This is very interesting – Walid Jumblatt is the leader of the Druze. In this excerpt Jumblatt focuses on the essential truth of ending the Hezbollah threat:
Mr. Jumblatt is dubious. “Rice didn’t clarify how the international force would deploy. As I’ve told the Americans: As long as Syria can send weapons to Hezbollah, there will be no change in the situation. Not with this regime in Damascus. We need a force that can cover all of Lebanon, like in Kosovo. Monitor the Syrian border, then talk.”
The United States is not thinking about such a scheme, Mr. Jumblatt tells me. And that’s why he plainly feels that American ambitions are likely to crash against the reality on the ground. If Hezbollah refuses to disarm (and it does), “then we enter a phase of all-out war, endless war, with the possibility that this will weaken the Lebanese state. Let us also remember that the Syrians a few days ago promised the Americans they would help them fight al Qaeda. This was, in fact, a backhanded warning that Syria could use al Qaeda to kill innocents in Lebanon.”
And on Syria and Iran:
It is the Syrians, however, who feed Mr. Jumblatt’s anxieties. As he surfs the Internet at night–a pastime for which he is known to depart early from dinner parties–he can read the mounting calls in the U.S. and at the U.N. to bring Syria into a deal to control Hezbollah. For the Druze leader, this has existential implications. It could mean a Lebanese homecoming for an Assad regime that wants his head. “Syria and Iran have strengthened their cards in Lebanon today,” he insists. As for the Bush administration, its Syria policy is “confused.”
Starting earlier this year, Mr. Jumblatt tried to help refine the administration’s strategy. On a trip to the U.S., he actively peddled the idea of regime change in Damascus, telling Ms. Rice: “The U.S. says Syrian behavior must change, but nothing will change for as long as this regime is in power. The U.S. must open a dialogue with the Syrian opposition, including the Muslim Brotherhood, which has accepted pluralism in its political program.” However, all the signs from Washington are that Mr. Jumblatt will be disappointed.
Iran’s role in starting the latest round of Lebanese violence is a theme Mr. Jumblatt has repeatedly raised in interviews. I play devil’s advocate and suggest there is no evidence yet of direct Iranian implication–or does he know something I don’t? He doesn’t answer directly: “It’s enough for Hezbollah to have the famous Fajr-1 and Fajr-3 rockets to show such involvement. The last I heard, these devices were not manufactured in Lebanon!” In that case had he heard that Iranians were fighting alongside Hezbollah? “Yes, we’ve heard rumors that Iranian Basij militiamen are participating in the fighting. I believe these stories.”
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