Via Friday-Lunch-Club
WPR:
".... The intelligence war as well as a recent Lebanese-Israeli border clash in which five people were killed have persuaded Lebanese President Michael Sulaiman and Prime Minister Saad Hariri to increase coordination between Lebanon's national armed forces and intelligence services and Hezbollah to thwart Israel's apparently extensive infiltration of Lebanon, to expand the presence of Lebanese regular forces along the largely Hezbollah-controlled Lebanese side of the border with Israel, and to prevent Lebanon from sliding into civil war....
Closer cooperation between the army and Hezbollah could have potential benefits for Western nations as well as for Israel, by limiting Hezbollah's ability to retaliate for a U.S. or Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear facilities. Nonetheless, members of the U.S. Congress have forced the Obama administration to put a hold on $100 million in military aid for Humvees and maintenance support to Lebanon....
Lurking in the background of the review are concerns that Hezbollah is increasing its influence within the Lebanese military by inducting into the army Shiite fighters who have first served for two years in the militia....
'The French AML90, circa 1972...
Closer military and intelligence ties with Hezbollah also threaten to scuttle plans for a defense cooperation treaty with France that would increase French-Lebanese cooperation in combating organized crime, drug trafficking and money laundering, because of French fears that Hezbollah would benefit from the agreement. Those fears were fueled by Lebanese demands that the treaty adopt the Arab distinction between terrorism and resistance, which would have allowed Hezbollah to be classified as a legitimate movement. Hezbollah supporters in southern Lebanon have clashed in recent weeks with French members of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), after Hezbollah accused the peacekeeping force of gathering intelligence on Israel's behalf....
Too weak to intervene in the 2008 fighting, the Lebanese army watched from its Western-made armored vehicles as Hezbollah and pro-Syrian forces humiliated the more Western-leaning militias loyal to Hariri. Now, with Hariri moderating his positions toward Hezbollah as well as Syria, the refusal by the U.S. and France to give the Lebanese military what it needs to position itself as a symbol of national unity could wind up undermining Western interests in Lebanon more than Hariri's unavoidable cooperation with Hezbollah."
The Lebanese government has also helped Hezbollah bust alleged Israeli spy cells by granting it access to tools and tradecraft acquired from its U.S. and European allies...
The spy war and clash with the Israelis have left Hezbollah little choice but to welcome the closer intelligence and military cooperation, which is to some degree likely to curtail its freedom to operate independently. The militia is smaller than the Lebanese army in terms of men, but better-equipped and more battle-hardened. The stepped-up cooperation would reverse Lebanon's past policy of keeping its army away from the southern border due to concerns that it lacked firepower and could spark renewed sectarian fighting. The move also breaks with fears that the army could be torn apart again were it to be fully deployed along the Israeli border.
Posted by G, Z, or B at 5:56 PM
River to Sea
Uprooted Palestinian
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