The Greek Orthodox community in Lebanon is being subjected to great injustice by having its name tied to a draft electoral law, in which it has neither stakes nor interests, and by virtue of which each confessional community would vote for its own Members of Parliament. This community is thus suffering injustice twice, having as a sect never carried any plans of its own in Lebanon, and having had its name hijacked and associated with plans that have seemed suspicious since their inception. It is no coincidence for those who put forward this draft law and who most enthusiastically advocate and strongly support it today to be affiliated with the March 8 Alliance – which reveals the identity of the party that suggested it and reveals that it had from the start amounted to political procrastination by this party, within the framework of continuing to sow sectarian division in the country, and of course not in order to rectify popular representation in Parliament. The name of the draft law became attached to the sectarian affiliation of the person who initially put it forward, and who is one of the most enthusiastic defenders of Syria's policy in Lebanon and of Lebanon's pro-Syrian political faction. Hezbollah and the Amal Movement claim to support the draft law under the pretext of being in favor of what the Christians want – Christians whose presence in Lebanon the Shiite duo summed up in their ally Michel Aoun. Yet at the same time, they realize that such a law would make their hegemony over the votes of the Shiite community eternal, and would prevent the emergence of any other political force within their sect. This draft law would thus in fact pave the way for sustainable political hegemony over the country, and not for rectifying the representation of any of the country's sectarian communities in Parliament. As for General Aoun, he will never find a law with a greater impact than this one in terms of dividing the country and fragmenting it under the pretext of defending the Christians. Other draft laws that have been put forward also aim at reinforcing the political influence of those who have proposed them, and will not meet the real needs of building a state for citizens in Lebanon – a notion exposed to the most serious threat it has faced since the establishment of Greater Lebanon. Indeed, the matter is not one of electoral technicalities and articles of the law, but rather essentially one of rearranging the Lebanese mosaic in a single piece, after it has been shattered, with each of its colors now in a different corner. The Christians may well be the ones most sensitive to this reality. And with developments in the region being accompanied by a rise of confessional fundamentalisms, such sensitivity is increasing. An expression of this has been the stance taken by Maronite Patriarch Bechara Al-Rahi of siding with dictatorial regimes under the pretext that they protect minorities, and among them the Christians. Thus Christians in Lebanon began producing numerous electoral laws of their own, in hopes that they would help them preserve some of what they still have. The marginalization of Christians in Lebanon has been tied to what the country has come to under Syrian hegemony, before and after, as well as to the imbalance of power at every level with the country's other sects, especially the Shiites. Thus, any attempt to correct such an equation on a sectarian basis will necessarily clash with the new gains achieved by other sects. Indeed, as long as the discussion, whether regarding the draft electoral law or any other issue, is about sectarian representation and sectarian shares, the Christians will certainly be the losers, for a simple reason – the fact that they no longer hold the means to defend their own share. And it would be foolish to believe that the others, regardless of the sugar-coated language that issues from them for political goals, could be the guarantors of such a share on the long run. Christians in Lebanon have no choice but to depart from the logic of sectarian shares to that of citizens' rights, and to move from the phase of political cohabitation to that of citizenship. And this means redoubling efforts to start working on a national project addressing all Lebanese, and aiming at saving the nation and its citizens, rather than a sectarian share here or another there. It is true that Hezbollah's political and military hegemony, as well as the obscurity surrounding the future of the Syrian regime and of the developments of confessional tensions in the region, represent some of the main obstacles facing communication between all Lebanese and the launching of a project that would be successful across the sectarian spectrum. Yet a great many of the Lebanese wish to find a place for themselves within the framework of citizenship and outside that of sectarian shares, as well as to liberate themselves from the hegemony of fundamentalisms.
