A giant poster of the late Syrian President Hafez al-Assad stood for many years in the Raoucheh area right before Ramlet al-Bayda on the Beirut coast with the caption: “No man can break the divine bond between Lebanon and Syria." The poster was taken down following the departure of the Syrian forces in 2005. It was part of the symbolic dominance of the Hafez and Bashar al-Assad regimes over the Lebanese for thirty years. On the Syrian side, during the 1990s, the state-owned television used to air a show called “Together We Grew," a title quoted from a song by Feyrouz. The show presented thousands of proofs that Lebanon and Syria constitute “one people in two states" (Al-Assad's famous quote), and that the social, cultural, and economic relations are deeply rooted in the mutual Syrian-Lebanese consciousness and sub-consciousness. The Lebanese supporters of Al-Assad returned the favor and came up with the “unity of fate and paths" slogan. Through this term, the Al-Assad supporters clearly expressed their rejection of Lebanon's right to decide on its own foreign politics in agreement with its own interest and sovereignty. In return, they obtained a Syrian continued support for their control over their sects and their shares of the looted public funds under the slogans of the resistance and the anti-Zionist and anti-occupation sentiments. This was a collaborative and cooperative relationship of dominance and monopolization among corrupted and blood-thirsty politicians in the two miserable countries. The winning party in this relationship had to be necessarily the strongest and fiercest party, and the one that is most capable of dictating its will through whatever means and methods. This relationship was consecrated through the “Treaty of Brotherhood, Cooperation and Coordination." The supporters of the Syrian regime are still insisting that this treaty served the Lebanese “interests", knowing that the interpretation and analysis of these interests is a difficult and controversial matter. A lot has happened since that day when the members of the second Lebanese republic went to Damascus to sign the treaty that consolidated the status quo between the Lebanese politicians and the Syrian rulers. The Syrian army left Lebanon and the mechanisms of dominance revealed their true colors through a long series of assassinations, terrorizations, and accusations of disloyalty. Except for the “Hafez al-Assad Obelisk" in Beirut's southern suburbs, the indications of the Syrian dominance were removed from most Lebanese regions while the mechanisms of that dominance remained. The agents that proceeded with the implementation of the Syrian policies in Lebanon are well aware of the meaning of their long dependence on the Syrian regime. They understand the regime's present need for the military assistance provided by the masses of sectarian fighters who are going from Lebanon to the Damascus suburbs and Rif Homs. They also realize that the Syrian regime needs the political and media platforms provided by a large delegation from “national" parties. The delegation listened to Bashar al-Assad's strategic and military explanations and transmitted it to the media. The announcement of the fall of a number of villages surrounding Al-Qoseir near Homs at the hands of Hezbollah's fighters came simultaneously with the meeting between the delegation of the parties and Bashar al-Assad. This was probably not a coincidence, but rather a double indication on the extent of the Lebanese involvement in the Syrian war and the continued dominance of the Syrian regime over the Lebanese political life. One can thus realize the reality of the relation between the Syrian regime and its Lebanese supporters whereby Syrian tyranny would be maintained in return for supporting the Lebanese Resistance. This raises some serious questions on the role of this Resistance and the path that it has been forced to follow since the mid-1980s. The supporters of the Resistance and its “Syrian incubator" are refusing to see that the fighting in Al-Qoseir and the delegations that are congratulating Al-Assad for his victories over his citizens, actually constitute means of taking part in the mad massacre that the thugs perpetrated in the Jdeidat Artouz Al-Fadl, and all the past and future massacres. It is a new form of the “Together We Grew" slogan: “Together We Kill."
