This text is from a lecture that Dr Oumlil was invited to give in Beirut on the special significance of the 20^th anniversary of the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri. The lecture was attended by Lebanese figures including former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, current Deputy Prime Minister Tarek Mitri, current Minister of Culture Ghassan Salameh and Saudi Ambassador Walid al-Bukhari.

Twenty years have passed since the assassination of former President Rafik Hariri on 14 February 2005. The anniversary is very different this year. It is enough to mention what has happened to the two parties accused of Hariri's assassination: Bashar al-Assad's regime has fallen and fled; as for Hizbullah, its secretary general has been assassinated along with members of its top leadership, its arms supply route through Syria has been cut, and it has lost control over Beirut’s airport and seaport, as well as land crossings into the country. The group has been forced it to accept the Security Council resolution ordering it to disarm and submit to a monitoring mechanism. A president and a prime minister were elected who were not of its own making.

When Rafik Hariri returned permanently to Lebanon to engage in politics and become its most important leader, his homecoming achieved two things:

Firstly, the reconstruction of Lebanon after the destruction caused by the decade-and-a-half-long civil war, especially its capital Beirut. This was the largest reconstruction in the shortest time in the history of Lebanon.

Secondly, he entered Lebanese politics and succeeded where no other political leader was able to prevail, becoming the most powerful political figure inside Lebanon with close ties to political leaders around the world. He was targeted because of this unparalleled success, and it was an earthquake that shook Lebanon and far beyond Lebanon.

I visited Hariri a few days before the bombing that killed him in the centre of Beirut, the city he had reconstructed. I remember the conversation was about the elections that Lebanon was about to hold. He was confident he would win and gain a majority in parliament. As I said goodbye to him, I wondered with concern: Will he be allowed to have a majority in the next parliament? It was parliament’s job to elect the president and that was at the height of the dispute between former Prime Minister Hariri and President Emile Lahoud, whose term Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had decided to extend. A Hariri-majority parliament would also have been able to put an end to the Syrian occupation of Lebanon. The decision to assassinate Hariri was probably taken when the Security Council passed Resolution 1559, ordering the removal of the Syrian army from Lebanon and the disarmament of its militias, that is disarmament of Hizbullah, especially since those concerned with the resolution, the Syrian regime and Hizbullah, accused Rafik Hariri of being behind the passage of Resolution 1559.

When Rafik Hariri entered Lebanese politics, he faced two obstacles: Political sectarianism and the control of the Syrian regime over Lebanon.

The first obstacle was structural because Lebanon's sectarian system was, and remains, deeply rooted in its social and political makeup. The disadvantages of the Lebanese sectarian system are many, but its greatest disadvantage is that it divides the country into two irreconcilable parts—the Lebanon of Modernity, thanks to its educational system, the standard of its universities, its economic openness, its top echelons who boast the best knowledge and skills allowing them to integrate in today's world, and the vitality of its human capital at home and in the diaspora. Side-by-side next to the Lebanon of Modernity, however, sits the Old Lebanon with its sectarian system, wherein no civil, democratic state is possible because sectarianism is its antithesis.

- In a civil, democratic state, citizenship is the unifying identity, not one’s sectarian identity.

- The independence of the judiciary is the pillar of a civil and democratic state, while in a sectarian state, the judicial positions are merely quotas between sects.

- The sectarian identity of individuals in the sectarian system predetermines their existence. Their social relations are imprinted with their sectarian identity, which sets the boundaries for their political trajectory.

The Lebanese people's deepest problem is the division between these two Lebanons, the modern and the old. Lebanon's gamble, or what should be Lebanon’s gamble, is to become united and pluralistic—not the kind of pluralism we see now, the outdated sectarian and confessional pluralism, but pluralism in its modern democratic sense, a plurality of political parties, professional unions and opinion platforms.

The second obstacle that Rafik Hariri faced as he ventured into politics was the Syrian regime that held Lebanon by the throat. The autocratic nature of this regime did not allow any Lebanese politician to accept anything but absolute dependence.

