Lebanese Elections and European Fortification

As most of you who have been reading this blog might know, Lebanon just elected a new parliament. First of all, I have to admit that I don't know much about Lebanese politics, so don't expect an in-depth analysis of the competing parties and the impact of the results. However, I was very curious about the whole process. How do people experience elections in Lebanon, where a stable democracy has not been around for much more than two decades, and where politics, religion, violence and foreign intereference has historically been an unseparable all-in package.
The streets had been dominated by the elections already long in advance. Huge billboards tried to convince voters to support certain parties. There was the red poster of Nadim Gemayel, leader of a right-wing (some say fascist) Christian Phalange party, mainly visible in Achrafiye, the district where he ran for office. The poster says: Solid, today and tomorrow. In the Christian neighborhood where I live, the Lebanese Forces are most popular, with their leader Samir Geagea. Their logo of the Lebanese cedar tree in a red circle is visible everywhere. This Christian party originated from Bashir's Phalange, but has now risen to more prominance. A few blocks from where I live is a mainly Shia (muslim) neighborhood, where the Amal and Hizbollah parties find much support. Hizbollah (the Party of God)'s poster - here in front of a devestated house that hasn't been restored after Israel's bombardments in 1996 or 2006 - has the crossed words Occupation, Aggression and something I can't read, and in large green letters Lebanon (they mainly want to end the Israeli occupation and aggression, that still continues in some parts of the south).

Before elections day on June 7th, everybody was wondering what would come. When I left office on Friday the 5th, everybody who left expressed their wishes to see everybody alife and well again on Tuesday (Monday was a holiday because the results of the elections would probably prevent a normal return to day-to-day activities anyway). So we didn't know what to expect. Would there be clashes, would there be heavy fighting, would it be peacefull?
Eventually, it all went relatively smoothly. There where some incidents in the South, in Tripoli and in Zahle, but nothing dramatic. In short, nobody was killed, something nobody expected, I think. What did make these elections different from what I had experienced in other countries where the frequent public expressions of party-affiliation. A group of young supporters of Amal (Hope) and Hizbullah, wich originated from Amal, where riding around on their scooters carrying flags of their parties and of Lebanon. The same ritual was performed by Christian supporters of Forces of Lebanon and other parties, but with cars in stead of motopeds. In fact, each party had their own honking-signal, so there was a lot of noise in the streets if a group of supporters passed.

Apart from such demostrations of support there was not much going on, though. Most shops were closed, there where not many people on the streets and the blocks around the polling stations were heavily guarded, so I didn't even try to get nearby. Local party offices blasted their campaign-music from big loudspeakers and the honking signals echoed in the empty streets, but otherwise the neighborhood was quiet and empty.
Once the first results came out, around 12:30 at night, it seemed like fighting had broken loose. Heavy blasts where ignited right next to our appartment (or so it seemed), but luckily those where just fireworks to celebrate the victory of the Christian parties. The previous majority, united in the "March 14" movement had maintained their power. Anyway, the winners of the elections would have to cooperate with the oppositions to form a government of national unity (which has been in place for about a decade now), so there would not be much change anyway.

So much for the Lebanese elections. As a Dutch citizen who very much feels affiliated with other European countries, I can't let the European elections pass by unnoticed. I was very surprised (and disturbed) to read that, according to the dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad "European voters voted for mainly (center) right-wing parties. Parties that have chosen for more market in Europe in the past few years." As opposed to more socialists parties, who advocate more restrictions of the free market. So, the market was the central theme of the elections, according to the NRC? If only that was true. I think Le Monde is closer to the truth when it asserts that "in this environment of distress, the voter becomes defensive and returns to the national framework and votes for the conservatives of his country." This is especially visible in the Netherlands, where the young Party for Freedom turned out as the second biggest party after the Christian Democrats. While this party advocates "more room for entrepreneurs" and "less bureaucracy", it is obsessively trying to limit the freedoms of Islamic residents of the Netherlands. That has nothing to do with free market, but more with a xenophobic tendency to try to keep the Netherlands as Dutch as possible (whatever that might be and for whatever reason). In the meantime, the PVV forgets that the Netherlands could only become the wealthy country it is today by adopting, exploiting and inviting (influences from) other cultures througout its history. I won't bother you with the details, I pretty sure that everybody knows that the tulip is actually a Turkish flower, the Indonesian occupation and slave trade laid the foundations of the Dutch so-called "golden century" and that "guest-laborers" provided a crucial workforce during the build-up after WWII. What I think is more interesting is the contrast between Lebanon and Europe, and in particular in the Netherlands. The Dutch have done away with their "collumnized" (verzuilde) society decades ago, so that now catholics, protestants, laborers and owners of capital go to the same schools, watch the same television channels and play in the same soccer teams. Now it seems that Europe is getting collumnized along christian-muslim and local-immigrant lines. In Lebanon, on the other hand, the passed elections have finally showed that power can be divided and shared in a non-violent way, with many christian, muslim and other parties expressing their support for this national unity. Maybe we should take their example and realize that different religions have to cooperate, because we will have to live together and deal with each other's differences. We can't force immigrants to abandon their culture or religion, and contrary to what Geert Wilders wants us to be afraid of, the Netherlands will never become an Islamic state. So should we appreciate and learn from our differences, or be afraid of it and try to suppress it?