- “What do you want to do with the boxes in the corridor?”
- “Take them up to the roof.”
- ”Let me help you.”
- ”Don’t worry about it. I’ll get a Syrian to do it.”
This conversation took place right in front of me in Beirut during 2012. I should make it clear that the lady who made that comment isn’t racist towards Syrians, but it seems that this is a perception of Syrians in Lebanon – that menial tasks is what Syrians are there for. In his article Here is Damascus Hazem Al Amin states that in the Lebanese collective consciousness a Syrian’s presence in their country is associated with one of two negative stereotypes, which, as he puts it, “cannot be expressed euphemistically”. They are the “occupying Syrian soldier” and the “needy Syrian citizen, barred from attaining equal status with other Beirutis” [1]
I had visited Beirut only a few times before my transfer there in 2012, so I felt uncomfortable facing the fact that I could be regarded as a representative of the Syrian regime, just for being Syrian and despite my past and present opposition against it. It is quite usual in Lebanon that Syrian citizens are automatically identified with Syria’s regime holding an entire population responsible for their regime’s mistakes. For my part - as a Syrian who is well aware of the tragedies brought upon the Lebanese people during the Syrian Army’s presence in the country (1976-2005) -- I can fully understand the uncomfortable associations the word “Syrian” evokes in Lebanon. What many Lebanese seem to miss, however -- perhaps as a consequence of their great sufferings -- is that the monstrous crimes perpetrated by the Syrian regime in Lebanon were merely an extension of even more atrocious practices carried out in Syria, which were possible because of the absolute power that this regime enjoyed on its home turf. Thus the fact that the majority of Syrians have kept silent about the illegal actions taken against the Lebanese – though understandably misunderstood within Lebanon – is not because they approved of it, but out of fear of the consequences of criticizing their regime’s actions internally, let alone abroad.
That there were other than only the official voices became perhaps apparent in the attempts made by a number of Syrian intellectuals who supported Lebanese demands for the withdrawal of Syria’s military and intelligence presence from Lebanon in 2005. More than 140 intellectuals signed a letter sent to Bashar al- Assad on May 22, 2005, which read:
“Abiding by the Taif Accord and the initiative to withdraw Syrian armed forces from Lebanon would allow us to benefit from the current situation and avoid regrettable consequences. If this initiative were put into action today, this would allow the mutual desire of the Syrian and Lebanese peoples to forge a new relationship, ill-intentioned foreign powers would be robbed of their pretexts and pave the way to rebuild trust and solidarity between the two populations and their states.” [2]
Another example is the letter penned by a Syrian intellectual in 2005, to apologize to the Lebanese people following Bashar al-Assad’s speech in which he announced the Syrian Army’s final withdrawal:
“Syrians—all Syrians—wanted nothing more than to do as you have done. They wanted to join you, to hold aloft the Lebanese flag in Martyrs’ Square or even to wave it in al-Salahiya [4], outside what they call the Syrian Parliament.” [3]
But such individual efforts and apologies did little to change Lebanese’s hatred towards the Syrians. The average Lebanese on the street did not see the Syrian soldier as a representative of a repressive regime’s system of control, but first and foremost as a Syrian. This has allowed the Syrian regime to rule and pillage Lebanon without shouldering any responsibility for its actions. It has managed to pit Lebanese against Syrians, victim against victim, while the criminal goes free.
This may help to explain the general Lebanese attitude towards the Syrian revolution. Despite the fact that the majority of Lebanese fear the Syrian regime (including some of those who support it) and despite the many opportunities they have had to change their position and join in supporting the revolution do otherwise, they have made no contribution to bringing it down, choosing to defend it or watch events from a distance. Contrary to the commonly held conception that two victims will unite against a single persecutor, the Lebanese authorities have done nothing to help the Syrian people to stand up to the one who has been tormenting them. Despite all reassurances which Syrian opposition figures have given after the start of the revolution on 15/3/2011, urging the Lebanese people to turn the page and initiate a new chapter based on mutual respect, a generation of Lebanese who grew up under the Syrian military occupation are still incapable of separating the two words “Syrian” and “soldier”.
