The Lebanese Druzenfuhrer Walid Jumblatt over the independence of Lebanon, the influence of Syrian secret service, economic sanctions and resistance in Iraq
Last Sunday, the Syrian Prasident, Bashar Assad, has criticized the Resolution 1559 of the UN Security Council for repeated Male, which calls for the restoration of the independence and sovereignty of Lebanon. The reason for this resolution, the Syrian influence in the termination of office of Lebanese prasident (cf. "eyes shut and go for it"), was just a ready for advanced reason. In fact, it was about strategic goals.
The demands for the deduction of all foreign troops, as well as the disarming of all militias in Lebanon made this very clear. "International institutions have become at the expense of smaller states to the superpower tool", explained the prasident.
In Lebanon, the waves of the protest against the term of office of Emile Lahoud have meanwhile laid themselves, mainly from Walid Jumblatts "Progressive Socialist Party" worn. Although there are no public events against the term of office, but a government participation of the socialists remains excluded. Background of public backup was allowed to be the assassination at the ex-economic minister, Marwan Hamade, a good week ago. A car bomb had Hamade, who had returned from the Cabinet from protest against the term of office, and seriously injured his bodywork. His driver had come to life.
Marwan Hamade is a member of the "Progressive Socialist Party" and like Walid Jumblatt a Druse. In general, the assassination was understood as a warning to the party to be more influential in the future with their criticism. Still on the day of the Attentat, Marwan Hamade released an explanation that all called for peace. A sign of life that should prevent any riots from the sides of the druses. Telepolis said Walid Jumblatt with the Druzenfuhrer.
They said that the catch is a step to the police state? Walid Jumblatt: Yes, slow but certainly Lebanon will be a police state. When Lahoud was chosen to prasident in 1998, I have already warned against the militarization of society and now that happens exactly that. The secret service plays an always great role in many aspects. Sometimes everyone spies out. That’s almost the way back then in eastern Germany. In September, some of their followers were arrested in a demonstration against the old and new prasides. Walid Jumblatt: Yes, what happened there is a proof that the police state takes over in Lebanon overhand. Each of us can be brought out of the house from the security apparatus every time. To use a comparison from genetics, Lebanon could become a new clone of the other autoritaren Arab regimes. We do not want that under no circumstances. The existence of Lebanon is based on cultural diversity, democracy, press and freedom of expression. For the Arab world, it is also a profit when the Lebanon remains what he is.
Convention by intelligence or money
In different newspapers was to read that a large part of the deputies, which had voted in favor of changing, were not actually. Why do people do not agree with their opinion? Walid Jumblatt: Many deputies are influenced by Syria. Prasident Bashar Assad says Rafik Hariri, the prime minister that Lahoud is the right man, and then he is that too. Other deputies are also convinced by the secret services or also with money. bribery? Walid Jumblatt: … Yes, black sliceters in banks or in the GamesCasino du Liban. That’s how easy this works? Walid Jumblatt: Unfortunate yes. Lebanese politicians have just been used to the deal with the Syrian secret service. Rafik Hariri had a conversation with the Syrian intelligence chief, Rustom Ghazaleh, who convinced him, but for the term of office of the prassident. Walid Jumblatt: Hariri was against the catching elongation, at least he had said several times. But obviously he could not resist some offers. Which offers can make a billion-heavy politicians, to whose friends international statesmanners such as Jacques Chirac, bring to do the opposite of what he’s right? Walid Jumblatt: He just hung his opinion, that’s not my affair. Since you have to ask him best yourself. He will give you an explanation. Although we believe in many points, privately he is a good friend. I only know that he stood under coarse prere. But of course it is unacceptable that the prime minister must discuss with the Syrian intelligence chief, which comes to the agenda of a cabinet meeting and how he coordinates in parliament. From government side are accused of you, they are against the national unity, were given their Arab identity. Walid Jumblatt: That’s all a joke. Our government is anything but national. We just do not want the Lebanon to become a totalary regime with a party. The elongation change has now become an international topic by UN Resolution 1559… Walid Jumblatt: … Stop, the people who, on the other hand, do not want to be involved in international affairs. This is a coarse handicap for us. Very automatically one could call us rendering, imperialists, American agents. Consequently, we do not want to do anything to do with these international interference.
