WHY was the international community still fumbling yesterday in the provision of peacekeepers for South Lebanon? It has been evident for at least the last two weeks that such a force would be needed urgently once the fighting stopped. The French, who in the UN Security Council stopped Washington from supporting a cease-fire resolution totally supportive of Israeli aggression, knew full well that any agreement was meaningless without the rapid deployment of UN troops to make it stick. They were widely supposed to be leading it.
French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy was in Beirut yesterday talking to the Lebanese government. It is perfectly understandable that governments such as France, Turkey and Malaysia which have indicated that they are prepared to commit troops to the difficult operation should wish to establish clearly how both the politics and the practicalities of the deployment will work. Hezbollah is certainly disinclined to disarm though it may be prepared to withdraw from southern Lebanon. The Israelis say they are not going to end their occupation of Lebanese territory until they are sure that Hezbollah is no longer in a position to attack Israeli territory. The Lebanese Cabinet, which includes five Hezbollah ministers, is understandably reluctant to send its army south until it is clear that Washington will not maneuver the army into a confrontation with Hezbollah fighters nor be caught in a renewed onslaught by the Israelis.
The key in the end is going to be the presence of a robust and well-armed UN force to support the Lebanese army. The clarifications and assurances that the French foreign minister and UN officials are currently seeking from all sides are theoretically deliverable within days, if not hours. But where are the waiting UN troops who are needed so desperately to stop this extremely fragile cease-fire from breaking down?
Any competent commander will want to plan such a peacekeeping operation as this with the most meticulous attention to detail. Thanks to the disproportionate force used by Israel, Lebanon’s infrastructure, power stations, roads, fuel depots, water and sewerage systems are largely destroyed. A UN force of 30,000 troops will have to bring absolutely everything with them from tents to toothpicks. But this was patently clear a month ago. Why then was a French general warning Tuesday that it could take weeks before the planning for a UN deployment could be completed ?
The sad conclusion may possibly be that the French government, harking back to its old colonial involvement in Lebanon and Syria, was perfectly content to grandstand in the Security Council, apparently representing Arab interests against Washington’s purblind support for Israel. However, now that it has come to the nitty-gritty of actually doing something positive to implement the cease-fire, many are, including the French, less committed. It seems that big power politics is once again unprepared to pay more than lip service to the interests of the little people, in this case the bombed and blasted civilians of southern Lebanon.
