Word: hariri
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...world, pitting those countries that are allied with the U.S. - including Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt - against those countries and militant groups such as Syria, Hamas and Hizballah, which have opposed American power in the region and are at war with Israel. That rivalry deepened after the assassination of Hariri, who was Riyadh's main ally in Beirut, and got personal during the 2006 war in Lebanon, when Assad implied that the King and other Arab leaders who had criticized the Hizballah raid on Israel that sparked the conflict were "half-men." Saudi Arabia withdrew its ambassador to Syria...
...waiting at the airport with a red-carpet welcome. Abdullah's visit is a particularly sweet foreign policy triumph for Assad, who became persona non grata after many in the international community accused Syria of involvement in the 2005 car-bomb assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in Beirut. In the past year, however, the Syrian leader has hosted a growing number of heads of state and world leaders, including French President Nicolas Sarkozy and U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell, who have sought Syria's cooperation in settling many of the region's seemingly intractable disputes...
...election victory in June by Hariri's U.S.- and Saudi-backed alliance seemed to promise the closing of a three-year chapter of war and political upheaval. Ever since it fought a 33-day war with Israel in the summer of 2006, the Shi'ite Hizballah movement has challenged the legitimacy of the Lebanese government, accusing it of secretly trying to disarm the anti-Israeli "resistance." For its part, the ruling coalition has accused the Hizballah-led opposition of attempting a coup d'état at the behest of Iran and Syria. After Hizballah prevailed decisively in a brief armed...
...tempting to see the breakdown as a result of a regional game of brinkmanship. Syria has been slowly working its way back into the good graces of the international community after having faced widespread condemnation over accusations that it planned the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, father of the Prime Minister-designate. As the Obama Administration has reached out, Syria has made progress on some of the outstanding points of contention between the two countries. It has for the first time officially recognized Lebanese sovereignty, by opening a Syrian embassy in Beirut. (Damascus has traditionally viewed...
...Hariri's resignation, in fact, may be an attempt to call that bluff by demonstrating that he and his backers in Washington and Riyadh can play the confrontation game too. He is almost certainly going to be renominated as Prime Minster by President Suleiman, and his supporters are warning that Hizballah can forget about a unity government. That could return the Lebanese political deadlock to the dangerous days of 2006 and 2007, when the threat of violence loomed large...