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| Postwar Lebanon Faces Problems |
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The year of 2006 is full of troubles for Lebanon, which endured a 34-day Israeli military offensive that brings not only huge casualties but also economic loss and political crisis to the beautiful coastal country. The Israeli-Hezbollah conflict erupted on July 12 when guerrillas from the Lebanese Shiite group crossed the border at Aita al-Shaab, and killed three Israeli soldiers and seized two others. The Hezbollah action provoked immediately the fierce counterpunch from Israel, which pounded Hezbollah's strongholds and Lebanese infrastructure in the following month. Economy shrinks at all-round levels In a period of more than one month, many key infrastructure in Lebanon, including bridges, highways, power stations, oil tanks and the only international airport, were destructed by Israeli devastating assault, which also claimed the lives of some 1,200 Lebanese. According to a recent government report, total direct loss to Lebanon from the war were US$2.8 billion, which, as what Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Seniora said, had wiped out 15 years of economic development of the country. Facing the huge loss from the war, the Lebanese government is unable to make it up by itself as the government revenues also shrink greatly. The 34-day conflict totally shattered the government's hope of reaching a record high revenue growth in 2006. As a destination country for tourism, Lebanon every year has a large number of foreign tourists, who bring considerable income to the country. However, this summer's war scared almost all foreign tourists away the resort country, whose economy largely depends on tourism and the related businesses. The worse is that the revenues of postwar Lebanon did not restore to the prewar level, because Israeli continued siege on Lebanese ports and airport after the war cut off the government's revenues from another backbone industry -- transport. Huge loss plus low revenues caused a large budget deficit, which jumped to 40.54 percent of total spending in 2006 from the previous year's 30.83 percent. Affected by the government's budget deficit, the public debt could reach more than US$40 billion at the end of 2006, according to Lebanese Finance Minister Jihad Azour. Meanwhile, Lebanese central bank also adjusted the inflation rate in Lebanon, giving a staring 7 percent compared less than 0.5percent in 2005. Local economic analysts said that the negative impact of the war will not be confined to 2006, but will spill over to the coming few years as well. Environment needs years to restore Similar to Lebanese economy, the environment of the country also needs years to restore from an environmental disaster caused by the Israeli bombings. On July 13 and 15 Israeli jets targeted the fuel tanks at the Jiyeh power station, some 30 km south of Beirut, resulting in the leak of between 10,000 to 15,000 tons of fuel oil into the Mediterranean, the worst in the world maritime history. Some environmental experts worried that the spilled oil will release toxic substances, which will go into the marine animals and the food chain. "It's going to affect seafood trade, fisheries and tourism. It's going to be a hard and tough few years in terms of marine environment," said Wael Hmaidan, a coordinator with the Lebanese environmental Non-governmental Organization Greenline. The contamination of the sea affected not only the marine life but also the human being. An evaluation on this oil leak disaster said that the oil evaporation could cause air pollution, which would affect the long-term health of as much as three million population living on Lebanese coast. In the heavily pounded southern Lebanon, intensive bombings on the residential area produced a mass of construction rubbish and dust, which could enter the lungs with breath and cause diseases in respiration system. Another killer to Lebanese is the unexploded bombs, including the prohibited cluster bombs, which have killed at least 24 people and wounded more than 100 since the end of the war on Aug. 14. According to an early testimony of an Israeli army officer, Israel fired at least 1,800 cluster bombs containing over 1.2million bomblets on Lebanon. However, the estimate made by the United Nations is much higher than the testimony, saying that three million such bomblets were fired into Lebanon during the war. The UN estimates that around one million unexploded cluster bombs now litter 590 sites in south Lebanon posing a serious hazard to civilians who returned to the area after the war and are now trying to rebuild their lives. The clearing work is estimated to cost at least a year because the task will become much harder as winter rains and the growth of grass in spring will conceal the bombs. Political rift deepened As a multi-sect country, Lebanon had suffered a 16-year civil war between 1970s and 1990s, during which the country's infrastructure and economy were heavily damaged. Learning lessons from the civil war, the Lebanese people in recent years began to be aware of the importance of a peaceful and harmonious society and dedicated to stabilize the domestic political situation, which tended to stability in 2003. However, Israeli assault in this summer smashed the relative tranquility in Lebanon, where sectarian tensions and power struggles rose again and reached a climax after the assassination of Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel this month. Israeli army launched a large-scale assault on Lebanon with the aim of eradicating Hezbollah and bringing back the two abducted soldiers but had to end the offensive resultless after a 34-dayoperation. Encouraged by Israeli failure in reaching the established goals, Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah declared "divine victory" few days after the end of the conflict, and thus given higher support by the Lebanese people. With the stronger backing, pro-Syrian Hezbollah began demanding for a greater say in the government, which has been dominated by an anti-Syrian coalition since elections in last year, and called for the formation of a national unity government. But the country's top leaders failed to reach agreement on the formation of such a unity government in which Hezbollah and its allies would have a third-plus-one veto power. Collapse of the consultation led to resignation of six pro-Syrian cabinet ministers, including two from Hezbollah, in earlier November. After a few days, Lebanese political crisis turned to a sharp deepening when the Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel was assassinated on Nov. 21. Gemayel, a Christian anti-Syrian leader in Lebanon, was shot dead when his convoy was attacked in Jdeide, about 15 km northeast from Beirut. The resignation of the six ministers and the death of Gemayel put the Lebanese government on the brink of collapse, as according to Lebanese law, the government dissolves automatically if eight ministers, or one third of the 24-member cabinet, quit the government. That would lead to the miscarriage of a newly approved draft to set up an international tribunal to try the suspects in the murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Lebanese President Emile Lahoud and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, also an ally of Hezbollah, rejected the draft, citing that the government was no longer constitutional after the six ministers' resignation. At the key point, Hezbollah called for street protests to topple the current government while anti-Syrian Christian leader Samir Geagea warned in response a counter-protest. Despite the two sides' pledges of peaceful action, the country has still been gripped with fears that the country would fall in civil war when several clashes erupted between anti and pro-government protestors. Some local analysts say that Lebanese postwar rebuilding project would doubtless be hampered by the ongoing sharp political crisis. (Xinhua News Agency December 12, 2006) |
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