Deadly days in Lebanon

BEIRUT, Lebanon - The string of bombings that has rocked Lebanon in recent days could be even more destabilizing than the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

After Hariri's killing on Feb. 14, there was a political effort to bring the Lebanese opposition and pro-Syrian forces together. But today, Lebanon is more polarized than it has been since the end of a 15-year civil war in 1990. The country is politically paralyzed, with the opposition refusing to join a new government that is supposed to oversee parliamentary elections in May.

Opposition leaders blame the Syrian-backed Lebanese security services for three bombings over eight days in mainly Christian areas around Beirut. They say the attacks are intended to spread fear, rekindle sectarian violence between Christians and Muslims, and renew demands for Syrian troops to stay in Lebanon.

"We're seeing a scorched-earth policy," said Gebran Tueni, a Maronite Christian leader and publisher of Beirut's An-Nahar newspaper. "The Syrians don't want to leave Lebanon without destroying it."

The latest bombing took place Saturday night in an industrial suburb of Beirut, injuring five people and setting off a huge fire that damaged six factories. In the two earlier attacks, on March 19 and Wednesday, three people were killed and at least 10 were wounded.

Syria and its Lebanese allies deny any involvement in the bombings, or in Hariri's assassination. A United Nations report released last week said it could not assign direct blame for Hariri's killing, but it noted that the Syrian government "bears primary responsibility for the political tension that preceded the assassination."

Hariri's killing heightened international pressure on Syria to withdraw its 14,000 troops and hundreds of intelligence agents from Lebanon. About 4,000 soldiers left Lebanon earlier this month, and the rest are expected to depart by the end of April. But the Syrian regime is also under pressure to end its political domination of its smaller neighbor.

The UN report quoted Hariri's aides as saying that Syrian President Bashar Assad had threatened him during their last meeting in Damascus, the Syrian capital, in August. The report said Assad warned Hariri and opposition leader Walid Jumblatt that they would face "physical harm" if they did not agree to extend the term of the Syrian-backed Lebanese president, Emile Lahoud.

Assad told Hariri that he "would rather break Lebanon over the heads of Hariri and Jumblatt than see his word in Lebanon broken," the report said.

Syrian officials deny that Hariri was threatened, but opposition leaders have latched onto the report as evidence that Syria is orchestrating the bombings as part of a campaign to destabilize Lebanon.

"There is a political decision to create a security crisis in the country," said George Hawi, an opposition member of parliament and former leader of the Lebanese Communist Party. "This is intended as an excuse to delay the elections and keep Syrian troops here."

Already, some Syrian allies in the Lebanese government have warned that the Lebanese army may not be able to fill the void created by the departure of Syrian troops. Defense Minister Abdul-Rahim Murad warned Friday that Lebanon might not have enough troops to adequately protect the eastern Bekaa Valley, which makes up a third of Lebanese territory. Lebanon has about 68,000 active troops.

"The Bekaa needs a lot of military forces," Murad told reporters, hinting that Syrian troops may still be needed. The region is strategic for both Lebanon and Syria's security because parts of it border Israel.

Opposition leaders insist that the Lebanese military will be able to defend the country once it is freed from Syria's grip. The opposition has also demanded the resignation of the heads of Lebanon's five intelligence and security agencies because they failed to protect Hariri and botched the investigation into his killing, according to the UN report.

All three bombings have taken place at night in busy commercial areas, apparently designed to send a message to the anti-Syrian opposition but not to cause mass casualties. Yet each explosion has been more powerful than the previous one, and Lebanese wonder how long it might be before other bombings are carried out during the day and in Muslim areas.

"I'm afraid that in the next stage, the attacks will happen during the day and will kill many more people," Hawi said.

The bombings have further weakened the Lebanese economy, which was already reeling from Hariri's assassination. Most of the restaurants and cafes in Beirut's once-bustling downtown are empty, and there is little traffic in the city's glitzy shopping districts.

The attacks also cast doubt on whether parliamentary elections will be held as scheduled in May. The Bush administration has warned the Lebanese and Syrian governments that elections must not be delayed, but the deteriorating security situation could make it difficult to hold the balloting.

Made up of Christian, Sunni Muslim and Druze political parties, the opposition currently holds 43 seats in the 128-member parliament, but it expects to win a majority in the next election. Its biggest competitor is likely to be an alliance of pro-Syrian parties headed by Hezbollah, a Shia Muslim group.

Opposition leaders dismiss fears that the recent bombings could rekindle the type of sectarian conflict in Lebanon that led to the civil war, which pitted Christian militias and the Lebanese army against Palestinian groups and militias from the country's Muslim majority. The war - in which nearly 150,000 people were killed - was fueled with arms and money provided by Syria, Iran, Israel and other regional powers.

The war ended with a peace deal that redistributed power among a Maronite president, Sunni prime minister and Shia speaker of parliament. As part of that agreement, the Syrian military was supposed to guarantee security and disarm militias.

"As long as there is no foreign interference in Lebanon," Hawi said, "there is no danger of civil war."