One enduring political position of all governments is that they will not interfere in the internal affairs of other countries. This bedrock policy includes elections. A people should be allowed to choose for themselves, without coercion, force or pressure from within or from the outside, the leaders they believe will best serve their interests. So when Joe Biden says future US aid to Lebanon depends on the outcome of upcoming elections, the vice president is trampling upon an ethical political stand that, ironically, a nation like his would otherwise mightily defend. When the US claims to back Lebanon’s democratic process, only to reconsider its assistance to the country if its next government strays from certain “fundamental principles”, its duplicitous side is showing in the extreme.
This position that Biden brought to Lebanon in the run-up to its June 7 legislative elections is not only bare-faced to the point Washington does not even bother to hide it. Washington is more than meddling, more than warning Lebanon’s electorate. It is a threat.
The US is concerned that Hezbollah, which it considers a terrorist group, and its allies stand a good chance of coming narrowly ahead in these key elections. The poll is indeed close. In the National Assembly, the Western-backed March 14 Alliance holds 70 seats while the March 8 Alliance, which includes Hezbollah, holds 58.
Washington is making it clearly known who it is rooting for, which would no be a terrible secret and might even be considered acceptable behavior. But Biden’s warning of likely consequences if Hezbollah and its allies were to prevail and form the kind of government Washington would frown upon is unacceptable. Besides blatant interference, the aid Biden threatens to hold back is, among other kinds, of military nature. Situated on Israel’s doorstep and the memory of Israel’s infamous attack in 2006 still vivid and frightening, Lebanon must have at its disposal all the military hardware it needs.
The US is obviously concerned about what happened the last time it did not meddle in an election. In transparent and legitimate contests, in January 2006, Hamas, another US archenemy, swept the Palestinian parliamentary polls, giving them the majority in the Palestine Legislative Council and the ability to form a government. Monitored by the Carter Center, former US President Jimmy Carter called them “open, honest, and fair contests.” The reaction they engendered in the US, Israel and Europe — and the subsequent punishment meted out on the electorate — needs little elaboration.
Biden insists that Washington’s commitment is to Lebanon, its sovereignty and independence, that it is up to the voters to choose their own leaders, and that the US does not want to interfere in the elections. But what Biden says and what the US will do should the outcome not meet its approval directly oppose each other.
On June 7 Hezbollah might strengthen its political hold beyond the veto power it currently has in the government, but that is not the point. March 14 could end up maintaining its parliamentary majority but that’s not the point either. What matters is that no power, inside or outside Lebanon, should in any way hamper the Lebanese’s ability to freely express themselves at the ballot box, without fear of retribution.
Enough with the outpost disgrace
Excerpts from an editorial in Haaretz yesterday:
Three days after US President Barack Obama used his meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to publicly and assertively demand that Israel halt settlement expansion, Defense Minister Ehud Barak met with the Yesha Council of settlements and told them of his intention to remove the outposts. The next day, the Israel Defense Forces evacuated the outpost of Maoz Esther, which was established on private Palestinian land many months ago and had previously been evacuated twice in the past year. A short while later the settlers re-entered the area for the fourth time.
Netanyahu’s government, like the two that preceded it, claims that the outposts, mostly those on private land, violate the rule of law and require an appropriate response by the authorities. The defense minister, who has authority over the occupied territories, must explain to the Israelis and Palestinians why it is that instead of immediately enforcing the law against violators, he has carried out pointless negotiations with their representatives for years over “consensual evacuation.” Why does an Israeli hero, who does not hesitate to attack crowded neighborhoods in Gaza, try to woo the invaders at the Migron outpost?
Experience has taught the settlers that the politicians’ fear of confrontation supersedes their concerns about a crisis in relations with the United States. An administration that puts the solution of two states for two peoples at the top of its agenda cannot ignore the efforts by one side to create facts on the ground that blatantly undermine such a solution. Hopefully, the strong statements by President Obama suggest that unlike his predecessors, the new administration will not accept anything less than the evacuation of all outposts and a complete freeze on settlements.
