IT WOULD be difficult to imagine a more bitter and tragic irony than the events since 19 May in Lebanon. The Syrian-backed and Muslim Amal militia are carrying out an attack on the Palestinian camps at Sabra and Chatila that is at least equal in scale and ferocity to the massacres in those camps carried out by Israeli-backed Christian militia in September 1982.
The attacks mark another stage in the collapse of the Lebanese central government in the wake of Israeli withdrawal. It is another step by the Syrian regime of president Assad in its attempts to win control of Lebanon.
It shows yet again the cynical disregard of the Arab bourgeois regimes for Palestinian interests. Although the Shite militias fought the Israelis, this attack on the Palestinians demonstrates that they are not a revolutionary or anti-imperialist force. Nabih Berri. the Ama leader and Lebanon justice minister interests. The Palestinians are being attacked, as they were previously utilised, in the interests of Assad's role in a future Middle East settlement.
When the Israelis invaded Lebanon they two aims. First, to break the strength of the PLO. second to estabish a Chmstian- halaneist bro Israeli state. The first was achievable, the second was not.
A christian state no longer corresponds to the military or demographic forces. The main political factor now in Lebanon is Syria.
The Israeli 'withdrawal' to the Awali river -which in reality leaves them in control up to the Litani river — has opened the battle for control of Lebanon. This struggle, given the decisive weakening of the Christian forces, is concentrated on the issue of who controls West Beirut which is mainly Muslim. bund musums. 1ne raesunlans noweyer nave been building up their forces in Lebanen over the past few months.
They represented a threat to the Amal forces, hence the attack on the camps. The Assad regime has an interest in ensuring that no section Lebanon assumes dominance. It wants a divided client state, that will ensure Syria's place amongst the Arab bourgeoisie in future negotiations. crisis in Lebanon, with shifting alliances by Syria between Shites, militias will continue.
The losers in all this are the Palestinians. Arafat's policy of relying on Arab bourgeoisie for the adyancement of the Palestinian cause has ensured that the PLO has once again entered a blind alley. I Is surely me crowning holy or tat sluation that the anti-Arafat Palestinians around Abu Musu, whose aiternative was the alliance with the Syrian regime, have been as much under attack as the pro-Arafat wing in the camps.
Syria's Shiite clients have their own interests as well. The result has been that the pro-Syrian faction has also been forced to fight for its life. The conclusion must be that the choice of alliances between bourgeois Arab regimes is no choice. For the Palestinians. unless their fundamental interests are placed above those of the ruling groups in those regues, aere will be no victory.
represents bourgeois nationalist had balance of The Shite Amal has pushed back the in The Druze and Maronite christian to ject