The issues of the international community addressing Iran's challenging of Security Council Resolutions concerning the nuclear issue and of the international community dealing with Israel's obstinacy in insisting on illegal settlement-building, at odds with UN Resolutions, are intertwined. Indeed, the five permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany have moved this week to the phase of discussing the core and elements of a draft resolution to reinforce sanctions against Iran, after China gradually advanced towards such a group stance, driven by the Islamic Republic of Iran which spurned its help in avoiding a resolution involving sanctions. At the same time, elements of a draft resolution about Israeli settlement-building have begun to find their way backstage at the Security Council, in light of indications and hints to the fact that the US Administration will not prevent such a resolution from passing through the use of its right of veto. The reason behind the signs of American and European willingness to hold Israel accountable includes perhaps a new kind of language that condemns and threatens with sanctions on two fronts: the first is connected to the embarrassment and the anger aroused by Benjamin Netanyahu's government of the US Administration and the international community, which has adopted resolutions against settlement-building, supported the two-state solution and asserted the necessity of not taking measures on the ground that would predetermine the form of the permanent solution; the second is connected to international insistence on informing the regime in Tehran that the international community has resolved to issue a resolution to sanction it, without affording it the pretext to direct accusations of using double standards when it comes to Israel. This is a valuable point and a good performance is necessary when using it at the Arab level on the international scene. Indeed, the matter should not be left at the level of “feeling the pulse” at the level of delegates at the United Nations, but Arab Foreign Ministries should in fact rather lay down their view in addition to a comprehensive, careful and smart strategy, so as not to waste such an opportunity. Indeed, if the Security Council were to adopt a qualitative resolution towards Israel on the issue of settlement-building on occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem, it would not merely be a passing resolution but rather an American, European and international stance of the utmost importance on the path of pressuring the Israeli government to awaken it to the necessity of being truthful with regard to the two-state solution. Work on the basis of emphasizing the links between issuing a resolution that would awaken Iran to the necessity of accepting the carrot being extended to it by the 5+1 group of countries and a resolution over Israeli settlement-building has a clear and common rule, namely: that the international community will not be able to ignore Israel trampling UN Resolutions and international legitimacy by moving forward with its illegal settlement-building at a time when it is heading towards a resolution to strengthen sanctions against Iran under the pretext that it is refusing to implement UN Resolutions. The countries that seek to play a role in the two issues – apart from the permanent members of the Security Council – view the relation between the issue of Iran and that of Israel from their own perspectives, concepts and interests. Brazil for example has entered the track with both Israel and Iran in a manner filled with confusion, whereas Turkey has entered it with a policy that serves its own strategic ends. Both of them speak the language of negotiating a settlement with Iran as if they were “inventing the wheel”, knowing that the offer of the 5+1 is the negotiation of a deal based on enticement, even through sanctioning. Both countries maintain special relationships with Israel that have nothing to do with verbal escalation or outbidding, such as that engaged in by the Turkish Prime Minister at the Arab Summit in Sirt when he spoke of Jerusalem. The powerlessness of the Arabs has in some cases reached hopeless degrees, yet this does not cancel out clever Arab stances, the latest being that which built on the disagreement between the US and Europe on one hand and Israel on the other to cleverly avoid disrupting the disagreement and allowing Israel an outlet through random action. What could benefit the Arab stance on Jerusalem today is not just endeavoring to provide every kind of financial assistance and to gather every international stance, but also taking qualitatively bold decisions. One such decision could take the shape of a campaign to encourage Arabs to visit Jerusalem and to revoke the local laws of Arab countries that forbid their citizens from visiting the occupied Palestinian territories, considering them to be “Israeli”. Faisal Al-Husseini, a true son of Jerusalem, has cried out more than once, repeatedly telling the Arabs: come to Jerusalem in order to save it. He said: walk in our streets, sleep at our hotels, eat at our restaurants, speak our language, and, yes, suffer with us from the humiliation of the measures taken by the occupation. But come to Jerusalem in order to save it. Such a decision does not need to be issued by Arab Summits like the Sirt Summit, but should rather be issued by Arab capitals as a group, as part of a popular civil campaign aimed not so much at civil disobedience as at civil strengthening of Jerusalem's inhabitants, so that they may save it. Iran and Turkey's exaggeration in outbidding the Arabs on the issue of Jerusalem has become quite plain, as they both resort to it as a banner to gather popular support behind