Not only that, but the Syrian regime was the complete opposite of Lebanon. The two were opposites in terms of economic systems, open in Lebanon and closed and directed in Syria, and at the level of the education system and universities, and in the margin of freedom of opinion and publication in Lebanon and its prohibition or censorship in Syria. Ironically, it was the Syrian regime which controlled Lebanon. It was Syria that exported its unemployed to Lebanon, and it was Syria’s wealthy that came to Lebanon for hospital treatment and to deposit money in Lebanese banks.

Lebanon's curse and blessing comes from its geographical setting. For a long time, from the last quarter of the 19th century to the 1970s at the eve of the civil war, Lebanon was sought after because of its surroundings. In Egypt, many Lebanese citizens contributed to the establishment of the cultural milestones of the Arab Renaissance. The Lebanese press shone brightly and influenced opinion far beyond Lebanon's borders, thanks to its margin of freedom and professionalism. Lebanese journalists were credited with establishing and managing a number of media outlets across the Arab world.

However, since the 1970s, Lebanon's relationship with its surroundings has been turned upside down. Lebanon became a source of danger to itself and its surroundings. Just look at the map: Syria to the north and east, with a stranglehold on Lebanon; to the south, Israel, whose aggression has plagued Lebanon ever since the 1948 Nakba expelled a large number of Palestinians from their homes; Iran may be geographically distant, but since the Khomeini revolution, because of Lebanon's sectarian system, it has become a major player in Lebanon's political arena.

There are many reasons for opposition against Iran, including how it has exported its Khomeinist revolution and for its hegemonic ambitions in the region, relying on its Twelver Shiite followers and their loyalty to the Wilayat al-Faqih (Guardianship of the Jurist). However, the Iranian regime has done more harm to Lebanon than most. It has penetrated its social and political fabric to the point of eliminating part of its people and rendering them completely dependent on Iran. Iran’s takeover is a major impediment to the establishment and stability of a national state in Lebanon for the following reasons:

- There is no way to establish a sense of patriotism, which is loyalty to the homeland and the nation state, because Iran's followers in Lebanon are loyal to Iran and its Supreme Leader, not exclusively to their national state and its institutions.

- There is no room for an inclusive national identity, that is a citizenship identity that transcends individual sectarian identities, because the sectarian identity of Iran’s followers in Lebanon is orientated exclusively towards Iran.

- There is no guarantee of national sovereignty, which is one of the pillars of the nation state. This is because in a sectarian system, sects are empowered against each other by inviting the intervention of external powers. Hizbullah is the most empowered by Iran, and its leaders continue to publicly declare their loyalty to Iran and its Supreme Leader.

Israel has meant nothing but evil since 1948, the year of the Nakba, when thousands of Palestinians were expelled into Lebanon. Since then, the Palestinian issue has become an internal Lebanese affair and a key factor in the Lebanese political equation.

Iran created Hizbullah as the spearhead of its conflict with Israel. Hizbullah built its political existence on the legitimacy of resistance against Israel's occupation of parts of southern Lebanon. Hizbullah extended its geographical scope beyond the borders of Lebanon because it represents resistance on behalf of the Palestinian cause and the liberation of Jerusalem. When Hamas launched its al-Aqsa Flood operation on 7 October 2023, Hizbullah entered into confrontation with Israel in support of Hamas in its ongoing war with Israel in Gaza. The result of this decision is now clear: The assassination of Hizbullah's leadership, at its head the irreplaceable Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah, and the destruction of the military and human capabilities of this party, which forced it to accept the Security Council's decision to disarm and monitor the implementation of this decision by a committee headed by an American officer!

For the first time in a long time, Lebanese people have elected a President of the Republic who is not of Hizbullah's making, as well as a Prime Minister from outside the usual Lebanese political environment. There is a feeling among the Lebanese, or the majority of them, that Lebanon can finally turn to its own national affairs and distance itself from the axes that made it an arena for their conflicts. However, for this to happen, the Lebanese must agree on Lebanon's neutrality, and the situation in Syria must stabilise. Will Israel leave Lebanon alone, even if the Lebanese agree on their neutrality and independence? All evidence indicates that it will not do that, but rather will seek to impose on it a normalisation that will be nothing more than an annexation.