BEIRUT: Lebanon on Friday marked 20 years since former prime minister Rafic Hariri’s assassination, with seismic political changes underway that have weakened Hezbollah and its backers and could herald a comeback for Hariri’s son Saad.
Rafic Hariri, a towering political figure who oversaw Lebanon’s reconstruction era after the 1975-1990 civil war, had recently resigned as premier when he was killed on February 14, 2005.
In 2022, a UN-backed court sentenced two Hezbollah members in absentia to life imprisonment for the massive suicide bombing that killed him and 21 others, though the group has refused to hand them over.
His son Saad, who served three times as prime minister, is based in the United Arab Emirates but has again returned for the annual commemorations.
This time, he is back in a changed Lebanon.
The commemoration comes days before the deadline for implementing a Hezbollah-Israel ceasefire, which ended more than a year of hostilities that weakened the group.
Concerns have mounted for the fragile truce after Beirut rejected Israel’s demand to remain in five southern locations after the February 18 deadline.
But Hezbollah still carries weight, with supporters Thursday blocking the airport road after two Iranian planes were barred from landing.
A day earlier, Israel’s army had accused Iran of sending funds to arm the group through the Beirut airport.
On Friday morning, a few thousand Hariri supporters carrying Lebanese flags gathered near his father’s burial site in downtown Beirut.
“For the first time in 20 years, our joy is double: first because the Syrian regime fell... and second because Sheikh Saad is among us,” homemaker Diana Al-Masri, 52, told AFP.
A source close to Hariri said he was due to give a speech addressing developments “in Lebanon and the region,” though he may not resume political activities right away.
“His supporters are calling on him to return to political life,” said the source, requesting anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.
Until early 2022, Hariri was the main Sunni Muslim leader in a country where political power is shared along sectarian lines.
Once enjoying strong support from Saudi Arabia, Hariri’s relationship with the regional heavyweight deteriorated because of his conciliatory attitude toward Hezbollah.
In 2017, Hariri resigned as premier in a shock address from Riyadh, citing Iran’s “grip” on Lebanon through Hezbollah and prompting accusations he was being held against his will.
French President Emmanuel Macron had to intervene to secure his return to Lebanon, where Hariri rescinded his resignation.
He resigned again as prime minister after nationwide protests in 2019 demanding the wholesale overhaul of Lebanon’s political class.
In a tearful 2022 announcement, he said he had suspended his political activities and those of his party, citing “Iranian influence” among other reasons.
The source told AFP that all these reasons had now “vanished.”
For decades, Hezbollah was Lebanon’s dominant political force, but its arsenal and leadership were decimated during its war with Israel, while Syrian ally Bashar Assad’s ouster cut the group’s vital arms supply lines.
’New chance’
In January, former army chief Joseph Aoun was elected president after a more than two-year vacuum.
He was widely seen as the United States and Saudi Arabia’s preferred choice.
This month, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, who had been presiding judge at the International Criminal Court, formed a government. On Friday, Salam visited Rafic Hariri’s tomb to pay his respects.
“Lebanon has been given a new chance as Iranian influence is declining and the international community has returned,” the source said.
Riyadh has recently retaken an interest in Lebanese politics after distancing itself for years over Hezbollah’s influence.
“Saudi Arabia seeks a strong, organized Sunni leadership,” said Imad Salamey, head of the International and Political Studies Department at the Lebanese American University.
“If (Saad) Hariri can present himself as that figure, his return would serve both his interests and those of the kingdom.”
His father’s assassination anniversary “will serve as an opportunity to assess his ability to mobilize support and reassert his leadership within the Sunni community,” Salamey added.
Hariri was thrust into the political limelight following his father’s murder, widely attributed to Damascus and Hezbollah at the time, which triggered massive protests that drove Syrian troops out of Lebanon after 29 years of occupation.
Rafic Hariri was a billionaire and the architect of Lebanon’s reconstruction era after the 1975-1990 civil war.
