Opinion: #Lebanon is a booby-trapped mailbox
Lebanon’s Hezbollah did not wait long to accuse “Israeli spies” of responsibility for the twin explosions outside the Iranian embassy in the Bir Hassan neighborhood of southern Beirut. Al-Qaeda affiliated groups did not wait long to claim responsibility for the attack.
There are clear political objectives behind the two claims of responsibility, as well as the sheer scale and timing of the twin blasts.
What was Hezbollah’s objective in accusing Israel and its “agents” of carrying out the bombings? It is probably seeking to restore the legitimacy of its arms, which it has been re-directed away from Israel since 2006, using its arsenal instead in a Muslim-against-Muslim civil war in the name of combating the so-called “Takfirist” groups. In fact, despite the fading luster of the Palestinian cause and the accumulated tactical and strategic mistakes made by Palestinian leaders—first by Fatah and then by Hamas—the Palestinian cause remains the litmus test of legitimacy in Arab politics. Therefore, Hezbollah and the powers behind it did not have any choice but to accuse the “spies of Israel and Zionism” of carrying out the bombings, in a bid to transcend the bitter reality of its role in displacing millions of innocent Syrians, most of whom are not “Takfirists.” This is not to mention the destruction of scores of towns and villages and the approximately 200,000 Syrians who have either been killed or displaced as a result of Hezbollah’s actions.
Initially, Hezbollah justified its military intervention in Syria on the pretext of protecting holy shrines, including the Sayyida Zaynab Mosque in Damascus and the “Lebanese-inhabited” border villages in Homs. Later on, however, the scope of Hezbollah’s intervention in Syria expanded, so it needed additional justifications for its actions. When Hezbollah militants reached the towns of Nubbul, Al-Zahraa and Al-Fu’ah in northern Syria, pretexts of protecting shrines and “Lebanese” nationals were no longer credible. As a result of this, Hezbollah put forward an even riskier pretext, namely fighting “Takfirists.”
Being preoccupied with fighting “Takfirists”—despite the fact that the Shebaa Farms and the Kfarchouba Heights remain under Israeli occupation—can only mean two things. First, there is another issue Hezbollah sees as being more serious than the Israeli occupation, which is supposedly the reason why the Shi’a militia has kept hold of its weapons of “resistance” while other Lebanese militia agreed to disarm. Second is that Hezbollah has no problem fighting “Takfirists”—those who declare other Muslims non-believers in the name of Islam.
Regarding the first point, one must remember that the Syrian regime has accused Israel, the US, and some Western and Arab countries of fomenting the revolution in Syria due to Damascus’s “enmity towards Israel” and its anti-imperialist stance. Later on, however, we discovered that Israel, the US, and imperialistic Western countries were in no hurry to get rid of the Bashar Al-Assad regime. On the contrary, both Tel Aviv and Washington have made it clear that they had no intention of attacking Syria, particularly after Damascus handed over its chemical stockpiles, which it previously claimed had been allocated for the “liberation of Palestine.”
As for the second point, it is obvious that Iran—and by extension Hezbollah—does not see the risks of inciting potential Muslim-on-Muslim (Sunni–Shi’ite) strife in fighting “Takfirists.” If we consider Iran as an Islamic Republic and Hezbollah as an Islamist organization with Islamist slogans, this means that they are questioning the faith of their enemies, namely they are declaring their enemies as “unbelievers.” In other words, they are practicing precisely what they are accusing their enemies of doing.
In an attempt to assure those Christians who still believe in the “alliance of minorities,” Hezbollah came up with a third pretext for its intervention in Syria, namely to “prevent strife from creeping into Lebanon.” Nevertheless, since Hezbollah has intervened in Syria, the number of bombings and attempted bombings has risen, and—worse still—it has emerged that some of the suspects in these attacks have close ties to the Syrian regime.
The full article: http://www.aawsat.net/2013/11/article55323118
YALLA SOURIYA 