25 February 2011

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammad Rashid Qabbani and caretaker State Minister Adnan Qassar appealed Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdel-Aziz Thursday to intervene to help solve the country’s months long political crisis over a U.N.-backed court investigating the 2005 assassination of statesman Rafik Hariri.

The separate appeals by Qabbani and Qassar came a day after Abdullah returned home following a three-month absence in the U.S. and Morocco. The Saudi king underwent surgery in New York before flying to Morocco for a recuperation period.

In a statement congratulating the Saudi people, Qabbani said that Abdullah’s return home, which was welcomed by the Saudis and people across the region, has “confirmed that the Arab world and the Islamic world are in dire need for the Saudi king’s wisdom and foresight to strengthen solidarity among the Arab and Muslim peoples.”

“Lebanon and its people are looking to the king’s return to Saudi Arabia to play his leading role with a great hope for the continuation and intensification of the king’s generous attention to the Lebanese crisis,” the mufti said.

Qabbani added that Abdullah’s concern for the Lebanese crisis was essential to bring Lebanon to “the safety shore in an atmosphere of maintaining the unity, safety, stability of the Lebanese people and the justness of their cause which the kingdom’s wise leadership has followed up in cooperation with Arab brothers for a long time.”

Qassar appealed to Abdullah to launch an initiative aimed at breaking the Lebanese stalemate, which appears to be delaying the formation of a new government as a result of a sharp political split between the March 8 and March 14 groups over the U.N.-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon.

“King Abdullah’s return … has created joy in our hearts in the same way it created joy to the Saudis in view of the king’s permanent care for Lebanon. Everyone remembers the honorable attitudes of the Saudi kingdom and King Abdullah in all difficult stages through which Lebanon has passed, particularly during the 2006 July [Israeli] aggression,” Qassar said in a statement congratulating the Saudi government and people.

“While we appreciate the king’s attitudes, we hope this honest paternal sponsorship will continue and be followed up with more initiatives toward Lebanon,” Qassar said, adding: “We are confident that King Abdullah will not hesitate to help Lebanon emerge from its current political crisis.”

Saudi Arabia and Syria, the main powerbrokers in Lebanon backing rival factions, coordinated their efforts last year in a bid to find a solution for the Lebanese crisis over the STL, which is threatening to destabilize the country. However, the Saudi-Syrian initiative reached a dead end. The March 8 groups accused the U.S. of scuttling the initiative, while caretaker Prime Minister Saad Hariri has blamed Hezbollah and its March 8 allies for the collapse.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblatt said “U.S. pressure” was to blame for the failure of the Saudi-Syrian initiative. In an interview with LBCI TV Thursday night, Jumblatt said the Americans were using the STL as a means of pressure on Lebanon because their aim was to destroy Hezbollah.

He said Monday’s visit by U.S. senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman to Lebanon was designed to exert pressure on Prime Minister-designate Najib Mikati not to end Lebanon’s cooperation with the STL. “They came with a clear mission: Pressure. The Americans want the tribunal at any cost … The American goal is to destroy Hezbollah,” Jumblatt said.

He warned that the STL’s indictment, which is widely expected to implicate some Hezbollah members, was aimed at destroying national unity.

Jumblatt called for an internal dialogue among rival factions to discuss how to confront the repercussions of the indictment which, according to media reports, will be issued next month.

“There is an American-Israeli trap set for Lebanon at the security and economic levels,” Jumblatt said. He urged the feuding Lebanese parties to cooperate in order not to give the Americans and the Israelis any chance to destabilize the country.

In a statement after meeting Mikati Monday, McCain and Lieberman called on the next Lebanese government “to provide stability and promote justice for the people of Lebanon by honoring its international agreements.”

The appeals to the Saudi king came as Mikati’s efforts to form a new government were marking time with no solution in sight to the problem over Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun’s tough demands for participation.

A source close to Mikati said Thursday the government formation process was in “a state of stagnation” because the problem over Aoun’s demands has not yet been solved. “Contacts are made to reach a full package on the parties’ demands. There is a political problem relating to Gen. Aoun’s demands and a constitutional problem that might arise from the president’s possible refusal to sign the decree of a Cabinet make-up which he does not approve,” the source told The Daily Star.

Mikati’s attempts to form the government have run into trouble over Aoun’s tough demands. Aoun is insisting on a large Christian representation in the government commensurate with his Change and Reform bloc, the second largest parliamentary bloc after Hariri’s Future bloc.

Aoun is also locking horns with President Michel Sleiman over the key Interior Ministry portfolio, which Aoun is seeking for a member of his bloc. Sleiman was reported to be adamant on retaining caretaker Interior Minister Ziyad Baroud.

Similarly, Mikati’s attempts to include the March 14 groups in the government have foundered after he rejected their demands concerning Hezbollah’s weapons and the STL. The March 14 groups and Hariri’s Future bloc have called on Mikati to make a public commitment not to end Lebanon’s cooperation with the STL as demanded by Hezbollah and its allies in the March 8 alliance.

The March 14 coalition’s participation in Mikati’s government has been ruled out after Hariri unleashed the coalition’s opposition and strongly upheld the STL during last week’s rally to commemorate the sixth anniversary of his father’s death.

Copyright The Daily Star 2011.