National Bloc: No to sectarian duos and trios… Yes to Lebanon’s national unilateralism

The “Shiite Duo” is a new-but-old expression that is brought into play today in a revived show of quota allocations, on the incoming government formation banquet. This logic, which proved to have disastrous consequences on our nation, is still finding parties to embrace and promote it!

Sectarian duos and trios that marked decisive turning points in the history of modern Lebanon, and demonstrated their inability to build a full-fledged state:

Starting with the Maronite-Druze duo in the nineteenth century, to the Sunni-Christian duo in 1943, to the Shiite-Christian duo at the Mar Mikhael church, to the Christian-Christian duo in Maarab, in addition of course to trios, such as the Shiite-Maronite-Druze “Tripartite Agreement” in 1985, and the Shiite-Shiite-Sunni-Druze “Quadripartite Alliance” in 2005.

What was understandable in the cultural reality of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century, and what was expected during the sectarian civil war, under the Syrian guardianship over Lebanon, and immediately after its end, is no longer acceptable today, for two reasons:

• These ad hoc and beneficial alliances devastated Lebanon and led to the killing of Lebanese, despite that they allegedly claimed to be protecting the sects.
• The emergence of a cumulative national identity among the Lebanese, which manifested itself, or literally exploded, on October 17 and August 4.

All bipartite and tripartite alliances have fallen apart. Here is the national unilateralism forcing its way through obstacles to build the new Lebanon; the state where citizens, rather than warring sects, live in harmony.

Lebanon’s national unilateralism, arising from October 17 and August 4, is the alternative that will inevitably rise on the remains of their statelets, and their sectarian jungles.