Jawad Pakradouni

Sohmor. A town located in the western Bekaa, home to fifteen hundred households and between five and eight thousand residents. Given its size and population, the term "village" is the most geographically appropriate way to describe Sohmor. Sohmor has been repeatedly targeted by Israeli bombardments, as if it were routine for them. If this village and its successive mayors have been a magnet for the Israeli army, its municipality has proven to be a true lightning rod. Among the top ten worst electricity bill defaulters listed by EDL are: the Southern Water Authority, the Bekaa Water Authority, and the municipality of Sohmor…

The philosophical question of what comes first, the chicken or the egg, appears almost simple when set against the issue the country now faces: a (peace) agreement whose signing is made conditional on the disarmament of Hezbollah. This condition – set by our government, imposed by Israel, and desired by a growing majority of the Lebanese population – cannot, however, be met within a set timeframe. Moreover, whether through the Lebanese army or through strikes on Hezbollah positions, the militia’s arsenal remains operational. The problem is not only the presence of weapons, but also the infiltration of the militia into certain segments of the state apparatus. The militia paralyzes any measures taken against it and, worse, triggers internal unrest, while also raising the specter of mutiny aboard a drifting vessel that has already begun to sink.

A young teenager proudly returns home and announces to his parents that he passed his exam, handing them his paper with a grade of 3/20 written on it. A failing grade, certainly, but for the student, it's a victory! And why not, really? Hezbollah proclaimed its own victory, in a psychologically charged moment, this Friday, April 17th, in a festive atmosphere, where its supporters let their joy erupt, along with the shells of B7s and RPGs; bursts of fire from their tracer-bullet machine guns lit up the sky for more than forty minutes. A veritable sound and light show over the capital, declared a demilitarized zone just a few hours earlier at a conference…

During the last Council of Ministers, last Thursday, it was enough for Nawaf Salam to mention the demilitarization of the capital for the Ministers of Health and Labor (representing Hezbollah) to step up and oppose it. Irony and aberration. The irony is that the ministerial portfolios granted to Hezbollah are those directly concerned by the dramatic consequences of a war: strikes indeed cause market stagnation and an increase in the number of injured and dead. The aberration is that ministers of a government refuse to allow the State to have full sovereignty, at a minimum , in its capital, and prefer the rule of chaos and paramilitary groups to that of public institutions.

The current position of the Lebanese Executive is certainly not enviable. From the President of the Republic and his inauguration speech, to the Prime Minister and his government project. Beautiful speeches, beautiful promises, a certain will to realize them, good faith (at least for the latter), but the obstacle of reality, of the field, of dissensions, of nostalgia, of a dream, of a utopia. Some reproach the Executive for its inertia, its inability to face events, and remind it of Winston Churchill's position facing Chamberlain, the choice between dishonor and war. It is easy to criticize and transpose situations. Except that the policy of the Land of the Cedars is not that of a single man like Great Britain, but that of a consensus, and a confessional one at that.

And what about forgiveness when the offenders know perfectly well and consciously what they are doing? What about leniency towards those who don't give a damn about the country, others, or even their own? In the name of Khamenei and the Islamic Republic, Hezbollah launches rockets at the country that annihilated its supreme leader in a single strike. The supposed leader of Hezbollah, Naim Kassem, the one in hiding, launches 'Karbalaean' wars, battles named after Quranic verses, thus honoring its original name, 'the Islamic resistance in Lebanon'. And meanwhile, it's death, destruction, panic, chaos. Forgive them?

Yet another return to war, a war that is still not ours, one to avenge the death of a theocratic dictator. It is said that in times of misfortune, solidarity is in order, and that we should only settle our scores afterwards. This is, moreover, what moralistic voices advocated in 2023-2024. No! Today more than ever, we must once and for all denounce the causes of our misfortunes. Our misfortunes are obviously due to Hezbollah, but also to political complacency, to the acquiescence to a state of affairs, from all parties. Complacency to avoid 'civil war'; acquiescence which translates into unnatural alliances, for the sharing of positions or to preserve confessional quotas.

The cruise ship Costa Concordia ran aground off Giglio Island after hitting underwater rocks on January 13, 2012. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP) Imagine, as the Costa Concordia cruise ship was sinking in 2012, the restaurant manager asking passengers not to forget to pay their bill. Absurd? Yet, that is, more or less, the logic adopted by our government. In a country paralyzed by crisis, where only inflation is progressing, the State, desperately seeking to finance salary increases for its civil servants and more or less adapted pensions for retired military personnel, has found the solution: increase VAT by 1% and tax gasoline by three hundred thousand pounds per can.

Americans are known for being "direct," especially in the questions they ask their interlocutors, expecting an automatic, Manichaean answer: yes/no, black/white. Kash Patel, FBI director, during his Senate hearing, was relentlessly pressed by Senator Eric Swalwell with the same question: "Did you inform the Attorney General about the mention of Donald Trump's name in the Epstein file, yes or no?", a question to which Patel did not give the expected categorical answer. While the answer to this question is simple, as it concerns a fact, the one posed by Senator Lindsey Graham, in Washington, to the army's commander-in-chief, General Rodolphe Haykal, is, however, much more complex, as it concerns an opinion, or even a political stance.

A dark corridor, the smell of dampness emanating from it, a broken or unpowered elevator, dirty stairs, then another dark corridor, strewn with coffee cups whose grounds have splashed the floor, empty water bottles, crushed cigarette butts... There, in an office plunged into darkness, a rickety chair awaits its occupant, who settles in, waiting for the generator to deign to light up the premises. Then there was light, revealing the decrepitude. This is not the setting of a post-apocalyptic film, but indeed that of the Palace of Justice in the city that the poet Nonnus of Panopolis, in the 5th century, named guarantor of order and mother of laws: Berytus Nutrix Legum.