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There’s an interesting tidbit in a report of the indictment of Lebanese men for smuggling arms to Hezbollah.

Harb, Moussa Ali Hamdan of Brooklyn and Hasan Antar Karaki of Beirut were also charged with seeking to funnel to Hezbollah counterfeit money and stolen cash generated by the sale of phony passports, with Hamdan acting as a U.S.-based conduit to a confidential government witness based in Philadelphia.

Hodroj was identified in court documents as a member of Hezbollah’s political council and has been identified in news reports as spokesman and head of its Palestinian issues portfolio. None of the four is in U.S. custody and all are believed to be overseas, said Patricia Hartman, spokeswoman for Levy.

So he’s a member of Hezbollah’s “political council” and he was smuggling arms to Hezbollah. So that would mean that there’s not much difference between the “military” and “political” wings of Hezbollah. Wouldn’t it?

Can you find the error? Ok, I’ll tell you: the words “military wing of Hezbollah.” This is a gimmick used by Hizballah [my transliteration] and Hamas, too, to fool people in the West. It is used by advocates of engagement with these radical Islamist terrorist groups in places like Britain.

Sure, they say, there is a military wing and a political wing. The latter is moderate or becoming so and thus you can negotiate with them separately. This is rubbish. There is no such differentiation except for normal administrative purposes. The same leadership and doctrine runs both.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Snoopy noted a Bradley Burston column in the wake of Israel’s war with Hezbollah in 2006 in which Burston wrote (the link to Ha’aretz has expired):

When this war is over and Israel’s troops are gone from Lebanon, and when the rage at Israel begins to subside, it will be Nasrallah’s turn – like Nasser’s four decades ago – to answer to fellow Arabs for his actions.

I was dismissive, as it appeared that Hezbollah had no intention of keeping its side of the deal – and it didn’t. I was also dismissive because Thomas Friedman had made a very similar point in “The morning after the morning after.”

On the morning after the morning after, Lebanese war refugees, who had real jobs and homes, will start streaming back by the hundreds of thousands, many of them Shiites. Tragically, they will find their homes or businesses badly damaged or obliterated. Yes, they will curse Israel. But they and other Arabs will also start asking Nasrallah publicly what many are already asking privately:

“What was this war all about? What did we get from this and at what price? Israel has some roofs to repair and some dead to bury. But its economy and state are fully intact, and it will recover quickly. We Lebanese have been set back by a decade. Our economy and our democracy lie in ruins, like our homes. For what? For a one-week boost in ‘Arab honor?’ So that Iran could distract the world’s attention from its nuclear program? You did all this to us for another country?”

(Not a surprising sentiment since Hezbollah wasn’t founded to fight Israel as much as it was to create an Islamic state in Lebanon.)

Frankly, I thought that Friedman was trying to be too cute, but he seems to be somewhat on target in this case. As the Washington Post reported the other day.

But the events of the past few years, voters said, made the campaign a broad referendum on Hezbollah. The group’s militia in 2008 briefly seized control of downtown Beirut in a bid to boost Hezbollah’s political power, a move reminiscent of the country’s 15-year civil war. And Hezbollah’s 2006 war with Israel was cited by some voters as showing the danger of allowing the group to keep its arms stockpiles.

What are some of the other factors leading to Hezbollah’s defeat? Now, Thomas Friedman even gives some credit to ex-President Bush.

While the Lebanese deserve 95 percent of the credit for this election, 5 percent goes to two U.S. presidents. As more than one Lebanese whispered to me: Without George Bush standing up to the Syrians in 2005 — and forcing them to get out of Lebanon after the Hariri killing — this free election would not have happened. Mr. Bush helped create the space. Power matters. Mr. Obama helped stir the hope. Words also matter.

“People in this region have become so jaded by the ability of their states to dominate everything and hold sham elections,” said Paul Salem, analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “And mostly the world never cared. And then here came this man [Obama], who came to them with respect, speaking these deep values about their identity and dignity and economic progress and education, and this person indicated that this little prison that people are living in here was not the whole world. That change was possible.”

As I mentioned before I wonder if President Obama’s speech spurred Christians to vote in greater numbers, realizing that he was reaching out too much to the likes of Hezbollah. (I was happy to see that Michael Ledeen feels the same way.

My thinking is more along the lines of the editors of the Wall Street Journal:

This being Lebanon, talks on building a governing coalition are bound to be difficult. But in the bigger picture, this election marks a step forward since the 2005 Cedar Revolution ended the Syrian occupation. And it’s a vindication of America’s policy of democracy promotion. In Pakistan, Turkey, Iraq and now Lebanon, extremist Muslim parties didn’t fare as well as feared at reasonably free polls, and often lost ground. The outcome in Lebanon is another good reason for the Obama Administration to make democracy a priority of its so-called new relationship with the Muslim world — even if George W. Bush also happened to think it was a good idea.

Democracy promotion was decidedly not a part of President Obama’s Cairo speech.

The usually frivolous Dion Nissenbaum recalls another incident that may have hurt Hezbollah.

At the end of the day, in the battle between the pro-Western March 14 coalition and the Iran-backed March 8 rivals, the date that may have mattered more was May 7th.

That was the day last year when Hezbollah fighters easily stormed through West Beirut in a military takeover that Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah later called “a glorious day.”

What Nasrallah touted as a great day many Lebanese voters saw as a betrayal.