It is worth noting here that these reassurances were made on a political level by the president of the oppositional Syrian National Council at that time, Burhan Ghalioun,, who stated on in December 2011:
“Syria’s next government will not interfere in Lebanon’s internal affairs. We want to send a clear message to all the allies, agents and those depending on the Syrian regime in Lebanon to think seriously about their future in their country amidst their fellow countrymen after this criminal, exterminatory regime in Damascus has collapsed.”
On January 21, 2012 [6] this was reiterated by a spokesman of the Free Syrian Army:
“We respect Lebanese sovereignty and the sovereignty of our Lebanese brothers over their territory. We must apologise to them for what they have suffered at the hands of the regime under the regimes of both the father (Hafez Al Assad) and his son (Bashar Al Assad), in the past years.”
Unfortunately, neither the military nor the political wings of the Syrian opposition built upon this pre-emptive outreach, which was particularly evident in their failure to play a role during the operation to free the Lebanese hostages seized in the countryside of Aleppo on May 23, 2012. The opposition could so easily have made a constructive contribution to solve the crisis by demonstrating their good intentions which could have been: a positive beginning of a new era in Syrian-Lebanese relations.
Though the majority of Lebanese have by-and-large avoided actively supporting the Syrian revolution, they have nevertheless been thoroughly involved in changing the nature of Syrian-Lebanese relations. As a preliminary basic analysis of this phenomenon we can divide Lebanese stances on the Syrian revolution into three main categories:
-Supporting the revolution
Within this category, four main approaches can be discerned: those emotionally involved in events within Syria, those who support the revolution for religious reasons, those who believe in the aims and principles of the Syrian revolution and finally those hostile to the Syrian regime, on the grounds that “my enemy’s enemy is my friend”.
-Supporting the Syrian regime
The reasons for this support are strategic in some cases and emotionally and/or religiously in others. The political solidarity felt by the majority of these individuals contrasts with a personal hatred of Syrians who are residents in Lebanon, especially in the period just after the outbreak of the revolution when those Syrians making their way to Lebanon were almost exclusively Syrian anti-regime activists.
-A general dislike of Syrians
Those in this category have no clear stance on the Syrian revolution, though are fine with Syrians killing one another on the “let them have a taste of their own medicine” principle. This group of person has always hated Syrians, but in recent times their hatred has increased after the huge influx of refugees from Homs and Damascus and for them, Syrians in Lebanon are a scapegoat for rising prices, an alleged decline in public safety and increased tensions between various Lebanese factions. As far as they are concerned, Syrians are the source of all of Lebanon’s misfortunes. It’s worth pointing out here that these people are blaming the Syrian people for their tormentor’s mistakes once again, since it is the indiscriminate and large scale violence of mainly the Syrian regime that has caused these refugees to flee in the first place. It is the regime that is threatening to burn down not only Syria but to set the whole region ablaze, a strategy long expressed by Syrian officials, most recently in Bashar al-Assad’s address on Syrian state television on April 17, 2013:
“The fire will not stop at our borders.”
And:
“The flames in Syria will spread to neighbouring countries.”
For the sake of the two peoples and the region, working to overcome this Syrian-Lebanese rift is more important now than ever before. It is no longer a matter of Lebanese and Syrians hating one other; it has escalated into a Syrian-Lebanese conflict which enhances the strain on inner-Lebanese relations. Following repeated news reports of active Hezbollah involvement in the armed conflict, Hezbollah’s operatives and supporters are now regarded as enemies of the revolution, leading to abductions and killings between various armed groups and Hezbollah and inevitable negative repercussions for those Syrians resident in Lebanon.
