Three years ago, Hezbollah plunged Lebanon into a devastating war that left over 1,000 civilians dead and rendered another 1 million homeless. The damage from the month-long conflict has been estimated at $7 billion, while the political fallout paralyzed the government Fouad Siniora for the remainder of its term.

After the ceasefire, Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah declared the outcome a “Divine Victory”, presumably because Israel had failed to achieve its stated goal of mortally wounding Hezbollah’s military capability. The declaration was as arrogant as it was thoughtless. One only had to wander the bombed-out streets of Bint Jbeil or Beirut’s southern suburbs and compare the scale of the damage inflicted upon Israeli society to realize that this was a victory only within the very parochial confines of Hezbollah’s agenda, one set and managed by sponsors in Iran. The boast is also unlikely to be a stern warning to Israel. (Indeed the only lesson Israel learned was that it will do the job properly next time, even it means just bombing Lebanon to smithereens from the air.)

While many Lebanese quite understandably railed against Israel’s relentless bombardment of the South, the Bekaa, southern Beirut and other strategic locations across the country, the fact remains that it was Hezbollah’s reckless kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers – and killing eight more in the process – that was the catalyst to the horror unleashed upon an undeserving country.

Many of those who believe the Party of God can do no wrong have since sought to excuse the July 12 kidnapping. The most popular justification sold the operation as part of an ongoing strategy to kidnap Israelis and use them in negotiations to free Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails. How, they argue, was Hezbollah to know Israel would react so ruthlessly?

This, of course, holds little water. Weeks earlier Hamas had launched a similar operation against Israeli forces, killing two and capturing one soldier, Gilad Shilat.

Israel’s response was to level areas of Gaza. Israel is not a county to quietly accept the deaths or abductions of its young men, so it would not have taken a genius to calculate the reaction to the abduction of not one but two soldiers and the killing of eight in what would have been seen as a concerted effort by its two biggest foes.

Within 24 hours Lebanon did not have a functioning airport.

Nasrallah has confessed that, had he known the consequences, he would not have authorized the kidnapping operation. But there has been no act of epic contrition and no disarming in recognition of the misery, heartache and destruction wrought on the country. Instead, the party consolidated what it perceived as a tactical advantage, and for the next three years stymied the running of the country. Not only did it rearm, it has repeatedly shown that it has scant respect for Lebanon’s democratic institutions.

Three years on, after an election it lost, an election in which the Lebanese said no to the “Hezbollization” of their country, the party still wants a controlling stake in the government.

As March 14 leader Saad Hariri seeks to form a government, it is well worth remembering that Lebanon has four years in which to prove that it can live up to its promise, addressing critical economic and social issues and building a peaceful and prosperous state upon common values. Peace and prosperity cannot happen in the shadow of war, they cannot happen amid social unrest, they cannot happen while gunmen still roams the streets, and they cannot happen when one-third of the government can block the policies of an elected majority.

On the third anniversary of what was a tragic chapter in Lebanon’s short and equally tragic history, these are facts worth remembering.