Articles

The history of Lebanese Shiism is too often told backwards, or worse, flattened by a teleological reading that presents Hezbollah as the natural culmination of a long religious and political continuum. Nothing could be further from the truth. Scholarly work on the ulama of Jabal Amel, on the contrary, allows us to reconstruct a very different genealogy—one rooted in doctrinal pluralism, a conscious relationship to the state, and a non-theocratic conception of religious authority. It is precisely this tradition that has been broken. Historically, Ameli Shiism developed within the framework of wilayat al-umma : a community of believers endowed with moral and spiritual autonomy, but not with a project of political domination. The choice of marja‘iyya was free and plural, often oriented toward Najaf, within a deliberately distanced relationship between clerical authority and political power. This tradition acknowledged the diversity of religious authorities, rejected doctrinal centralization, and, above all, did not seek to govern society in the name of the sacred.

At a time of rising regional particularisms, under the effect of the war in Gaza, the Pope's recent visit to Lebanon, particularly to Annaya, takes on a special dimension for Maronites. It should be an opportunity for this community to activate its historical research on an academic level and to refresh its memory on the "missionary" nature of its presence in Lebanon as a historical core of Lebanese identity. Pope Leo XIV's recent visit to Annaya on December 1, 2025, should be the first groundbreaking of a Maronite historical project “revisited.” Beyond the person of Saint Charbel, the Pope indeed went to the source of the Lebanese Maronite Order (OLM), which encapsulates the essence of the Maronite Church. In Annaya, we are also at the source of Greater Lebanon, of which John Paul II affirmed that “its historical roots are religious in nature.” Here we touch upon its genesis.

The year 2025 was a pivotal year in the Middle East, as it shattered a project that had been in gestation since the early 1980s - including the al-Daawa party in Iraq, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Assad regime in Syria - Michel Seurat had been one of the first to discuss it in his articles. Later, in the 2000s, Hamas in Gaza and the Houthis in Yemen joined this dynamic, which also attempted to establish itself in Bahrain during the Arab Spring of 2011. It was, incidentally, in 2005-2006, after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, the assassination of Rafic Hariri, the July 2006 war, and the gradual subjugation of Fatah by Hamas in Gaza, that the Iranian “Shiite crescent” project truly took shape… before receiving de facto legitimacy in 2015 through the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action on Iranian nuclear, a golden “gift” from Barack Obama that benefited the imperialist ambitions of the mullahs.

Is the mullahs' regime loosening its grip on the mandatory wearing of the Islamic veil, or is it granting a temporary relaxation to appease an exasperated population? One thing is certain: in recent years, women have increasingly defied the strict rules of the Islamic Republic, and a wind of freedom is blowing through the streets of Iran. Women dancing at parties or chatting in cafes... without headscarves. Images unimaginable until recently are multiplying. Braids, curly hair, or bleached hair are now making their mark in public spaces, alongside more traditional women wearing the hijab or the chador.

In Lebanon, politics is no longer measured by results or the extent to which national interests are protected, but rather by the loudness of one's voice, the intensity of one's rhetoric, and the ability of an official to appease the instincts of a divided and exhausted public. In this climate, any minister who chooses calm, cool-headed thinking, and working without grandstanding becomes a potential target of constant accusation. This is precisely what Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi is facing, as he is subjected to a campaign of criticism inseparable from a deeper crisis afflicting the very concept of the state.

For the past two years, investors have watched gold and silver climb relentlessly — at times with disbelief. Since December 2023, gold has more than doubled, rising from roughly $2,000 to around $4,300, while silver has surged from about $26 to $63, with momentum accelerating sharply in the second half of 2025. If current levels hold into year-end, both metals are on track to register their strongest annual performance since 1979 — the opening chapter of the last great precious-metals cycle. And the “shiny metals” have not been alone. Platinum and palladium have also rallied sharply, copper is up roughly 50%, and a broad range of strategic minerals is enjoying a banner year.