Lebanon: A Country in Fragments by Andrew Arsan (review)

In the late 1980s the derogatory term Lebanonization entered the lexicon, describing political, social, and economic situations whose resolution seemed intractable. (At the same time Beirut became popular shorthand for any environment of chaos and destruction.) Despite the approval of the Ta'if Agreement on August 21, 1990, many Lebanese hoped it would signify Lebanon's renewal, its "second republic"—others viewed Ta'if as a more conservative version of Lebanon's 1943 National Pact. While emphasizing national unity, Ta'if also enshrined Lebanon's traditional confessional political system, which divides power among representatives of the country's religious communities and codified Syrian hegemony over Lebanon. These unaddressed conditions were major factors in the country's 15-year civil conflict. Inevitably Lebanon's postwar culture subordinated social justice and equal rights under the law to allegiance to long-standing identity politics, coupled with denial of the past and frantic pursuit of affluence and social status.

Andrew Arsan's book, Lebanon: A Country in Fragments, examines this distressing situation by focusing on Lebanon's recent past—the 13 tumultuous years following the assassination on February 14, 2005, of former prime minister Rafiq al-Hariri. Arsan states that his goal is to understand "how the existence of Lebanon's inhabitants have been shaped—or bent out of shape—by the disruptive episodes that have punctuated the years since 2005." He asks, "What does it mean to, and how does it feel, to attempt to live an ordinary life in extraordinary times? What strategies for everyday living and political action have they devised . . . ?" (pp. 2–3).

As Arsan recounts, there was a direct connection between Hariri's assassination and United Nations Security Council Resolution 1559, sponsored by France and the United States in September 2004. The resolution called on Syria and all other non-Lebanese forces to withdraw from Lebanon, and for all Lebanese and non-Lebanese militias to disband. The unfortunate result was to polarize Lebanon into pro-Syrian and anti-Syrian factions. Hariri, a protégé of Saudi Arabia and the French president, Jacques Chirac, engaged in a power struggle with Lebanon's president, Émile Lahoud. Syria supported Lahoud and was determined to "keep the extensive mechanisms that siphoned revenue away from Lebanon and towards Damascus in good order" (p. 29). Hariri's relationship with Saudi Arabia, the success of his parliamentary bloc in the 2000 Lebanese elections, and his plan to return as prime minister threatened Syria's strategy.

The assassination of Hariri evoked national and international outrage. Two popular mass demonstrations followed. The demonstration of March 8, 2005, was a pro-Syrian coalition of political parties led by Hasan Nasrallah, the general secretary of Hizbullah. Nasrallah criticized Resolution 1559, declaring, "The resistance will not give up its arms . . . because Lebanon needs the resistance to defend it."¹ The second demonstration took place on March 14, the one-month anniversary of Hariri's assassination. Hundreds of thousands of Lebanese representing different factions of the anti-Syrian opposition rallied to demand an international inquiry into Hariri's murder, the firing of Syrian-backed security chiefs in the Lebanese government, and a total Syrian pullout from Lebanon. The protests led to the withdrawal of the last Syrian troops and intelligence agents from Lebanon on April 26, 2005.

However, any sense of triumph was short-lived. From March 2005 through 2007, a series of bombings and assassinations rocked Lebanon. The "martyrs" included political, military, and intellectual figures critical of Syrian interference in Lebanese politics. Among those killed (others were severely wounded) were Samir Kassir, a university professor and journalist; Gebran Tueni, editor and publisher of the daily newspaper An-Nahar, and MP Pierre Gemayel, son of former Lebanese president Amine Gemayel.

Added to this tragedy was the 2006 war with Israel. As Arsan asserts, Israel regarded Lebanon as a failed state, unable to exercise sovereignty over its borders. This led Israel to justify its response to a July 2006 incursion by Hizbullah with full-scale force. Over a 34-day period...