Title: TheHeralding - Lebanon
1Lebanon
2Content Overview
- Country Profile
- Political Situation
- Domestic and Foreign Politics
- Current Security Situation
3Country Profile
- Demographics
- Mainly Muslims (54) and Christians (40)Major
Ethnicity Arabs, Armenians, Kurds - Geographic Location
- Syria (north, east) and Israel (south)
- Ruler
-
- Past relation with Israel
- Lebanon affected by aftermath of six-day war when
Palestinians use Lebanon as a base for attacks on
Israel (1967) - Israel attacks after Hezbollah captures two IDF
soldiers, leading to a 34-day war along the
Israel-Lebanon border(2006) - Was embroiled in a Civil War from 1975 1990.
4Political System
- Framework
- Seats in parliament were divided on a 6-to-5
ratio of Christians to Muslims, until 1990 when
the ratio changed to half and half. - The top three positions in the ruling "troika"
distributed as follows - The President, a Maronite Christian.
- The Speaker of the Parliament, a Shi'a Muslim.
- The Prime Minister, a Sunni Muslim.
- The following came about as a result of the 1943
National Pact, (which allocated political power
on an essentially confessional system based on
the 1932 census) - Branches
- The political system is split into Legislative,
Judicial and Executive branches with the
Judicial branch being completely independent of
the other two branches. - Current Positions
- Still no President
5Domestic and Foreign Politics
- Friction between Political Parties
- Three primary issues are still causing frictions
between parties - 1. A pro-or anti-Syrian stance
- 2. The cooperation with the Special Tribunal for
Lebanon - 3. Disarmament of Hezbollah.
- Division of religious groups exist for top
positions in politics, consisting - Maronite Christian
- Sunni Muslim
- Shia Muslim
6Hezbollah
- Officially founded in 1985
- Shi'a Islamist militant group and political party
based in Lebanon - Current leader is SEC-GEN Hassan Nasrallah
- Conceived by Muslim clerics and funded by Iran
following the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 - Primarily formed to offer resistance to the
Israeli occupation - Listed fully or partly as a terrorist
organisations by certain countries - Receives military training, weapons, and
financial support from Iran, and political
support from Syria
7Current Security Situation
- The latest conflict between Israel and Hezbollah
was the 2006 Lebanon War - 34-day military conflict in Lebanon and northern
Israel - Hezbollah paramilitary forces vs IDF
- Began when Hezbollah kidnapped two IDF soldiers
during a cross-border raid - Killed 1,300 Lebanese citizens (incl. combatants)
and 165 Israelis (incl. soldiers)
8Current Security Situation
- Beginning Jul 2014, Hezbollah has sent
intelligence analysts to Baghdad in support of
the Iranian-led intervention in Iraq. In Mar
2015, Hezbollah was reportedly sending 800 elite
fighters to help recapture Mosul from ISIS. - As of Sep 2014, unconfirmed reports put
Hezbollah's missile arsenal at an estimated
100,000 rockets and 5,000 long-range missile,
covering all of Israel.
9US interest in region
Need for regional control In practice, U.S.
policymakers have sought to walk a line between
maintaining a neutral posture and marginalizing
those in Lebanon who are hostile to the United
States, its interests, and its allies.1 1
https//www.fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/R42816.pdf
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