The Mehlis Report, otherwise known as the Report of the International Independent Investigation Commission charged with investigating the murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri on Feb. 14 of this year, indicated that high-level Syrian officials and their agents in Lebanon were behind the assassination. I posted a brief entry on it when it was published; this post is the more in-depth analysis I promised.

Following the report, the United Nations renewed Detlev Mehlis’ mandate, and the investigation continues. Today Al-Sharq al-Awsat had two articles indicating that the pressure on Syria continues to accumulate. One, “Lebanon: Two of the Arrested Generals Confess (Arabic),” reports that two of the four Lebanese generals arrested at Mehlis’ behest have admitted to being involved in the murder of Hariri. The other article, “UN Summons Syrian Officers in Hariri Probe (English),” reports that Mehlis is now demanding that six Syrian officials come to Lebanon to be questioned by him there, including Syrian President Bashar Assad’s brother-in-law, who is head of Syrian military intelligence. The article indicates that Syria has not responded yet, but has said resisted having officials interviewed outside the country before. Al-Hayat is reporting the same, as well as the fact that Syria has begun its own “investigation” into the Hariri killing.

This post will summarize some of the key evidence implicating the Syrian government in Hariri’s murder (for those who don’t want to read the report themselves), and then offer some analysis of the situation from here. Here are the key evidentiary points from the Mehlis Report:

• The report suggests, without concluding, that Hariri’s assassination was linked to a series of 12 assassination attempts against Lebanese opponents (apparently; the target is not clear in every case) of Syria following Feb. 14, including the nearly successful assassination of journalist May Chidiac.
• There is widespread fear among the Lebanese population that after this investigation goes away, if the Syrian regime survives, they will come back and exact revenge on their opponents in Lebanon.
• The weight of evidence from both witnesses and taped conversations indicates that in a meeting on Aug. 26, 2004, Syrian President Bashar Assad demanded that Hariri accept the extension of the term of Syria’s puppet (Emil Lahoud) or else Assad would “‘break Lebanon over your head and ÄDruze leaderÅ Walid Jumblatt’s.’” Hariri is reported to have said after that he was told that if he opposed continued Syrian control, he would “pay a high price.” (pp. 5-6)
• On Feb. 1, just two weeks before the murder, Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Walid Al-Moallem is recorded on a taped conversation telling Hariri that “‘we and the services here have put you into a corner. Please do not take things lightly.” (p. 9)
• Syrian witnesses resident in Lebanon testified that the decision was made to kill Hariri two weeks after the UN Security Council adopted a resolution demanding that Syria withdraw last fall. (p. 29)
• The white Mitsubishi van used to carry the explosives which killed Hariri was driven across the Lebanese border from Syria by a Syrian colonel. (p. 29)
• The terrorist who appeared on a tape claiming responsibility for the murder was just a decoy, was forced make the tape at gunpoint, and was later killed in Syria. (p. 29)
• The operation used special explosives which had at that point only been used in Iraq by Islamic groups in order to deflect attention. (p. 30)
• Hariri’s movements were monitored for months prior to the attack in order to time the attack precisely. (p. 38)
• Overall conclusion: the murder of Rafiq Hariri could not have taken place without the knowledge and consent of high-ranking Syrian and Lebanese military and intelligence officials.

Ammar Abdulhamid, writing for a Lebanese newspaper, framed Assad’s choices well (“Bashar Assad’s Moment of Truth is Now“):

On Monday, the United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1636 calling on the Syrian authorities to cooperate more fully with the UN probe into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Although the final version of the resolution failed to include sanctions, the possibility of “further action” and of sanctions being imposed against particular individuals in the regime was left open…

…Assad has had a tin ear whenever faced with such advice Äto engage in political reform and open up Syrian societyÅ, despite the fact that events continue to justify how sound it is. What does this tell us about the president? Is he really a closet reformer waiting for just the right moment, as some portray him? Is he a helpless figurehead with powers too limited to make any difference in resolving his country’s deepening crisis? Or is he a part of the problem, part of that very circle of corruption and ineptness that is ruling Syria, and has been all along?

