By Antoine Ghattas Saab
Opposition movements in the Arab world are preparing to engage in dialogue with the rulers of tyrannical regimes to discuss transfer of power from these rulers to the people. At the same time, Lebanon seems to be moving in the opposite direction.

Instead of engaging in dialogue, the country is accelerating toward an abyss from which there can be no return. If it falls into this abyss, it will be the result of futile political bickering and a lack of trust between the parties.
Lately there has been talk of once again convening sessions of the National Dialogue Committee. The March 14 bloc has taken a decisive stance against these calls for dialogue. The group believes that the role of these sessions would not be dialogue; rather it would be to cover up March 8’s re-gripping of the reins of power and its control over the country.

March 14 believes that dialogue is not what is needed at the present time, and instead there should be a focus on the dangers of the country being led single-handedly by a political-military party. This party’s main priorities lie in overthrowing the Special Tribunal for Lebanon and what it represents, which is a means to achieving justice by holding those who committed crimes against sovereignty and independence accountable. Thus, the obvious question is whether the tribunal and the indictment that it issued will be at the top of the next dialogue’s agenda.

Between the first round of dialogue called by Speaker Nabih Berri in March 2006 up until the most recent meeting at Baabda Palace after Michel Sleiman’s election as president, it is known that agreement was reached on several issues. Agreement was reached most quickly on the work of the STL, at a session where Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah was present. As for the issue of weapons, debate continues until this day.

Sources close to the president say that at the start of previous dialogues, it should have been identified which weak points could be used by the resistance to distort the role of its arms from what was laid out by a national and Arab consensus. The events of May 7 saw those weapons directed internally, rather than to resist the Israeli enemy, liberate the land and preserve Lebanese dignity.

The 2008 Doha Accord provided a temporary solution to political problems, with parties pledging to refrain from using weapons or violence to achieve immediate political gains. However, security skirmishes continued from the Beirut neighborhood of Aisha Bakkar to the line between Bab al-Tabbaneh and Jabal Mohsen in the north Lebanon coastal city of Tripoli. Dialogue was disrupted again.

Sources close the president have said that an idea is currently being discussed that would mean an expansion of the dialogue roundtable to include figures whose sects were not represented in previous dialogue sessions. This idea is being floated for two reasons: the absence of a senate under which all Lebanese sects fall, and because of an intention to transform dialogue into a permanent political committee that would discuss political, economic, social, military, security and development issues.
The sources were surprised at how Arab regimes, which we used to describe as tyrannical, have approved the principal of dialogue, while here in Lebanon it is being rejected under false pretenses which are devoid of the most basic elements of political realism.

As for former President Amin Gemayel, he has different opinion, which he conveyed to The Daily Star. “First of all, it is necessary to know that six years have passed since the beginning of dialogue and it has made little progress. On the contrary, the situation has remained static,” he said.

“As long as Hezbollah’s stance is dogmatic and it does not accept debate about its arms, it is impossible to reach any result with them,” Gemayel said. “Until now, [Hezbollah] hasn’t submitted its project within the defense strategy as all the others participating did,” he continued, saying that if they had good intentions from the start, Hezbollah would have implemented what they agreed upon in the previous dialogue concerning disarming the Palestinians inside and outside the camps. Most importantly, [they agreed to] move on with the STL, [rather than] … deciding to dispense with it today only because its [indictment] included names of those among its ranks.”