Ever since the first quarter of the nineteenth century, Lebanon's political life has been blackened by inescapable and destructive sectarianism that was institutionalized by edict of regional and great power rivalries. To find a solution to Lebanon's conflict it is necessary to take an unflinching look at mistakes and successes in the past. Nostalgia for a Lebanon that never truly existed must cease.
For centuries, Lebanon provided refuge for religious communities - including the Maronite Catholics, Druzes, and Shiite Muslims - seeking to avoid persecution. The emergence of Lebanon as a separate state can be traced back to the establishments of a principality on Mount Lebanon in the sixteenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries, a secular Druze-Maronite princedom existed.
Not until the 1820s did the communal problem become a dominant aspect of Lebanese life its emergence was partly due to socioeconomic factors but mainly to the existence of great power rivalry. As part of its effort to gain control of "geographical" Syria (present-day Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan), France aligned itself with the Maronite Catholics, whereas the British supported the Druzes. In 1841 the great powers, who had become the determinant force in the region, joined with the Ottomans to end the principality, cantonize Mount Lebanon and establish the first governing councils based on religious affiliation. Thus, whatever prospect existed for the reemergence of a secular prince to rule the whole of Mount Lebanon was eliminated by great power interference.
Following the Allied defeat of the Ottomans during World War I, France supported the Maronite plan for a Greater Lebanon in 1920 under a French protectorate gave Maronites, who believed it was their destiny to rule the whole country, the opportunity to attach toi Mount Lebanon (where Maronites were concentrated) the economically vital areas that surrounded it. This included the mostly Sunni Mediterranean coastal region, including Beirut, Tripoli, Sidon, and Tyre as well as the northern Akkar Plain, the mainly Shiite south, and the fertile Bekaa Valley to the east.
Although Maronites as their realization of dream greeted the creation of Greater Lebanoin, in the long run the inclusion into Greater Lebanon of large numbers of Sunni and Shiite Muslims dampened the prospects of Lebanon's ever becoming a politically unified nation.
Yet Lebanese unity did develop, as a means of ending French imperial control. With crucial British backing, Lebanese of all communities came together to throw off French rule and establish a sovereign and independent state under the National Pact of 1943.
In essence, the National Pact reaffirmed the sectarian idea that the Maronites should exercise predominant authority over Lebanon. But Maronite Leader Beshara Khouri and Sunni leader Riad Solh also agreed the Lebanon (1) had an Arab face and was an integral part of the Arab world, (2) had special characteristics that obliged it not to cut its ties with the West, and (3) needed to maintain equilibrium in its relations between the Arab world and the West.
The National Pact ensured that the president would always be a Maronite Catholic, the prime minister a Sunni, and the speaker of the Chamber of Deputies a Shiite.
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