Word: sectarian
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...hazard of the sectarian strife in Lebanon is that it could accidentally trigger a broader Middle East war. Damascus already has an estimated 2,000 to 3,000 troops in Lebanon-many of them disguised as commandos of the Palestinian Saiqa movement based in Syria-who were dispatched to enforce peace. Syrian President Hafez Assad may have to send still more troops to force the Moslem side into full peace. Assad, however, is reluctant to do so for fear that Israel might respond by occupying southern Lebanon, where many Palestinian strongholds are located...
...face the problem of how to deal with a new ingredient in the Middle East morass: a Lebanon that is not the Lebanon of old. It seemed certain last week that the Moslem leftists were on the verge of forcing the country to abandon the old sectarian political system, either by accepting reform or by facing the muzzles of 25,000 AK-47s. As King Hussein observed in Washington, it is no longer "a question of changing a President in Lebanon, but of changing a regime and its shape...
...forces until the ceasefire were locked in battle with Christian militiamen. More than any other Lebanese leader, Jumblatt was responsible for the collapse of Syrian President Hafez Assad's plan to end the civil war through a Pax Syriana. Jumblatt's reason: such a settlement would only perpetuate the sectarian bitterness dividing the nation...
...National Movement that Jumblatt heads also cuts across sectarian lines. It includes his own Progressive Socialists, as well as Communists, several groups of Nasserites and followers of the new renegade "Lebanese Arab Army." It also has the backing of the leftist Syrian Popular Party, headed by Inam Raad, a Christian, and including a sizable number of other Christians...
Despite Jumblatt's acceptance of the ten-day "freeze," he clearly intends to carry on his struggle against the obsolete sectarian political system that led to the civil war. "A false compromise is a bad compromise," he told Correspondent Wynn. "Somebody must win, and somebody must lose. We must go ahead to a real evolution of the country...