Hizbullah's long campaign against the Special Tribunal took the sting out of the indictments when they finally arrived. But the request to arrest its members in connection with Al-Hariri's assassination puts the prime minister in a bind, reports Lucy Fielder from Lebanon After years of waiting, the bombshell dropped on 30 June. Judges from the Special Tribunal for Lebanon handed over the first indictments for the cataclysmic 2005 assassination of former prime minister Rafik Al-Hariri. It was a sealed, secret file, but within minutes the four names were leaked to the Lebanese media, and soon confirmed by officials. As expected for a year now, at least three of the men named are Hizbullah members. One, Mustafa Badreddin, is believed to be a military commander and the brother-in-law of Imad Mughniyeh, Hizbullah's strategic mastermind who was killed in Damascus in 2008. Since Hizbullah far outguns the army and police force, few in Lebanon expect the men to be apprehended. Their whereabouts are unknown. Against expectations, Lebanese streets were calm, even in usual flashpoints in Beirut and the tense northern city of Tripoli. Hizbullah has said for a year that it expected its members to be indicted and has waged a campaign to discredit the court. Its success at stealing the march on the tribunal was evident -- by the time the indictments actually happened, they were already old news. But tensions simmered beneath the surface, and political rifts are widening, echoing the polarisation that followed the Hariri killing. That assassination by car bomb on Beirut's seafront, along with 22 other deaths, rent Lebanon in half. One camp, named after a demonstration on 14 March that year, blamed Syria and was backed by the West and Saudi Arabia. Syrian- and Iranian-backed armed Shia group Hizbullah led the other. Prime Minister Najib Miqati, head of a three-week-old Hizbullah-backed government, finds himself in an unenviable position. 14 March, relishing its new opposition role, has challenged him to pledge his full support for the court in parliament or step down. If he refuses, as 14 March knows he must, the opposition promised this week to work to topple his government and call on the international community not to cooperate with it. A parliamentary debate started as Al-Ahram Weekly went to press. It was to culminate in a vote of confidence that the government is expected to win because it commands a majority in parliament. 14 March has pledged to vote against the cabinet. Hizbullah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah gave a televised address two days after the indictments, ruling out the possibility of the Lebanese authorities, given 30 days to arrest the suspects, achieving that in 30 years, or even 300. "What will happen is a trial in absentia, a trial in which the verdict has already been reached," he said. "We reject the baseless accusations and rulings and consider them an attack on us." Nasrallah also set out a second batch of what he called evidence to support his claim that the court was politicised and that Israel killed Al-Hariri. It included documents he said showed 97 computers used by the United Nations Investigative Commission being shipped back to The Hague via Israel, instead of from the Beirut port. A video shown during the speech, which was dramatically edited with music by Hizbullah's Al-Manar television, appeared to show Gerhard Lehmann, an aide to a former chief prosecutor, receiving a wad of cash in 2006. Nasrallah said Lehmann received the money in return for information about the case. Lehmann's face was visible, but the person giving the money had his back to the hidden camera. The Hizbullah leader also alleged links between top tribunal officials and Western intelligence agencies. In response, the Special Tribunal for Lebanon said the proper forum to challenge the investigation was an open court. It welcomed his offer to provide the file he said he had and requested the video shown and any other relevant information. Nasrallah released the first round of alleged evidence against the court last August, a month after he dropped the bombshell about Hizbullah being the expected target of indictments. Until then, Syria was presumed to be the court's number one suspect. Nasrallah showed what he said was footage intercepted from an Israeli spy-plane and showing Israel monitoring the routes taken by Al-Hariri's convoy. The footage was not dated and it was unclear how much material it had been selected from. Debate rages over how Miqati's cabinet should and will cooperate with The Hague tribunal over the indictments. A policy statement defining its official position was finalised on the day the indictments came out -- timing immediately decried by critics as an immediate international challenge to the government and proof of the politicisation of the tribunal. The statement was vague, respecting Lebanon's international commitments as long as they had no impact on stability and civil peace. 14 March coordinator Fares Soueid acknowledged that Miqati was in the opposition's sights, telling the Weekly that he "stood between two fires" -- that of Hizbullah and that of 14 March. "He cannot be in good favour with both sides, he has to choose. And he has chosen to be under the weapons of Hizbullah and to implement its agenda," he said. Hizbullah and its allies resigned from a government headed by Hariri's son Saad in January, causing it to collapse in a row about the tribunal. Three months of horse-trading over positions elapsed before Miqati, who was nominated by a majority of MPs including those belonging to Hizbullah, was able to form a cabinet. Hilal Khashan, professor of political science at the American University of Beirut, also said the opposition was focussing on splitting the government by taking aim at Miqati. "It's clear 14 March is trying to put Miqati out of commission by making demands of him that they know he cannot achieve," he said. "They want to coerce him by making him feel he has backed the wrong side and committed political suicide." Miqati's soft spot is his Sunni credentials, which Al-Hariri's Future Movement has been seeking to undermine for months. Under Lebanon's sectarian political system, the prime minister is by convention a Sunni. Rafik Al-Hariri's assassination angered and politicised the community, in which he was a leading figure. Miqati's backing by Hizbullah exposes him to accusations of being the 'Shia choice' for a Sunni post. Any perceived wavering on the tribunal prompts accusations of betraying his people. "Tensions are definitely escalating. The Sunni community feels injured, humiliated and unable to achieve justice for Al-Hariri," Khashan said. 14 March is likely to take its campaign to bring down the government to the streets, he said. "14 March has to take the initiative to keep its support." But the key question, as the anti-Syrian movement seeks to ratchet up the pressure on the government over the court and Hizbullah's weapons, is how successful it will be in enlisting international backing. During the years before the June 2008 Doha Accord papered over the fissures in Lebanon, 14 March counted on firm backing from the United States, then under president George W Bush, and Saudi Arabia. Divisions escalated to the point that the government, encouraged by its backers, cracked down on Hizbullah's guerrilla communications networks. In response, Hizbullah and allied Shia Amal gunmen took over parts of Beirut loyal to Al-Hariri. This time, Khashan doubted that there was the same degree of interest for now, despite the Special Tribunal and the arrest demands. "Miqati is a successful businessman and a careful man. I'm quite sure he's coordinating with the United States and Saudi Arabia," he said. Washington under President Barack Obama had no clear strategy on Lebanon, he said, and no desire to see the government fall while neighbouring Syria is aflame and US allies in the region are under pressure. "The last thing the United States needs is another trouble-spot in Lebanon," he said.
