Global Policy Forum

There was a time when South Lebanon was rarely out of the international headlines. This 850-square metre strip of land was synonymous with perpetual warfare during two decades of Israeli occupation. The human cost was heavy. Over 20,000 Lebanese civilians were killed, while Israel lost more than 900 soldiers.

With Israel's withdrawal two years ago, there were hopes that all that had changed. In the spring of 2000 thousands of Lebanese citizens visited the southern part of their country for the first time to celebrate the end of the Israeli occupation. In the southern town of Khiyyam, jubilation accompanied the release of Lebanese detainees who had been held without trial in prison barracks, some of them for years and often under appalling conditions. With the Israeli troops withdrawn and its ally the South Lebanon Army (SLA) dissolved, Lebanon and Israel appeared to have finally turned the page on the war that had proved costly for both.

But the situation today is far from peaceful. Across the so-called "Blue Line", the provisional border drawn by the United Nations, Israeli troops and their main Lebanese foe Hizbollah face each other at multiple locations along the border and engage in skirmishes and small disputes over territory and resources which run a real risk of escalating into a major confrontation.

Amidst raging warfare between Israelis and Palestinians and mounting war-talk surrounding Iraq, there seems scant energy left to devote to this conflict. But ignoring it could be costly. Beneath the cover story of an Israeli-Lebanese border dispute, lies the reality of a lasting Israeli-Syrian confrontation and Iran's continuing involvement in the conflict. During the Israeli occupation, armed confrontations had been fierce, terrible and bloody, but the parties played by rules with which they were familiar.

After the withdrawal, there have been fewer casualties as the frequency and intensity of clashes diminished, but so did their predictability. Only a few weeks ago, a lingering dispute over water rights of the Hasbani River - which flows from Lebanon into Israel - provoked heightened tensions and even talk of war. Add to this already explosive mix Syria's sense of isolation in Middle East diplomacy and Israel's perception of its eroded deterrent posture, and the ingredients for a far more dangerous armed confrontation are all there.

The Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon was only the latest chapter in a long history of attacks and counter-attacks in which various armies and militias involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict sought control of the area to gain leverage over their opponents. After Lebanon slid into civil war in 1975, Israel was determined to stop Palestinian attacks from within Lebanon. But its heavy-handed approach drew intense international criticism.

Following Israel's invasion in March 1978, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 425, calling on Israel to immediately cease its military actions against Lebanon and "withdraw forthwith its forces from all Lebanese territory". It also established the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) "for an initial period of six months" in order to verify Israel's withdrawal. Israel failed to comply and even besieged Beirut following a second invasion in June 1982. It then retained its military presence in a ten-kilometre-wide strip along the border or "security zone" in conjunction with its proxy force, the SLA.

In the mid-1980s Israeli troops were faced with a new and formidable enemy, Hizbollah. The party drew support from a disgruntled Muslim Shi'ite population weary of Israel's harsh military actions and resentful of their relative social deprivation and political marginalization in Lebanon. Boosted by Iranian support and equipped with a radical Islamist ideology, Hizbollah soon became the strongest and most disciplined Lebanese group to oppose the Israeli occupation. It has been accused of involvement in the killing of hundreds of American and French peacekeepers and the kidnapping of foreign nationals in Lebanon. The party's alleged 'terrorist' outlook has earned it renewed interest in the 'war on terror'.

In December 1990, the Lebanese civil war came to an end and all groups were required to lay down their arms with one notable exception - Hizbollah. Syria, which by then exerted considerable influence over Lebanon, was keen to embrace Hizbollah's military operations in the south as a proxy in its conflict with Israel over the Syrian Golan Heights, occupied since 1967. Hard-line factions in the Iranian regime were equally supportive of Hizbollah but for different reasons. For them Hizbollah provided a valuable asset in their aim to export Iran's Islamic revolution.

This odd convergence of interests resulted in Syria allowing Iran to finance and arm Hizbollah. But Hizbollah could also rely on support in Lebanon. Widely regarded as a legitimate force of resistance, Hizbollah boosted its popularity by providing social services to war-victims in the south and refugees in the poverty belt of Beirut. Since 1992, Hizbollah has secured up to twelve of parliament's 128-seats and won a majority of Shi'ite seats in municipal council votes.

With its foreign sponsors and sizeable domestic constituency, Hizbollah proved a lethal weapon against Israel. Following persistent armed clashes and occasional escalations of violence, most notably in July 1993 and April 1996, the Israeli government led by Ehud Barak withdrew its troops. At the end of May 2000, the UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan confirmed that Israel had fully withdrawn from southern Lebanon and thus fulfilled Resolution 425.

Yet the conflict was not over. Syria still demanded the immediate return of the Golan Heights and hard-line factions in Iran were unwilling to exchange their 'Islamic' foreign policy for a more pragmatic approach. Under heavy pressure from both countries, the Lebanese government asserted that the Israeli withdrawal was incomplete by pointing at Israel's continuing occupation of a small border area called the Shab'a Farms.

Israel's position, and the Security Council's, was that this area was occupied Syrian territory and thus within the purview of UN Resolution 242 (governing the Israeli-Syrian conflict), not Resolution 425. However, Lebanon and Syria, on flimsy evidence and despite the fact that all available official maps showed the Shab'a Farms to be on Syrian territory, claimed that the Shab'a Farms were Lebanese. Their position is designed to legitimise continued Hizbollah attacks against Israeli positions in the Shab'a area, which, predictably, trigger Israeli counter-attacks.

In a detailed new report on the current situation, Old Games, New Rules: Conflict on the Israel-Lebanon Border, the International Crisis Group (ICG) sets out detailed recommendations to all parties to the conflict and the international community that aim to reduce the risk of a return to full-scale war. Among these recommendations are for the United States to engage Syria and strengthen its involvement in Middle East diplomacy, for example by setting a clear framework for negotiations on the Syrian track and a timetable for their completion.

Steps also need to be taken to help create conditions that will discourage conflict. Economic investment in southern Lebanon is in this respect urgently needed to ensure that southern Lebanon eventually makes the transition from a war zone to normal life. A donors' conference for the south, promised in October 2000, has still not taken place and only a fraction of required rebuilding funds have been deployed. The European Union in particular should provide assistance and encouragement to kick-start a long-overdue reconstruction plan.

On the political front, more action is required to bolster moderating influences, such as giving independent and moderate candidates with grassroots support in southern Lebanon a fairer chance in parliamentary elections. Hizbollah should also be able to increase its political role - first by being given its fair share of parliamentary seats and by being offered a government portfolio. This would force Hizbollah to be accountable to the southern population for bread-and-butter issues, rather than treating the zone simply as a base of attack for military actions against Israel.

In the long term, conflict management cannot be a substitute for a comprehensive solution of the wider conflict in which Israel, Syria, Lebanon, and Iran have been embroiled for several decades. But that is not immediately realistic. Nor is a total cessation of hostilities and for the time being Hizbollah and Israel need to be pressured to ensure that their conflict, which is unlikely to end while the underlying Israeli-Syria dispute is unresolved, is contained. Still, the conflict in southern Lebanon must be addressed if we do not want to be taken by surprise while our attention is focussed on what appear to be more pressing issues elsewhere in the region.

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