The Road to Damascus
By Benny Avni
April 16, 2007
The New York Sun
Original Source: http://www.nysun.com/article/52545
UNITED NATIONS — All of a sudden, everyone wants to negotiate with President Al-Assad of Syria. But as Secretary-General Ban sets out on the road to Damascus next week, one wonders what the visit can achieve. Unlike the speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, who went to the Middle East on a fool's errand to win voters in the Midwest, Mr. Ban's fool's errand is really about Syria and Lebanon. But if Mr. Ban wants to help Lebanon — where, unlike the rest of the Middle East, the U.N. is a real player — his best bet would be to find a suitable replacement for his own special representative there, Geir Pedersen.
A leftover from the Kofi Annan era, Mr. Pedersen has gone native, adopting the narrative of Lebanon's Syrian and Iranian allies. During Mr. Ban's trip to Beirut last month, Mr. Pedersen arranged intimate meetings for the secretary-general with top Hezbollah politicians and another puppet of Syria, President Lahoud, sending all the wrong signals to the region.
Sound policies can only be achieved if the right people set them. The Norwegian Mr. Pedersen said recently that if he weren't Christian, he would convert to Shiite Islam, the dominant religion of Iran and southern Lebanon.
Incidentally, those who believe, like Ms. Pelosi, that America could charm Mr. Assad away from Iran should look at the similarities between the Alawites who control Damascus and the Shiites — which partially explain why, far from being unnatural, the Syria-Iran alliance is one of the oldest and most durable in the region.
So what can Mr. Ban offer Mr. Assad? The answer, regrettably, is nothing. Mostly, he is expected to plead with the Syrian president to stop opposing the establishment of international tribunals to try suspects in Lebanon's political assassinations, as well as asking him to cease smuggling weapons through the Lebanese border.
But unlike his father, Hafez Al-Assad, who was obsessed with the loss of the Golan Heights to Israel, Mr. Assad's overriding fear is losing Lebanon, so he can ill afford to accede to either of Mr. Ban's requests. Instead, Damascus will divert attention from Lebanon by dangling a phantom peace offer to Israel.
Last week, a Syrian-born former businessman, Ibrahim Suleiman, visited the Knesset and swore that his friend Mr. Assad wanted peace. But the regime mouthpiece al-Thawra then disavowed Mr. Suleiman and reverted to an old Syrian standby, editorializing, Whoever wants peace should clearly announce his readiness to give back the full Golan Heights before any talks can take place.
At Turtle Bay, meanwhile, some of Mr. Ban's aides — including the leading candidate to become the next top U.N. envoy to the Middle East, British diplomat Michael Williams — say Lebanon's ills should be cured by dealing first with the Israeli-held Shebaa Farms.
The inexact art of relying on old colonial borderlines as a basis for international law led U.N. cartographers to conclude, in 2000, that Israel had completely withdrawn from Lebanon. Now some at Turtle Bay are urging those cartographers to use similarly imprecise data and declare the Shebaa Farms to be part of Lebanon — and do it by June.
That would only strengthen Hezbollah, which argues that it should remain armed in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions until Israel cedes every inch of Lebanese soil. Hezbollah did not disarm in 2000 after Israel's U.N.-certified withdrawal, and it will not disarm now — even if, by some miracle, Israeli troops immediately turn over the strategic high ground of Shebaa to their enemies.
Created by Iran to counter Israel's military, Hezbollah is now also Mr. Assad's vital ally, his ticket to controlling Lebanon, and the most important source of cash for the Soviet-style Syrian economy. He cannot stop arming his Lebanese allies, and he cannot accept a tribunal that will try his own relatives, thereby exposing them as masterminds of the assassinations in Lebanon.
So far, Damascus has succeeded in controlling Lebanon's politics through its Shiite and Christian allies. Prime Minister Siniora begged Mr. Ban in a letter last week to ask the Security Council to bypass those allies and implement the tribunals. Instead of hopelessly engaging Mr. Assad, Mr. Ban should simply recommend that the council act on Mr. Siniora's appeal.
As the rest of the region watches anxiously, Syria will play gracious host to yet another foreign dignitary who flatters its thuggish regime with diplomatic photo-ops. Mr. Ban should forgo the visit and tend to Turtle Bay, where personnel changes are needed most of all.