Some Israelis question what they will get out of Syria's planned withdrawal from Lebanon. By Emad Gad The Israeli media addressed several issues over the past week, local, regional, and international. Domestically, the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the dismantling of four settlements in the West Bank remains the primary concern, with the debate over disengagement and its consequences still raging. As disengagement becomes more of a reality, there has been increasing concern about the voluntary evacuation of settlements and potential reaction from settlers and their supporters, some of whom have threatened to take up arms to resist the evacuation. At the same time, some prominent Likud figures continue to call for a public referendum on the disengagement plan. Regionally and internationally, the focus on internal developments in Lebanon surpassed all other topics, particularly the possible Syrian withdrawal from the country and the future of Hizbullah. Judging from the Israeli media, Israel has adopted a wary, wait-and-see attitude about Lebanon. On one hand, many in the Israeli media took the opposition demonstrations and the resignation of the government as an extremely important development, being the first time in the Arab world that a government has fallen under popular pressure. On the other hand, there are many questions about the Syrian withdrawal. Will it be a complete withdrawal? At the same time, there are questions about the future of Hizbullah and whether the organisation will be dismantled. An article by Ofer Shelah, "Good News from Beirut", published in Yediot Aharonot on 1 March well expressed the Israeli confusion about events in Lebanon. "Naturally, we judge all developments in the Arab world by whether they are good for Jews or not," Shelah wrote. "But yesterday's resignation of the Lebanese government seems to be an exception to this rule. "First of all, it is not yet clear what is good for Israel. While our political leadership has joined international forces to pressure Syria to withdraw from Lebanon, there are several people within the security establishment who doubt whether the withdrawal will benefit us. Demographically, Lebanon is torn and has not seen a stable government for decades. We ourselves had a bitter experience as a result of this instability. "Secondly, the scene witnessed outside the Lebanese parliament yesterday should not be viewed through the lens of its benefit to Israel. That an unarmed Arab public expressed its protest using non-violent means and achieved results represents a huge change. The fact that it happened and that the authorities felt forced to pack up and go home may be the first fruit of change in the region, particularly when we also consider President Mubarak's announcement about democratic elections in Egypt. "Certainly the success of the demonstration springs from the sense that Syria is weak. Under American pressure on its borders, Syria can be challenged -- unlike the past. No less important, it could also be an expression of the current zeitgeist. Al-Jazeera, for example, is seen in the West as an agent for Arab propaganda, but it brings Arabs themselves scenes that stir winds difficult for dictatorships to face. "It is still not clear how the Lebanese crisis will end. All those predicting what will happen to the Syrians, Hizbullah, and Israeli interests are doing so at their own risk, and most such prognosticators have been proved dismally wrong in the past. Right now we can only look on in astonishment, and perhaps even with respect, at a public that has expressed its willingness to act even if it puts their lives at risk. Who would have thought that Lebanon would be liberated from Syrian oppression not by international conspiracies, but by people whose patience has run out?" Smadar Peri continued the discussion of Israel's stance in an article entitled "The situation is dangerous for Israel", published in Yediot Aharonot on 6 March. "The situation emerging in Lebanon since [former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq] Al-Hariri's assassination three weeks ago is putting difficult challenges in Israel's path," she wrote. "Statements from Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad that he intends to gradually withdraw his forces from Lebanon are not improving the situation. "Since the death of Al-Hariri and the resignation of the Lebanese government, there has been a security and power vacuum in Lebanon that grows deeper by the day. For more than a week, Lebanon has been living without an effective government. The opposition is preventing the formation of a new government, fearing that it, too, will be a puppet of Damascus. "Hizbullah is the primary winner from this scenario. Since Al-Hariri's assassination, Hizbullah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah has been maintaining his silence (this article was written before Nasrallah's public address in Beirut on Tuesday) but he has been quietly deploying his men around the country. Given the lack of a strong army in Lebanon, Nasrallah received a green light yesterday to maintain his organisation's weapons and at the same time guard the Lebanese and exploit the opportunity to execute attacks on Israel. "In addition to the intensive deployment of Hizbullah men throughout Lebanon, we can add thousands of trained Iranians who are exploiting the current power vacuum to covertly lay the ground to take control of strategic positions along the border with Israel, currently occupied by Syrian troops. "Even if Al-Assad intends to withdraw the 14,000 Syrian soldiers in Lebanon, he certainly does not intend to renounce his grip on the country. Over the past four months, the number of Syrian intelligence agents present in Lebanon has skyrocketed from a few hundred to several thousand. They are now being joined by Hizbullah fighters, Iranian Revolutionary Guards, and Lebanese intelligence agents, who have long received their orders from Damascus. All of these can involve Israel in an extremely complex, dangerous situation." To read more articles from the Israeli press on this issue and others, please visit Arabs Against Discrimination www.aad-online.org.
