Daily Star - Quest for Hariri killers threatens to tear Lebanon apart - September 25, 2010

Elizabeth A. Kennedy

Associated Press

BEIRUT: “The Truth” was the rallying cry for hundreds of thousands of angry Lebanese who took to the streets of Beirut five years ago demanding to know who was behind the assassination of their hero, former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Their movement helped reshape Lebanon’s politics.

However, now the quest to uncover and prosecute Hariri’s killers threatens to tear the country apart.

The possibility that the UN tribunal probing the murder could indict members of Hizbullah – perhaps as soon as next month – is fueling Lebanon’s worst political crisis in years.

Deep feuds between Western-backed parties and Hizbullah worsened this week, raising fears they could bring down the fragile unity government in which both serve, and which is led by the slain leader’s son, current Premier Saad Hariri.

“The country has been drowning in a war of words,” Hariri said this week.

“The Lebanese are deeply anxious and some believe that we are on the edge of a renewed wave of destruction. This is not the image we want to portray to the world.”

But Hariri also rejected demands from Syrian and Iranian-backed Hizbullah and its allies that he push to shut down the Netherlands-based tribunal. If Hizbullah members are accused, many fear it could lead to violence between the heavily armed group and Hariri’s mainly Sunni allies.

The bombing that killed Rafik Hariri and 22 other people along Beirut’s Mediterranean waterfront on February 14, 2005, was one of the most dramatic political assassinations the Middle East has seen. A billionaire businessman, Hariri was Lebanon’s most prominent politician after the end of the Lebanese 1975-90 Civil War.

Suspicion fell on neighboring Syria, since Hariri had been seeking to weaken its domination of the country. Syria has denied having any role in the murder, but the killing galvanized opposition to Damascus. Huge street protests helped end Syria’s 29-year military presence, paving the way for pro-Western parties to head the government in subsequent polls.

But since then, the tack of the investigation appears to have changed.

Four pro-Syrian generals arrested early on were released last year for lack of evidence. Though the tribunal has not yet named any individuals or countries as suspects, Hizbullah’s leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, has announced that he expects members of his group to be indicted. He vows not to hand them over to be prosecuted.

In a stunning reversal this month, Hariri said it had been a mistake to blame Damascus for his father’s killing. He also has shuttled to Damascus five times in the last nine months to try to repair the relationship.

Supporters of Syria and Hizbullah have scrambled to discredit the tribunal, saying it was poisoned by witnesses giving false information.

Tensions heightened this month after one of the generals initially arrested launched bruising personal attacks on the younger Hariri.

Jamil al-Sayyed, who headed Lebanon’s security services at the time of the assassination, said the premier “sold his father’s blood” to frame Syria, and was behind the “false witnesses.” He said Hariri must be held accountable or “I will do it someday with my own hands.” The state prosecutor summoned him for questioning, but he said he would not comply.

Over the weekend, Hizbullah sent a crew of gunmen to Rafik Hariri International Airport to pick up Sayyed after he flew in from Paris, presumably to protect him from arrest.

Critics said the show of force amounted to an armed takeover of the airport.

Hariri’s backers struck back, accusing Sayyed of trying to blackmail Hariri for $15 million in exchange for dropping the charges that Hariri was behind the false witnesses.

Pro-Syrian Christian politician Suleiman Franjieh said in a television interview late Thursday that if Hizbullah members were indicted, “there will be war in Lebanon.”

“The atmosphere is waiting for the spark,” Franjieh said.

Some Lebanese are now saying the probe may not be worth the chaos its findings might create. “If the tribunal will lead to strife, then let’s all agree on canceling it,” said Walid Jumblatt, a political leader of the Druze sect who once was among the tribunal’s leading supporters.

Wi’am Wahhab, a pro-Syrian politician, warned on Hizbullah’s television station that it would take more than a decade for the tribunal to pore through all the evidence, putting Lebanon in a dangerous limbo.

“Are we going to keep the country in mourning?” he asked. “What is needed today is for the tribunal to be brought down immediately in order for the country to relax.”

However, Hariri and his supporters insist the tribunal will go forward.

The disputes are intensifying a long-running power struggle between Hariri’s supporters and Hizbullah that exploded into street violence in Beirut in May 2008. Fears over chaos stemming from indictments is so strong in the region that in July, the leaders of Syria and Saudi Arabia – once bitter rivals – traveled to Lebanon together in an unprecedented show of cooperation to calm tempers.