Random Thoughts from Lebanon

I have been somewhat negligent lately - nothing posted since 28 May, the day that the new president was elected. Now, today, more than seven weeks after the Doha Agreement was signed, we finally have the promised National Unity Government formed. Having seen the bickering and bargaining that has gone on for the last 30 days I cannot see how it is ever going to manage to achieve anything - personally I do not expect anything controversial to be discussed, much less there to be any agreement and action on such issues. The best that we can hope for is a period of calm and, perhaps, the passing into law of the new electoral law, the general terms of which were agreed in Doha. As usual, we shall see!

Following is a list of ministers making up Lebanon’s new cabinet:
Prime Minister: Fouad Saniora
Finance Ministry: Mohammed Shatah
Justice Ministry: Ibarahim Najjar
Social Affairs Ministry: Mario Aoun
Industry Ministry:Ghazi Zoaiter
Tourism Ministry: Elie Marouni
Culture Ministry: Tamam Salam
Environment Ministry: Tony Karam
Deputy Prime Minister : Issam abou Jamra
Defense Ministry: Elias Murr
Ministers of State: Wael Abou Faour, Nassib Lahoud, Jean Ogassapian, Ali Qanso, Khaled Qabani
Refugees Ministry: Raymond Audi
Administrative Reforms Ministry: Ibrahim Shamseddine
Economy and Trade Ministry: Mohammed Safadi
Interior and Municipalities Ministry: Ziad Baroud
Youth and Sport: Talal Arslan
Education Ministry: Bahia Hariri
Transport and Public Buildings Ministry: Ghazi Aridi
Foreign Affairs Ministry: Fawzi Salloukh
Energy and Water Ministry: Alain Taborian
Labor Ministry: Mohammed Fneish
Health Ministry: Mohammed Jawad Khalife
Agriculture Ministry: Elie Skaff
Telecommunications Ministry: Gebran Bassil
Information Ministry: Tareq Mitri

Now the president can leave for the Euro-Med conference in Paris tomorrow - he had been threatening not to attend if the government was not formed before he was due to leave. It might prove an interesting meeting, the attendees including Israeli Prime Minister Olmert and Turkish Prime Minister Ergodan. The latter is actively involved in indirect negotiations between Syria and Israel and Israel has indicated that it would like to bring Lebanon into the peace discussions. Of course, the biggest problem with regard to Israeli-Lebanon peace is the fate of the approximately 400,000 Palestinian refugees in the country. Most of these are 1948 refugees or their descendants and no one seriously expects that they are going to return to their homes in what is now and will remain the State of Israel. Equally, their permanent settlement and naturalisation in Lebanon is fraught with issues; since most are Sunni Muslims the fragile sectarian balance would be seriously changed and, publicly at least, no politician is prepared to accept this.