Re-Imaging the Lebanon Track: Toward a New U.S. Policy


Executive Summary

In the Century Foundation report entitled “Re-Imaging the Lebanon Track: Toward a New U.S. Policy,” Beirut-based political analyst Nicholas Noe argues that, contrary to conventional wisdom, a viable roadmap for disarming Hizbullah through domestic peace-building exists within Lebanon itself—and that it should be pursued vigorously by the Obama administration.

Recognizing the deep challenges confronting both a Syrian-Israeli peace agreement as well as any “grand bargain” between the United States and Iran, Noe suggests these efforts can and should be explored concurrent with US-led efforts in Lebanon, but that the prospects for failure on both tracks, as well as the fast approaching elections this summer, means a new, Lebanon-focused policy is needed in the immediate term.

Based on his reading of Hizbullah and the multitude of limitations it faces, Noe concludes that Obama administration policymakers can better serve U.S. and Lebanese interests by breaking with their predecessors’ inflexible, often needlessly aggressive, approach.

Instead, he urges that they work toward undermining the rationale Hizbullah relies upon to justify its independent weaponry by driving a wedge between it and its vital political alliances and soft supporters across the spectrum of Lebanon’s confessional system. To do this, Noe suggests the following steps:...

View the full Executive Summary and Webcast - released December 10, 2008 - at: http://www.tcf.org/list.asp?type=EV&pubid=243