ment has played a key role. Q What are the roots of the crisis in Lebanon?
A tating the present crisis was the rise of The most important factor in precipithe Palestinian resistance movement after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, and the establishment of its military bases in Lebanon. This had a very destabilising effect on Lebanese polities, leading to an explosive social crisis. The fighting broke out because of a Phalangist attempt to crush the Palestinian presence militarily. Q How did the Palestinians come to set up bases in Lebanon?
A ians into Jordans seria and Lebanes There was a massive exodus of Palestinafter the creation of Israel by the Zionists in 1948. Until 1967, the Palestinians had hopes that the Arab regimes could win their country back for them. But the humiliating defeat of these regimes in the 1967 war forced the Palestinians to take their fate into their own hands. They built up their own organisations.
The relative success of their operations against Israel, and the discredit into which the Arab regimes had fallen, won the Palestinian resistance movement the enthusiastic support of the Arab masses. This allowed the movement to establish independent military bases in the two countries where it was strongest: Jordan and Lebanon.
The Palestinian movement in Jordan was crushed by the Hussein regime in 1970. Since then, the Palestinians have been unable to reestablish bases there. In Lebanon too, the army tried to liquidate the Palestinian bases - the most serious attempts being made in 1969 and 1973. In both cases the fighting ended with a political victory for the Palestinians In 1969 the fighting ended with the Cairo Accords, which officially recognised the right of the Palestinians to launch operations against Israel from Lebanon, to carry arms, and to control their camps and certain other areas of the country. That is, the de facto dual power situation was recognised by these accords. In 1973 the fighting ended with the Melkart Protocol, which basically reconfirmed the principles of the Cairo Accords.
Why would Arab regimes like Lebanon, which claim to support the Palestinian cause, turn against the Palestinians and try to liquidate their bases in Lebanon? The present uneasy ceasefire in Lebanon cannot hide the decisive nature of the conflict which has been raging for the last nine months - in which the rise of the Palestinian resistance moveHere a Trotskyist of the Revolutionary Communist Group (Lebanese section of the Fourth International) explains the background to these developments.
There are two factors to consider here, one external, the other internal. First the external factor. The Palestinians used their bases at first to launch operations against Israel. The Lebanese army tried to prevent these operations. They were afraid of Israeli reprisals and did not want to run the risk of a conflict with Israel.
Like the other Arab regimes, they were un willing to wage a consistent war against Israel because this would have required a large-scale mobilisation of the masses, some thing far more dangerous in their eyes than the existence of Israel. To have fought Israel would have meant fighting western imperialism indirectly too, especially the US, which the Arab regimes were unwilling to do because western imperialism is in the last resort the only guarantor of their existence.
So, to avoid a conflict with Israel, the Lebanese regime sought to crush the Palestinian liberation movement and its bases in the country at the earnest opportune moment.
There were even more compelling internal reasons for the Lebanese regime to try to repress the Palestinian movement and the Lebanese left. To understand the effect that the existence of the Palestinian bases had on internal Lebanese politics, try to imagine what the presence of 300,000 armed people in Britain outside the authority of the British government would mean for internal British politics.
In Lebanon this dual power situation caused a very explosive situation. Other oppressed groups followed the example of the Palestinians and took their fate in their own hands. This sparked an intense radicalisation of Lebanese politics, massive mobilisations of the oppressed in extra-parliamentary action, a mushrooming of leftist organisations, and an intensification of the social crisis which threatened to destroy the foundations of the bourgeois state.
The army was discredited because it did not even try to resist the Zionist aggression, the government was corrupt and inefficient, and the bourgeoisie did not have any worthwhile programme of reforms to defuse the social crisis. The consequence was an almost total loss of authority by the bourgeois state. This, I think, was the most compelling reason for the Lebanese bourgeoisie to wage such an all-out war against the Palestinian resistance and the Lebanese left. Q ity in the new country majority. and the left.
ive strength? A militias.
The conflict has often been described as a religious conflict. How does religion enter the picture?
The Lebanese population is divided into numerous Moslem and Christian sects. Under French colonial rule from 1923 to 1943, the Christians were given privileged economic and political positions to assure their loyalty and backing to the imperialists. Before granting independence to Syria and Lebanon in 1943, France artificially carved out the present boundaries of the state of Lebanon, giving the Christians a slight majorBanking on the relatively privileged Christian community to protect their interests, the French imposed an unwritten National Pact' which ensured Christian domination in the political power structure. According to the National Pact, the Christians are guaranteed a majority in Parliament and both the President of the Republic and the Commander-in-Chief of the army have to be Christians - even though, because of a higher birth rate, the Moslems are today a The Christians feel threatened by Arab nationalism and moves towards Arab unity, which would endanger the separate existence of Lebanon and the political and economic privileges they derive from it. The Moslems, by contrast, have strong Arab nationalist feelings and have supported the anti-imperialist struggles waged in other Arab countries A Thus, while many Christians looked upon the Palestinian resistance movement with apprehension, the Moslem community sympa thised with and supported it. This is why the bourgeoisie nad to rely on canisuan based parties in its onslaught against the Palestinians What is the array of forces on each side, and what is their relatOn one side are the army, and the militants of the Phalangist Party, the National Liberal Party and the President of the Republic, Suleiman Frangieh. The 12,000 strong army, however, is a weapon that the bourgeoisie has to use with caution. The majority of the army officers are Christians, but most of the soldiers are Moslems If the army was fully used in a prolonged war, it might split. So only selected army units are used directly in the fighting. The role of the army is very important, however, in that it advises, trains and supplies the right-wing reactionaries.
The right-wing militias have well over 15,000 fighters, of whom the largest proportion belong to the Phalangist Party - a Christian-based party founded in the 1930s and modelled on the fascist parties of Europe. Its basic slogans are God, Country and Family'. It was the Phalangist militia, not the army, which began the offensive against the Palestinian resistance and the left, accompanying it with a massive propaganda campaign designed to strengthen the authority of the army and the state.
On the other side are the Communist Party, the Progressive Socialist Party, the Murabitunes (a Nasserite organisation) and several other nationalist and left-wing groups including the Lebanese Trotskyists of the RCG. Their strength is well over 15,000 fighters. The Palestinian organisations have a further 10,000 fighters But numbers are not the whole story. The right wing is very well organised, is united. and has been taking the initiative all along; it can also count on unlimited supplies of ammunition. The other side, however, is hopelessly divided, reacting to the attacks by the right wing but never taking the initiative in the fighting. It is dependent for its supplies on Syria and the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), making it very vulnerable to changes in their policy.
What are the policies of the PLO and Syria?
The reactionary offensive in Lebanon , coincided with negotiations between the PLO and Syria on the one hand and US representatives on the other. The imperialists hoped that the attacks against the Palestinians in Lebanon would force them to make sufficient concessions to arrive at a compromise agreement with Hussein and Israel whereby a rarestinian mini-state would be set up on the West Bank under Jordanian authority.
Such an agreement would certainly con tain a condition that the Palestinians abandon their bases in Lebanon. If this happens, the Lebanese left will become an easy prey for the fascist militias and a strong right-wing govern. ment will emerge.
The only other solutions for the Lebanese bourgeoisie would be partition, or a Bonapartist regime supported by Syria which would simultaneously clamp down on the left and grant some reforms in a bid to defuse the social crisis. But a solution based on a negotiated settlement of the Palestinian question is much more preferable to the
Red Weekly 29 January 1976 Portugal TI