them and to emphasize Arabs powerlessness with the aim of replacing the Arabs on the issue of Jerusalem. Furthermore, both Iran and Turkey brandish the Palestinian cause and particularly the issue of Jerusalem in order to turn the attention away from the domestic challenges they face in their own countries, whether it be the struggle of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's Islamist government against Turkish secularism or the Kurds, or the struggle of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's rule against reformists and dissenters in Iran. However, Turkey and Iran's roles are not limited to the Palestinian issue, but rather stretch deeply in Iraq, through Syria and up to Lebanon. Iran's role in both Iraq and Syria exceeds manifold that of Turkey, no matter how much Turkey feels that its proximity and coordination with Syria in Iraq will bring it tremendous profit. Yet what could be gradually putting an end to Iranian influence in Iraq is the arrogance of the regime in Tehran, as it insults the Iraqis by summoning Iraqi leaders who rush there seeking after power and standing in the new Iraqi government. They are reminiscent of Lebanon's leaders in the time when they were completely subjected to neighboring Syria, before its military withdrawal from Lebanon. Iran is behaving as if it had nothing to worry about from what is happening in Iraq, with Syria and in Lebanon, whereas the opposite is true. Indeed, in Iraq, the elections brought forth a result that is nearly another “defeat” for the Iranian regime, in the wake of its defeat in Lebanon's elections then in the elections in Iran which signaled the start of the uprising against it. This is why it is openly interfering and trying to assert its maintained influence by summoning Iraqi leaders to Tehran in order to form the new Iraqi government in the Iranian capital. The Iranian leadership is also pretending not to be interested in the convergence between Turkey and Syria and in Syria's role in Iraq, but it is in fact disgruntled and worried about the perspectives of this relationship in Iraq, in the Gulf and in Lebanon. In Lebanon, there are those who rail at a noteworthy development of Syria's relationship with Hezbollah, not in the direction of consolidation but rather in that of different priorities and a different “agenda”. And since the relationship between Iran and Hezbollah is nearly organic whereas that between Syria and Iran falls under tactics and strategy, it is necessary to monitor the details of this relationship. The talk of the town in Lebanon these days is robbing people of sleep due to hearsay, speculations and fears from acts of revenge against decisions connected to the international Special Tribunal for Lebanon to prosecute those implicated in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafic Hariri and his companions or in any of the other political assassinations proven by the investigation to be connected to that of Hariri. To begin with, it must be said that if the hypothesis proves true that Israel or the United States were involved in the assassination with the aim of implicating Syria and Hezbollah and of destabilizing Lebanon – as many of those close to Hezbollah and some of those loyal to Syria in Lebanon say – then we should welcome the Special Tribunal instead of opposing, doubting and threatening it if it were to issue formal accusations and of pledging not to deal and cooperate with it. Nevertheless, more important is the talk originating from those loyal to both Hezbollah and Syria, which brings the country into a vortex of guesses, predictions and threats of another May 7 in case the Special Tribunal were to issue formal accusations against Hezbollah members. Such recurrent talk is harmful to Hezbollah, as it originates from people loyal to the party, because it holds anticipated incrimination of it merely from investigators asking to interrogate Hezbollah members. Even if they are later interrogated as suspects rather than as witnesses, issuing a formal accusation does not constitute a conviction, but merely an accusation from which suspects can be cleared, if they are innocent, in court. Secretary-General of Hezbollah Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah spoke well in his latest interview, saying “we are concerned with knowing the truth as are the Lebanese people, we are cooperating to confront deception in the investigation, for the memory of Hariri and for the truth, and we accept the rule of trust” and asserting that “so far, none of our members has been called in on the basis of accusation, but this might happen in the future”. It is true that he said “we will not remain silent if we find that we are facing any political accusation or accusations in the media”, but he has the right to do so, as any formal accusation must be judicial, not political or in the media. All of this will remain in the framework of reports and conclusions as long as General Prosecutor Daniel Bellemare has not even issued formal accusations, either because he does not hold the minimum of evidence necessary, or because he is frustrated due to instructions from higher parties within the United Nation and outside of it, or because he is not qualified in the first place and refuses to confess his ineptitude and thus avoids doing the least he can do which is to talk to two out of the three who have investigated this costly atrocious crime, or because the formula of stability ahead of justice has triumphed. What is important today is to stop scare-mongering, threatening and suggesting Lebanese civil wars when this phase requires focusing on how to receive what rights can be obtained and to support the Palestinians under occupation, far from regional outbidding.