Oconomic sanctions can be a rough problem
Whether you want or not, your protests against change are water on the Muhlen of American politics against Syria. Walid Jumblatt: That is not true. I have said several times that I am only for a re-positioning of Syrian troops, not for a complete deduction. There is a strategic interest, as no peace treaty is signed with Israel. In addition, I’m for the presence of Hezbollah, against their disarmament and for their persistence in Lebanon. This is completely contradictory to the American UN Resolution. In the UN Resolution is also that "Matches for enforcement" can be taken. See a danger for Lebanon? Walid Jumblatt: Sanctions, economic sanctions can be well possible. The old, unequal game flat. If you have fair goods, you had to admit that UN resolutions can not only be applied against one side. It has given hundreds of UN resolutions to the Israeli-Arab conflict and not a single was applied. For Syria, the sanctions are a small problem, trade with the US is negligible. But that’s different in the case of Lebanon’s. The Lebanese Lira is coupled to the dollar, rough parts of the bank deposits in Lebanon are in American preservation. Walid Jumblatt: Yes, oconomic sanctions can be a rough problem. Believe that the US will go so far? Walid Jumblatt: I can only say that I am in our affairs against every interference of the USA. But the Syrians had to avoid this whole problem by simply having the Lebanese had easy election. For me, this elongation change was a trap. By whom I do not know, but the Syrians have fallen into it. The Maronite Archbishop said in an explanation that the Syrian government treats Lebanon like one of her provinces. Walid Jumblatt: With the Archbishop I have a great difference, but in this point he is right. Why is the Prasenz Syrian troops in Lebanon so important for them? Walid Jumblatt: You are entitled to protect your capital. You can not forget that Israelis, when you occupied the Lebanon, was almost in front of the goals Damascus in 1982. The Syrians can have military positions in Lebanon to defend themselves. That’s no problem for me. The Syrians should not interfere in every aspect of Lebanese concerns. How do you rate the withdrawal of the 3000 Syrian soldiers last month? Walid Jumblatt: That makes no rough difference. As already said, we have no problem with Syrian troops in Lebanon, only with Syrian interference in internal affairs.
Hezbollah as a weapon against Israel
So there is no doubt that after a complete withdrawal of Syrian troops the Israelis were again occupied by Lebanon? Walid Jumblatt: I did not say that. But I can remember it, for the Israelis, even if we defeated you later, the invasion was a very simple military company. Now we have a formidable weapon against Israel and that is Hezbollah, which Israel hunted out ever. If Israel wanted to play again with Hezbollah, I did not advise you. Common is said that the Hezbollah is equipped by Syria with weapons and money. Walid Jumblatt: That’s not my problem where Hisbollah gets her money or her weapons. I only woman, I’m a supporter of Hezbollah. Because it reprints something like resistance? Walid Jumblatt: Yes, very clear. For me it is the only way as we can get rid of the Israeli occupation. Also the only way against the American occupation of Iraq. That will take his time. Walid Jumblatt: We do not hurry. And so far, the American occupation of Iraq is not exactly successful.
