The young man said in a triumphant tone, “look at America leaving Iraq humiliated. It has paid a steep price for the adventure of occupation. Today, the U.S. dares not request permanent or temporary bases. Its sole ambition is to complete its withdrawal quickly. The sacrifices of the resistance fighters did not go in vain. Young men with limited capabilities have faced the mightiest force on earth”. I felt that it is the right of any citizen in any country to express his joy at the departure of a force that was occupying his land. I expressed my hope that the departure of the occupation would be an opportunity for Iraq to catch its breath and focus on rebuilding what was destroyed in years of occupation and infighting. I said that the time has come for the resistance fighters to return to a normal life. However, he quickly replied, “if only it were so. We have completed one stage of resistance but we will now begin another. We did not fight the U.S. occupation only for us to accept Iranian hegemony on our country. We drove the Americans out and we shall also drive out the Iranian control over our decisions”. I was intrigued by these words and I felt that I needed to inquire more. So I asked him how this Iranian hegemony will be driven out and he said, “through resistance and military operations against this hegemony and its symbols. News of this will not take long to reach you. We will never be lenient with those who facilitated the American invasion and who now stand under the Iranian umbrella. Every violator of the sovereignty of Iraq is an enemy for the resistance. Iran has also facilitated the invasion of Iraq, which it started to infiltrate to secure the largest possible slice of the cake for itself, as if Iraq's land is up for grabs and can be distributed among major powers and neighboring countries”. The young man said that the new operations do not mean starting a civil war. He noted that the discontent with the Iranian influence is also present in Shiite areas and is likely to rise. He pointed out that in recent years, there has been rapprochement with Syria over common interests, especially as the latter sought to thwart the U.S. invasion for its own calculations. He also stressed that divergence with Syria is very clear today “because of its alliance with Iran, from Tehran to Beirut”. The young man mocked all talk that claims “that Iran may lose Syria but that it shall have compensation for this in Iraq. No one has the right to grant influence on Iraqi land. We are a difficult country. The Iranians will discover this not long from now”. The young Iraqi talk reinforces the belief that difficult days in Iraq have not come to an end in spite of the occupation's withdrawal. The calls for the creation of autonomous regions in some Sunni-majority provinces tell us that Sunni-Shiite relations are likely to see more tension and that the divisions with regard to the relationship with Iran only fuel the fire of internal division over the distribution of powers and posts. This Iraqi clash is taking place not far from the fire emanating from the escalating crisis in Syria, a crisis that can be understood in part in light of the winds of the Arab Spring. However, a closer examination of the Syrian complexities prompts one to realize that they too cannot be taken in isolation from the sectarian tensions in the region and the conflict over the limits of the Iranian role therein. For this reason, one can say that many wars are converging over the Syrian arena: The war for change within Syria, the war for Syria's position in the region, and the war for Iran's position in the region, as well as that of precluding it from crossing from Syria to the shores of Beirut. On the other side of the Syrian fire, the intensity of conflicts in Lebanon is on the rise. Many battles overlap on this country's territories: The battle for the International Tribunal, the battle for illegal weapons, the battle for Lebanon's position and stance on the Syrian crisis and the Iranian influence in Lebanon. Just like the Iraqis are divided over internal affairs and the relationship with Iran and Syria, the Lebanese are divided as well. Everything suggests that we are well on our way to see many wars.
