Lebanon a small country with two armies

Lebanon is a pressure cooker which could blow at any moment, but don’t worry about confused US policy. Israel’s threats to invade are not irking the Lebanese, but many wish Hezbollah would end a local Shiite-Christian spat.

America’s confused position in Afrin, northern Syria, is not the only location in the Middle East where Washington’s loyalties are at odds with the reality on the ground. Lebanon, a country once called the ‘Switzerland of the Middle East’ for its Western pretentions, is now what many call a failed state which is consumed by corruption. And a confused one, for Washington to grapple with.

Lebanon is one of the highest net recipients of US military aid and because of its unique location (bordering Israel) and its dominance by Iranian-backed Hezbollah, that makes it a special case in the eyes of Washington. Indeed, only recently when Israel threatened to attack, it was the US which “pledged” support for the Lebanese Army, which it erroneously believes acts as a “counterweight” to Hezbollah. Is the US misinformed and comically out of touch of the recent developments in Lebanon, or is it simply confused about the realities on the ground?

A lot has changed since the 2006 invasion of Lebanon by Israeli forces. Recently, President Michel Aoun made it very clear that the Lebanese Army would support Hezbollah in attacking the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), if Israeli forces entered the country. Given this stark change to 2006, when the Lebanese Army didn’t fight Israel in the south, this new situation would put two US allies at war with each other – the IDF and the Lebanese regular army.

This presents Washington’s foreign policy hacks with a conundrum: does this abnormality of military support act as an incendiary device to pushing Israel to invade Lebanon (for a third time), or simply mean that Israel will merely threaten to do so more than it normally would, without going ahead? Are Israel’s threats strong words from an empty stomach?

In recent weeks, barely a few days pass without Israel making another threat to invade. Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman recently said that Israel would not let Beirut’s residents go to the

beach (like they did in 2006) while the south of their country was at war (and Israelis in Tel Aviv were in bomb shelters). In the same week, he also accused Lebanon of illegally taking Israel’s territorial waters – for oil and gas exploration – which he called a “provocation,” resulting in a no-nonsense response from Hezbollah: it will be war if you go there. Concurrent to these statements, an IDF spokesman also warned of war if Iran’s weapons facility, rumored to be in Lebanon, started production.

None of the Israeli threats stirs the average Lebanese though, even though in recent months a massive IDF build-up on the Lebanese-Israeli border has been ongoing.

A good barometer of how worried people are about stability in Lebanon can be found at the bank, where interest rates linked to the local currency indicate whether people are panic selling their lira; another one is inflation in supermarkets.