Lebanon was synonymous with life. We went there for education, medical treatment and tourism. We read books published by its publishing houses and followed its press, which gave a voice to issues that other Arab capitals had little room to accommodate. We called it the Switzerland of the East, a name that reflected our admiration for a small country with an outsized presence. Its mountains were green, its coastline was open, and its people carried their skills to Egypt, the Gulf and the wider world. Its wealth did not lie beneath the earth, but in the minds of its people and the freedom available to them.
This is not a discussion about any religious sect. The Shia are an integral part of Lebanon and among those who have suffered most from wars that turn their homes and towns into battlegrounds. The problem lies in a political project that ties the country’s fate to an authority beyond its borders and asks its citizens to pay the price for decisions in which they had no say.
The 37th anniversary of the Taif Agreement falls on October 22, reminding us of a serious Arab effort to save Lebanon. Saudi Arabia hosted the consensus that opened the way to ending the civil war and laid the foundations for restoring the state.
The agreement was no magic formula, but it reaffirmed the principle that Lebanon is the permanent homeland of its people, that their differences should be resolved through shared institutions, and that weapons should be subject to a single legitimate authority.
Yet some political forces took from Taif what distributed positions and offices while neglecting what was needed to build the state. Sectarian power-sharing became entrenched, reforms stalled, and Hezbollah’s weapons remained outside the state’s legitimate monopoly on the use of force.
An exception became the rule. The group then became a participant in government while retaining, outside the government, the power to decide whether the country would go to war.
I believe this contradiction is one of the keys to Lebanon’s tragedy: a state that bears responsibility before the international community, and a party that can create the very conditions that make it impossible for the state to fulfil that responsibility.
Behind this lies an ideological and political allegiance to Iran’s system of Wilayat al-Faqih – the Guardianship of the Jurist.
Lebanon is a pluralistic country that flourished through the exchange of ideas and openness. Yet it was drawn into a project that places loyalty to the Supreme Leader above the requirements of national partnership.
The consequences are before us: thousands dead, tens of thousands wounded, villages destroyed, people displaced, and Lebanese territory under Israeli occupation.
Israel is responsible for its aggression and destruction, and Hezbollah’s mistakes or adventurism do not absolve it of that responsibility. But condemning Israel does not exempt from accountability those who have drawn their country into regional wars.
Protecting Lebanon requires rejecting both aggression and the usurpation of the country’s sovereign decision-making. Neither position should be used as a pretext to silence the other.
Lebanon needs to complete the work of Taif: bringing all weapons under state authority, strengthening accountability, reforming public administration and the judiciary, implementing decentralisation while preserving national unity, and gradually opening the way to ending political sectarianism.
Arab countries can help Lebanon when they find a partner that controls its own decisions, honours its commitments and prevents its territory from being used against its Arab brothers.
The support Lebanon needs should rebuild schools, hospitals and villages, restore confidence in the economy, and ensure that emigration does not become the only option available to its talented and skilled citizens.
The Taif Agreement deserves to be celebrated through action: implementing what restores the state, reviewing what has obstructed it, and safeguarding the diversity that has made Lebanon valuable.
[by Mohammed Al-Rumaihi in Annahar]
Compiled and translated by Faizul Haque