While Sunday’s election doesn’t signal an end to the Hezbollah threat, it is a welcome development.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Tony Badran has a complete roundup of the results of the Lebanese election. It features of names that I’m unfamiliar with, but will be of interest with those who have a detailed knowledge of Lebanese politics. This is from his conclusion:

This balance of power will now be transferred to the battle over the cabinet formation. M14 has a clear victory, and so will pick the Prime Minister. The battle, however, will be over the heresy of the “veto third” — which has no existence in the constitution or the Taef Accord. Hariri has been consistently rejecting its continuation in the future cabinet, and he got support today from Jumblat as well, who called it a “fallacy.” M14 will agree to a national unity government, though its principled position now is that it rejects the “veto third” formula. They are making plenty of noise about giving a boost to Suleiman, and how that will materialize remains to be seen. M8 is almost certainly going to reject it and will cite the relatively weak performance of the so-called independents/centrists as support for their position.

via Barry Rubin who writes:

Whatever the result, Hizballah and its allies, including Iran and Syria, will keep up the pressure on the moderate regime, and this could mean crises ahead. One result could be that an attack on Israel from Lebanon is less likely, at least over the next year, as Hizballah and its allies don’t want to disrupt their efforts to bring Lebanon closer to their control. I hate to say this but political assassination–or at least attempts–and other terrorism could continue to be a method of intimidation.

The West is going to be challenged to provide support for the March 14 coalition government.

Legal Insurrection posts some pictures (via Instapundit).

The New York Times reports:

The tentative victory may have been aided by nearly unprecedented turnout. The preliminary results showed that about 55 percent of the 3.26 million registered voters cast ballots. Lebanese television reported that the March 14 coalition, a predominantly Sunni, Christian and Druze alliance, held at least 67 seats out of 128 in Parliament.

The Washington Post reports:

Heavy turnout in Christian districts returned to power a Western-backed coalition in the Lebanese parliament on Sunday, thwarting a bid by the Islamist Hezbollah party to increase its influence.

and

But the events of the past few years, voters said, made the campaign a broad referendum on Hezbollah. The group’s militia in 2008 briefly seized control of downtown Beirut in a bid to boost Hezbollah’s political power, a move reminiscent of the country’s 15-year civil war. And Hezbollah’s 2006 war with Israel was cited by some voters as showing the danger of allowing the group to keep its arms stockpiles.

In a statement to Agence France-Presse, Hezbollah member of parliament Hassan Fadlallah did not acknowledge the group’s defeat, but said it was important that Lebanon “turn a new page, one based on partnership, cooperation and understanding.”

I noted the emphasis on the heavy voting by Christians and wonder if it’s possible that President Obama’s Cairo speech had anything to do with the result. President Obama made it clear that he was reaching out to the Muslim/Arab world; did Lebanese Christians worry more about their future after that and thus vote in greater numbers than projected?

While this victory is good, in that it’s a setback for Iran and Syria, Hezbollah still remains a force.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Barry Rubin has some fun critiquing credulous reporting on the upcoming Lebanes elections.

More seriously, Amir Taheri considers the possibility of a Hezbollah victory:

If Lebanon comes under Iranian control it could become one arm of a pincer — the other being Hamas-controlled Gaza — designed to subject Israel to low-intensity warfare that would, in time, sap its will to resist. With the completion of the Israeli security fence along the West Bank within the next few months, suicide attacks would become increasingly difficult to organize. The fight, therefore, would shift to the skies with “an endless storm of rockets and missiles raining on Israel from Lebanon and Gaza,” as Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said in an election campaign message last month.

With its clients in control of Lebanon, Iran would build a naval presence in the Mediterranean for the first time since the seventh century. Experts from the Revolutionary Guards have visited the port of Beirut and prepared plans for a visit by an Iranian flotilla before the end of the summer. Six Iranian warships are already on their way to the Red Sea, ostensibly to help combat pirates operating from the Somali coast. In Tehran, there is also talk of helping Hezbollah to develop its own naval units for “resistance operations” against Israel.

And that’s not even considering how Iran would act if it would develop nuclear weapons that President Obama is anxious to convince them not to build with lots of nice words.

Crossposted on Yourish.

In case you’re wondering why Nasrallah’s response to the charge in Der Spiegel that Hezbollah was responsible for Rafiq Hariri’s murder, is that Der Spiegel is a Zionist tool, read Michael Totten’s take.

“[I]f (the majority) uses the report against Hezbollah,” said former Carnegie Endowment scholar and Hezbollah expert Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, “then of course we’re going to see instability in Lebanon, and that’s putting it mildly.” “One word,” said Fadia Kiwan at Saint Joseph University, “could set the streets on fire.” “If the Special Tribunal for Lebanon comes out and confirms the report,” Carnegie Middle East Center Director Paul Salem said, “we could be facing an all-out civil war.” “If these rumors are true,” my own source in Lebanon added, “expect some extremely dark times ahead in Lebanon. After all, the Sunni street hates Hezbollah enough to begin with. Once Hezbollah is officially accused of assassinating Hariri, all bets are off.”

All this raises the question: if Lebanon could plunge into war should “March 14” cite an unsourced report prematurely, what might happen if the UN officially indicts Hezbollah later?

Totten doesn’t seem convinced that the rumors are true. There does seem to be an element of whitewashing Syria’s role in the assassination attached to the rumor. (Of course, given that both Hezbollah and Syria are clients of Iran, would proof of Hezbollah’s involvement necessarily exonerate Syria?)

It does seem that Hezbollah is scared. That’s why Der Spiegel’s credibility must be undermined.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.