Syrian tutelage, the Lebanese drug trade, for which local Syrian military officers receive protection payments, flourishes. Syria’s regime supports the terrorist groups operationally and financially in Lebanon and on its soil. Indeed, the Syrian-controlled Bekaa Valley in Lebanon has become for terror what the Silicon Valley has become for computers. The Bekaa Valley has become one of the main distribution sources, if not production points, of the "supernote" — counterfeit US currency so well done that it is impossible to detect.
Text:
Negotiations with repressive regimes like Syria’s require cautious realism. One cannot sensibly assume the other side’s good faith. It is dangerous for Israel to deal naively with a regime murderous of its own people, openly aggressive toward its neighbors, criminally involved with international drug traffickers and counterfeiters, and supportive of the most deadly terrorist organizations.
Given the nature of the regime in Damascus, it is both natural and moral that Israel abandon the slogan "comprehensive peace" and move to contain Syria, drawing attention to its weapons of mass destruction program, and rejecting "land for peace" deals on the Golan Heights.
What has been suggested here has not been fully implemented, but there was a war between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006, and during the conquest of Iraq (as proposed in a different section of A Clean Break) it was suggested in particular elements of the media that Syria had hidden Iraq's alleged WMD. Israel also bombed an alleged secret nuclear site in Syria in Operation Orchard, claiming the site was being used by Syria to develop nuclear weapons.
A Clean Break shows that there was a definite desire to cleanse Lebanon of Syrian and Hezbollah/Iranian influence, even suggesting a large scale military conflict, an engagement with the enemy, to achieve that goal. Maybe the war in 2006 was supposed to achieve that goal, but if so then it failed.
And so Hezbollah now faces being accused by a corrupt UN body, The Special Tribunal for Lebanon, of assassinating Rafik Hariri. This could lead to civil war in Lebanon with all its implications, or war between Hezbollah and Israel dragging in Iran and then the USA.
Hezbollah has thus used its influence in the Lebanese parliament to block Lebanese funding to the STL.
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From http://www.naharnet.com/domino/tn/NewsDesk.nsf/getstory?openform&CFF7249D4D4C28E6C22577A1001CFB46
March 14 MPs Withdraw from Budget Meeting after Hizbullah Refused to Approve Funding for Hariri Tribunal
March 14 MPs on Thursday walked out of a budget meeting after Hizbullah MPs and their allies refused to approve funding for the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.
MP Jamal Jarrah, whose Mustaqbal Movement holds the majority in Parliament, said Hizbullah-backed March 8 lawmakers refused a financial provision for the STL in the national budget.
"We were on the point of discussing a clause on the financing of the court, when Hizbullah deputies said that from now on they would not deal with or finance the court," Jarrah said.
Head of the Finance and Budget Committee Ibrahim Kanaan said the clause was not approved.
The STL is reportedly set to implicate Hizbullah in the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and 22 others in Beirut. Hizbullah has repeatedly warned against any such implication.
Future News TV reported that March 8 MPs were pursuing the session "despite its loss of quorum" following the withdrawal of March 14 MPs.
Kanaan said, however, that the withdrawal of the majority deputies did not strip the session of its quorum.
He said the Committee had three choices: postponing discussions over the issue until the committee's upcoming session on September 27, voting on the article or leaving it to the Parliament's general assembly to vote on the article.
Kanaan was praised for his stance, particularly because he refrained from voting after the withdrawal of March 14 MPs even though quorum was not affected by the lawmakers' exit.
The STL funding and budget of the Council for Development and Reconstruction were on the meeting's agenda.
Mustaqbal Movement and Hizbullah MPs traded accusations following the session over failure to reach an agreement over the clause.
Jarrah said March 14 MPs walked out of the meeting to protest against Hizbullah's condemnation which described the STL as an Israeli and U.S. scheme.
Hizbullah MP Hasan Fadlallah was quoted by Mustaqbal Movement MP Ammar Houri as saying that the STL "is an Israeli and American tribunal; and we reject it."
"After September, we cannot wait or be patient," Fadlallah was quoted as saying. "We have entered a dangerous phase."
But An-Nahar newspaper on Friday said Fadlallah was quick to deny the remarks.
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