Come in Iraq worse than in Lebanese Burger War
Recalls the situation in Iraq with unfamblings and militias at the Burger War in Lebanon? Walid Jumblatt: Iraq is even worse. The Lebanese have expired foreigners, but not told. Well, is not quite right. A few have been killed because they were supposedly spies. One of them was the American Buckley. But it was not so unconditionally killed as now in Iraq. These decommenses throw a very bad light on the resistance. Lebanese, Egypt, Italians have been murdered who wife, what happens now with the French. Resistance to the Occupation is one thing, but such murders, that’s something completely different. See differences between sunni and shiite resistance in Iraq, as it is preserved in the media again and again? Walid Jumblatt: I think that’s one of the many cliches. Here the sunni triangle, there the shiites. There is a genuine Iraqi resistance. Composition and structure is very complex. Also a muktada al sadr is organisationally and politically linked to other groups, even at a tribal level. And the travel itself often consist of Sunniten and Shiites. You can not in the three parts "Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites" sort by. In Iraq there is a surprising national feeling that determines the resistance. There are no differences in the methodology of the fighting groups? Shiite Kopf no unused. Walid Jumblatt: Nobody woman who makes that power. These are extremist fundamentalists. Untestled, it’s sunni. But you know little about it, maybe it’s just gangster. She supports Hezbollah, so Muktada Al Sadr had to be her husband. Walid Jumblatt: I support politically the Iraqi resistance to the American occupation. There’s nothing more to say about that. As a socialist, it is not a little strange to support religious movements? Walid Jumblatt: We do not live in Europe, but in the Middle East. There are other PRAFERENZEN. How are we supposed to take that? Walid Jumblatt: Thanks to Hezbollah and the national movement of Lebanon we got rid of Israelis. But Palastina has been occupied for years and now also the Iraq. In the Middle East, there are more urgent problems than breaking your head over the ratio of religion and socialism. The future of the Middle East does not look very rosy right now …. Walid Jumblatt: Thanks to the unconditional support of Israel by the US, we are in a dead end. One reason for you to be pessimistic? Walid Jumblatt: No, just the opposite. We will not give up. We have to be culturally and politically further membran. That’s a long way that may take decades. And what concerns Iraq, the US is not very successful there. The Pentagon has admitted that they have 1000 dead and 7000 wounded. In Baghdad there is no central government, there is nothing there. In Afghanistan, US troops control the capital Kabul, but the warlords rule in the country. From the attempt to democratize the Middle East, auber Chaos has not remained much. Is the fight for Iraq crucial for the political future of the entire Middle East? Walid Jumblatt: Under this point of view, I do not see the whole thing. It is not the first time that a foreign power occupies a country in the Middle East. Now there is a resistance to this occupation. As simple as that. How to go out, will we see. Back to Lebanon. The state print almost 40 billion liabilities and belong to the highest indulgent countries in the world. How can you come from this misery?
The left and the national Arab movement have lost
Walid Jumblatt: We have too long focused on the sectors tourism and banking. That’s not bad, but not enough. You have to extend to other areas, such as agriculture and industry. Also high-tech goods well. They do not exist as well as in Lebanon, so highly qualified professionals leave the country. I am for a central plan. So far, a wild capitalism has ruled Lebanon. Four or fun percent of the population control the entire economy. A journalist of the daily of Al Nahar said the true government of Lebanon is a composite of super-rich and the secret service. Walid Jumblatt: Yes, that’s right. One has neutralized the unions that are usually a tool for social and political change. There are, except for very few exceptions, only dolls that the intelligence service installed. Nevertheless, there were demonstrations against the government in May. In Hay Al Sellom, five people were shot dead from the militar when one told the Ministry of Labor. Walid Jumblatt: People in this district come from the Bekaa valley and from the south. There, the government has not made any loss of improving the economy. So people come to Beirut, but they are not much better. Hay al Sellom is a completely different world. 40% of Lebanese population live under the poverty line. Do not believe that it’s just a matter of time until it comes to other social protests? Walid Jumblatt: For this you need real unions and parties, the coarse population places. To date, that does not exist in Lebanon. Political movements are confessional dependent, that’s the problem. Fruher was better than there was a strong left. But that’s a long time. Now the Islam has poured the left emancipatory. Walid Jumblatt: Every luck must be charged. The left and the national Arab movement have lost. In favor of Islam, who has added the emerged vacuum. Do not give you a headache or worry about this development? Walid Jumblatt: You have to accept things as they are. (Alfred HackensbergerTo)