Mick Hartley

An informative post at Quillette on The Fall of Beirut, from Art Keller – looking at the country's dysfunctional politics, and, in particular, at Hezbollah and its stranglehold over Lebanese life:

Hezbollah gets away with murder, both literally and metaphorically, without having to ensure Lebanon has effective governance. To the extent it has acknowledged any responsibility, it was to provide social services to its largely Shia constituency, which put a sheen of legitimacy on top of its terror, drug/gun running, money laundering, and corruption. Somewhere along the path to expansion, Hezbollah became a victim of its own success at accumulating power. It metastasized into the ultimate parasite, so fat on the blood it has sucked out of its host it can barely act, while the body politic it has drained is likewise paralyzed into immobility.

But just because Hezbollah won’t allow real government reform doesn’t mean the stasis and dysfunction it has created can be maintained.

And Nasrallah may not be the only person in Lebanon pondering the “good old days.” As filmmaker David Lewis, whose documentary on Hezbollah aired on PBS’s Frontline, said in a phone interview: “I’ve heard from a Lebanese friend, a former militia fighter, that some of the old-style militias from the civil war are beginning to form again. Which is scary. He said ‘It feels like it did before the civil war. Tribes, sects, are arming themselves again, because the state couldn’t protect them.’”

The Beirut explosion has just exposed what was already obvious: Lebanon is now a failed state.