Both ends of the opposition spectrum were doing what they do best over the weekend, with the Free Patriotic Movement calling for a reinstatement of the previous government as a solution to the political deadlock, while Hezbollah and co. was yet again banging its war drum in the south.
 
In a proposal that typified the Change and Reform bloc’s blithe disregard for the constitution, the FPM’s Ibrahim Kanaan told OTV on Saturday that if re-designating ministries in the new government were unfeasible, then Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri should just grant each bloc the ministries they held in the pre-election government of Fouad Siniora.
 
Kanaan, a distinguished lawyer before he joined the ranks of Michel Aoun’s FPM, is clearly too smart to actually believe that the suggestion will advance either his personal reputation or his party’s claim that it represents both change and reform. In short, what he is proposing would take Lebanon back to the shameful post-Doha formula, an arrangement that saw the country’s political process bob in the doldrums with no opportunity, assuming there ever was one, for meaningful progress. 
 
Kanaan’s proposal would once again grant the opposition the one-third veto in the cabinet. Originally a mechanism with a 1-year shelf life, the veto has insidiously wiggled its way onto the negotiation table, ignoring the constitution and selling itself as a necessity for a national unity government.
 
And there’s the rub. National unity government sounds so warm and cuddly. With a national unity government, we are told, Lebanon can move forward, holding hands into a brave new dawn of change and reform, a Lebanon free of suspicion, a Lebanon in which all the national groups are represented.
 
It’s a nice idea, but in reality the one-third veto is a tool crucial in thwarting key processes, such as the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, issues relating to United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701(including Hezbollah’s disarmament) and contentious economic policies such as privatization. Quite how Mr. Kanaan, who no doubt styles himself as a breath of fresh air in a Christian community his party claims is run by dinosaurs, can put his weight behind such a plan is anyone’s guess.

Meanwhile his March 8 ally, Loyalty to the Resistance bloc MP Nawwaf Moussawi, in an interview with Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Anbaa on Sunday, announced that Israel is waging war on Lebanon through espionage and targeted killings. Nothing new there you might say, but the good news is that we have nothing to fear, for, as Moussawi assures us, the stout men of the Resistance are redoubling their efforts to turn South Lebanon into a Middle East Maginot Line to, “confront Israeli aggression before it happens and defend Lebanon in a way that helps maintain the country’s political and military objectives.”

At least Hezbollah is being consistent in once again demonstrating its complete disregard of the state, but does Moussawi, like his learned parliamentary colleague, Mr. Kanaan, really believe that that his party speaks for all Lebanon, not to mention her best interests, when he makes such flabbergasting and arrogant statements. We saw what happened last time his party tried to maintain Lebanon’s “political and military objectives” and we’d rather pass this time.

Moussawi’s warped logic was echoed on the same day by Shiite Mufti Sheikh Ahmad Qabalan, who, despite saying that Hezbollah would never give up its arms, called on all Lebanese to work together to put the interests of Lebanon above all else. “Let us give up our selfishness and stop bargaining with loyalty and nationalism,” he declared. “Nobody, whatever his position, comes above the other. This is Lebanon. We will have it no other way and anyone who doesn’t like it can leave.”

Maybe Sheikh Qabalan should consult a travel agent.