The question posed to most observers and those concerned with public affairs is: What comes after the reconciliation carried out by Syrian Vice President Abdel Halim Khaddam between the President of the Republic, General Emile Lahoud, on the one hand, and the heads of Parliament and the government, Nabih Berri and Rafik Hariri, on the other? Did this reconciliation return the relationship to what it is supposed to be? It should include cooperation and coordination at the level of the authorities, after the major crisis that occurred in the past days between Lahoud and both Berri and Hariri.
Political sources close to the atmosphere of the Baabda meeting that took place the day before yesterday do not believe that the differences ended at the doors of Baabda Palace after the five hours of discussions between the three presidents in the presence of Khaddam and Major General Kanaan. These sources add - according to information - that despite the extreme secrecy about the atmosphere of the meeting, it appears that this The relationship needs a period of testing before giving a final answer on the direction that Lahoud’s relations with Berri and Hariri will take, and for this reason the sources specify four main stations in the coming days to know the “compass” of these relations, which are:
- The President of the Republic’s meeting today with both the Speakers of Parliament and the Government.
- The direction that the discussions of the Cabinet session will take tomorrow afternoon, Thursday.
- The three presidents dealt with participating in the memory of the late Syrian President Hafez al-Assad next Sunday in Qardaha, starting with how they will move separately or whether they will move together.
- The issue of opening the special session for which a decree was issued, starting next Monday, and in extension to the date for completing the discussion of the budget sessions.
Political sources believe that these stations are a vital area for testing intentions, and therefore these stations will be a period for testing presidential relations.
} What happened before Khaddam came? }
Amid this ongoing murky atmosphere in the relations of those in power, the other question raised is: Where would these relations have reached if Khaddam and the Syrian delegation had not come to Beirut to contain the presidential crisis?
A parliamentary source familiar with the course of affairs says that the dispute between Lahoud and Hariri is not a new element, but rather a renewed element, and the talk about the “chemistry” not having the right rhythm between them is old, new talk, and therefore the points of disagreement are multiple and exist in the Council of Ministers and outside it.
The new element in this crisis - according to the aforementioned source - is the state of tension that appeared and took on the character of intensity between the first and second presidencies, which has multiple causes, but the apparent nature of this crisis has emerged in the recent period through two main issues, which are: the phenomenon of sources that did not protect President Berri from a harsh attack. During which the harshest accusations and expressions were used, and the phenomenon of dealing with the second presidency with a kind of marginalization, and it became clear, as the source says, that these people wanted to “surround” President Berri through the campaign launched against him because he gave an unlimited date for the general parliamentary session before the issuance of the special session decree. Although Berri used the phrase “if the extraordinary session opens.”
(Berry, Hariri, and the tightening process)
In answer to the question about the direction that the relationship between Lahoud and both Berri and Hariri would have taken, the same source says that President Berri was not planning to visit Baabda Palace on the weekly date of this visit - that is, today, Wednesday - while Prime Minister Hariri wanted to open an extraordinary session quickly, and that His visit to Baabda was scheduled to take place this week, and the source adds that in light of this crisis that prevailed before Khaddam’s visit, the House of Representatives was expected to be an arena for political conflict, as was the Council of Ministers, albeit in a different way. The source goes on to say that personal and political relations were sharply tense between the presidents before Khaddam came to Beirut, and even less than an hour before the start of the Syrian mediation, and the source indicates that the atmosphere of Presidents Berri and Hariri before they reached the time of the invitation to lunch in Baabda at about eleven o’clock before noon the day before yesterday, Monday, was still Tensioned, and therefore, until a few minutes after Khaddam's invitation to lunch, Speaker Berri was not in the mood to go to Baabda for the weekly meeting, and Prime Minister Hariri was about to visit the Republican Palace, but he wanted to open an extraordinary session quickly, and so he sent the session's decree to Baabda.
The source adds that in light of this atmosphere, the Syrian Vice President moved towards Beirut, and the atmosphere began to move towards relaxation, and thus invitations to lunch arrived for Presidents Berri and Hariri, and it was natural for neither president to reject Khaddam’s invitation, but the only thing that changed in the form was that everyone moved together. To Baabda, and after the atmosphere indicated that Khaddam moved on the first trip to the Republican Palace to meet the President of the Republic, and then Berri and Hariri moved to Baabda. The source does not rule out that President Berri was behind this change in appearance with the aim of sending a message towards Baabda Palace, to the effect that: “Abu Jamal” was the one who wanted this visit to take place
In any case, the parliamentary source considers that what happened led to the relief of the tension that had prevailed in the relationship between Presidents Berri and Hariri, but correcting this relationship and returning it to its normal course requires many tests, starting with the stations that will be witnessed this week and next week, and does not end with the issue of the view of the agencies. Security, and what is being talked about in terms of the political roles of some, all the way to the issue of eavesdropping and the information raised around it, the most recent of which was expressed by Representative Basem Al-Sabaa in the House of Representatives session last week.