Hezbollah, meanwhile, is desperate to prove it has not lost ground to political rivals.
After the airport protests, authorities said they were working to bring back Lebanese passengers stranded in Iran using two Middle East Airlines planes.
But on Friday a source from the national carrier told AFP that Tehran had denied them permission to land in a tit-for-tat move.
Israel has repeatedly accused Hezbollah of using Lebanon’s only airport to transfer weapons from Iran, claims the group and Lebanese officials have denied, with the army reinforcing security measures there in past months.
Lebanon marks 20 years since Rafic Hariri killed as power balance shifts
https://arab.news/5y8uf
Lebanon marks 20 years since Rafic Hariri killed as power balance shifts
- A UN-backed court sentenced two Hezbollah members in absentia to life imprisonment for the massive suicide bombing that killed him and 21 others
Tunisia’s famed blue-and-white village threatened after record rains
- The one-time home of French philosopher Michel Foucault and writer Andre Gide, the village is protected under Tunisian preservation law, pending a UNESCO decision on its bid for World Heritage status
SIDI BOU SAID, Tunisia: Perched on a hill overlooking Carthage, Tunisia’s famed blue-and-white village of Sidi Bou Said now faces the threat of landslides, after record rainfall tore through parts of its slopes.
Last week, Tunisia saw its heaviest downpour in more than 70 years. The storm killed at least five people, with others still missing.
Narrow streets of this village north of Tunis — famed for its pink bougainvillea and studded wooden doors — were cut off by fallen trees, rocks and thick clay. Even more worryingly for residents, parts of the hillside have broken loose.
“The situation is delicate” and “requires urgent intervention,” Mounir Riabi, the regional director of civil defense in Tunis, recently told AFP.
“Some homes are threatened by imminent danger,” he said.
Authorities have banned heavy vehicles from driving into the village and ordered some businesses and institutions to close, such as the Ennejma Ezzahra museum.
- Scared -
Fifty-year-old Maya, who did not give her full name, said she was forced to leave her century-old family villa after the storm.
“Everything happened very fast,” she recalled. “I was with my mother and, suddenly, extremely violent torrents poured down.”
“I saw a mass of mud rushing toward the house, then the electricity cut off. I was really scared.”
Her Moorish-style villa sustained significant damage.
One worker on site, Said Ben Farhat, said waterlogged earth sliding from the hillside destroyed part of a kitchen wall.
“Another rainstorm and it will be a catastrophe,” he said.
Shop owners said the ban on heavy vehicles was another blow to their businesses, as they usually rely on tourist buses to bring in traffic.
When President Kais Saied visited the village on Wednesday, vendors were heard shouting: “We want to work.”
One trader, Mohamed Fedi, told AFP afterwards there were “no more customers.”
“We have closed shop,” he said, adding that the shops provide a livelihood to some 200 families.
- Highly unstable -
Beyond its famous architecture, the village also bears historical and spiritual significance.
The village was named after a 12th-century Sufi saint, Abu Said Al-Baji, who had established a religious center there. His shrine still sits atop the hill.
The one-time home of French philosopher Michel Foucault and writer Andre Gide, the village is protected under Tunisian preservation law, pending a UNESCO decision on its bid for World Heritage status.
Experts say solutions to help preserve Sidi Bou Said could include restricting new development, building more retaining walls and improving drainage to prevent runoff from accumulating.
Chokri Yaich, a geologist speaking to Tunisian radio Mosaique FM, said climate change has made protecting the hill increasingly urgent, warning of more storms like last week’s.
The hill’s clay-rich soil loses up to two thirds of its cohesion when saturated with water, making it highly unstable, Yaich explained.
He also pointed to marine erosion and the growing weight of urbanization, saying that construction had increased by about 40 percent over the past three decades.
For now, authorities have yet to announce a protection plan, leaving home and shop owners anxious, as the weather remains unpredictable.