This conflict has opened tension within Lebanon itself, starting with Lebanese-on-Lebanese scuffles within Lebanon and developing into Lebanese-on-Lebanese armed conflict within Syria, which was clear after two Sunni sheikhs, al-Assir (in Saida) and Al Rifaei (in Tripoli) agitated for Jihad in Syria in response to Hezbollah’s armed intervention.
Taking all this into consideration, if this crisis is to be overcome, work needs to begin on two basic fronts, which can be summarized as follows:
1. Syria
- The present: The Syrian political and military opposition have to start working on liberating Lebanese detainees as soon as possible, confirm that they reject all attempts to transplant Lebanese conflicts onto Syrian soil [7] and engage in the political process of reaching a truce with Hezbollah [8].
- The future: It has become obvious that individual apologies are not enough to bring about naturalization between Lebanese and Syrians. What is needed is an apology on behalf of the state and a sincere effort to implement transitional justice, bringing Syrian officials to account for their crimes in Lebanon, clarifying the fate of those Lebanese missing within Syria and compensating the Lebanese families of those whom the Syrian regime was responsible for, or complicit in, assassinating. The key here is for the Lebanese to feel that justice has been meted out to a regime responsible for tragedies whose consequences Lebanon still suffers from today. The future Syrian government must deal with Lebanon as one state according to the international norms and protocols and not as different sects and the consequent interference in the internal affairs of Lebanon.
2. Lebanon
- The present: Pressure must be put upon on all Lebanese factions not to engage in armed intervention in the Syrian conflict in view of the repercussions this will have for Lebanon’s future. Lebanese president Michel Suleiman has been warning against “sending arms or fighters into Syria, or setting up training camps within Lebanon,” in order to “safeguard Lebanese national unity and strengthen our communal existence against any disturbance or upset” [9] but the reality of the situation indicates that this trend is being reversed.
- The future: Engaging in a process of transitional justice with the aim of calling the Syrian regime and its Lebanese partners to account and working to alter stereotypical and racist behaviour towards the Syrian people, thus helping write a new chapter in the relations between the two communities and their countries.
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Footnotes
1. Here Is Damascus, Hazim Al Amin, Al Hayat, 13/1/2013 (http://alhayat.com/Details/471818)
2. A Letter from Syrian Intellectuals to Al Assad on the Saidawiyat website (http://saidacity.net/_NewsPaperID=980&Action=Details)
3. A district in central Damascus where the Syrian Parliament is located
4. An Apology to the Lebanese People for President Al Assad’s Speech, The Civilized Dialogue Show with Aliya Salwani (http://www.ahewar.org/debat/show.art.asp?aid=32993)
5. Burhan Ghalyoun speaks to Al Mustaqbal (http://www.lebanon.ms/vb/showthread.php?t=26063)
6. Statement by the spokesman for the Free Army, 21/1/2012, Sawt Al Jabal website (http://www.sawtaljabal.com)
7. On 24/4/2013 Aljazeera.net reported that the Free Army’s political and media coordinator had rejected the call for Jihad in a text that read. “We of the Supreme Joint Command thank them both, but we reject any call for Jihad in Syria and reject the presence of any foreign fighters in any location whatsoever.” (http://www.aljazeera.net/mob/f6451603-4dff-4ca1-9c10-122741d17432/36c6a702-3028-46e6-a99d-d32d1b7b3659)
8. The official website of the Free Patriotic Movement published the transcript of a video appeal by the former Lebanese president calling for Hassan Nasrallah to withdraw Hezbollah’s forces from all Syrian territory and maintain channels of communication with revolutionaries in districts home to Shia villages (http://www.tayyar.org/Tayyar/News/PoliticalNews/ar-LB/khatib-nasrallah-letter-zek-440.htm)
9. News report, Aljazeera.net, 24/4/2013 (http://www.aljazeera.net/news/pages/36c6a702-3028-46e6-a99d-d32d1b7b3659)