Middle East conundrum

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Though the "Arab Spring" may be branded a delusion in certain quarters, President Bush's strategy for democratizing the region is gaining momentum.

Elections in Afghanistan, Iraq and even Saudi Arabia, public demonstrations in Beirut demanding instant withdrawal of 14,000 Syrian troops and intelligence agents from Lebanon and a temporary lull in the Arab-Israeli conflict, indicate a serious challenge to the status quo by Arab civil society.

Moreover, emboldened by Mr. Bush's call for freedom, students and human-rights activists protested in Damascus against Syria's repressive 42-year-old emergency laws.

Accommodating old illiberal regimes of autocratic dictators and kings was the policy fostered by Western Arabists for a half-century. Reversal of that policy has found an evocative expression in Egypt's "Kifaya" (Enough) movement.

After an unchallenged 24-year reign as Egypt's president, Hosni Mubarak feels obliged to hold elections with multiparty candidates. Elections, of course, do not equal democracy. Meant to solve problems by secular reforms, however, elections do mobilize the public.

As expected, surprises accompany the new wave of democracy and reforms within internally conflicted Arab countries. The administration's traditional resistance to integrating terrorist organizations, such as Lebanon's Hezbollah or Palestine's Hamas, into the political mainstream as long as they refuse to disarm, contradicts the European commitment to engage Hezbollah's Iranian and Syrian sponsors.

Asserting they will never to give up militarily protecting their country, Hezbollah's leaders not only demand an end to Israeli warplane overflights of Lebanon but release of Lebanese detainees. The militant group, highly esteemed in the Arab world for forcing an end to Israel's 18-year occupation of southern Lebanon in 2000, has already entered the political arena with the election of 12 parliamentarians.

Hezbollah represents the political revival of Lebanon's 2-to-1 Shi'ite Muslim majority and is a threat to the country's Christian-Sunni leadership. Begun as an anti-Israel movement, Hezbollah is suspected of bombing the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and killing 241 U.S. Marines in 1984. In the last 25 years, it began providing social services in its Shi'ite community.

"Regarding the Lebanon process one needs to be careful what one wishes." a former high-ranking U.S. diplomat warns. "Confessionally a Christian state, means that there are Christian minority rulers whom at least the Muslims view increasingly as imposed upon them."

As dynamics change, he explains, it is necessary to keep the lid on to avoid another multifaceted civil war. Though Hezbollah reinforces its militant stance with a political arm, experts don't rule out a possible military action to derail the peace process.