If it is the first, then the president’s now has a chance to prove his reformist tendencies. He will never be presented with a better opportunity than by implementing the UN resolution, which gives Assad ample justification and legitimacy to thoroughly rework the structure of contemporary power in Syria, bringing the country at last into the fold of modernizing and democratizing states. The president could emerge as the hero of the hour for both the Syrians and the international community.

If, on the other hand, the president is simply a hapless figurehead, then the best service he can do at this stage is to resign and wash his hands of leadership…

Finally, if Assad is part of the problem and refuses to cooperate with the demands of the international community, even at the cost of international isolation and sanctions, then the world is facing a major crisis that could easily develop into a repeat of the Iraqi scenario. Indeed, many high-ranking figures in the Syrian regime, including those named in the Mehlis report, seem to favor this option. Already they have called their loyalists into the streets to protest against the UN document and reject international interference in Syrian affairs. Should Assad go along with this, he could damage the presumption of innocence still surrounding his own involvement in the Hariri murder. This would compel the international community to act against him personally as well.

In making up his mind on the next steps, Assad needs to consider that the Mehlis report was only a preliminary document prepared for the sake of getting an extension of the UN probe and securing Syrian cooperation. Mehlis did not put everything he had in the report and did not divulge all the pieces of evidence. This includes more taped conversations with Syrian officials, both alive and recently dead, as well as testimony by more credible witnesses whose identity still needs to be protected.

Therefore, the extension that Detlev Mehlis has acquired and the fact that the UN resolution avoided imposing sanctions against the Syrian regime, at least for the moment, will serve as convenient devices allowing Assad one final opportunity to show everyone his real face and colors. Neither Syria nor its ruler can afford to waste another opportunity.

The Arab world has changed a lot since 2001, but those calling the shots in Syria seem to be unaware of this. There was a time when Arab dictators could get away with assassinating political opponents, even prominent ones, but no more. Mehlis’ investigation is just getting going, and this has already weakened the regime in Damascus considerably.

The Palestinian Militias
Aside from the bilateral future of Lebanon and Syria, there is also the issue of the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, and their armed militias (see this Middle East Forum article for background). This is something that I’ve seen a lot lately from watching Al-Jazeera , but it has only recently started to crop up in the global media after a UN report recently confirmed that Syria was still arming Palestinian militias in Lebanon.

Robert Rabil of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy has this to say about the issue:

…Recent moves by the Asad regime suggest that Damascus will take its policy in an ominous direction. Beirut recently shuddered at the specter of Palestinians fomenting trouble in Lebanon at the instigation of Damascus. Syria had allegedly smuggled weapons to the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) and allowed extreme Palestinians to enter Lebanon????????s Palestinian refugee camps illegally. Even Ahmad Jibril, head of the PFLP-GC, defiantly resisted Lebanese and international calls to surrender his weapons. This violation of Security Council Resolution 1559, which calls for the disarmament of all militias in Lebanon, is expected to be the focus of a report that Terje Roed-Larsen, the UN envoy to the Middle East, is due to file in the coming days Änow published, this article comments on Roed-Larsen’s reportÅ…

We should look for three things in the weeks and months ahead.
– First, look for a continuing showdown between Mehlis, backed by the international community, and the Syrian government, which after due investigation will likely offer up some mid-ranking officials as the guilty parties (and probably execute them before they can talk to Mehlis, and of course Kenaan, having “committed suicide,” will be a prime suspect).
– Second, expect that the Palestinian problem will grow in Lebanon. This intersects with other issues; the Shia of Lebanon, for example, can’t accept any disarming of Hizbullah as long as the Sunni Palestinian militias are present. Syria seems to have switched from a strategy of assassinating Lebanese opposition figures – which wasn’t working – to undermining the entire country by increasing arms to the Palestinians. Also look to see if the Palestinians start returning to Gaza in significant numbers, because they will likely destabilize that situation further if so.
– Third, look for the United States and Iraq to step up the pressure on Syria to end the terrorist infiltration and operational planning being based out of Syria for insurgents in Iraq. There are operations going on right now near the Syrian border. This will continue until the flow is cut off.

Kirk H. Sowell, Arab World Analysis.com