Word: shying
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...into the Lebanese soldiers who had been guarding the previous checkpoint. It should have been members of a Christian battalion, which were our allies, but the night before they were replaced by Shi'a soldiers. Still, we felt safe to be captured by the Lebanese...
...makeup and capability of the Lebanese Army render it unthinkable, say military observers and government officials, for it to forcibly disarm Hizballah or take control of southern Lebanon. More than one third of the army's personnel is Shi'ite, drawn from a community in which Hizballah is overwhelmingly popular. And as long as it is the only force fighting the Israelis inside Lebanon, Hizballah's support would be even wider, making it even less likely that the government could order the Army to move against it. "The Lebanese Army will never be given any orders to disarm any militia...
...Israel's campaign against Hizballah in Lebanon, moreover, has inflamed Shi'ite public opinion against the Coalition. Sadr has warned that his movement will not stand by passively in the face of attacks on Lebanon, and the popularity of that sentiment among Shi'ites was highlighted by the fact that more moderate voices such as Prime Minister Maliki and Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani echoed Sadr's harsh criticism of the U.S.-British opposition to an immediate cease-fire...
...Moving against the Shi'ite militias has always been a difficult proposition, but doing so at a point where Shi'ite public opinion is so openly hostile to the Coalition may be entirely implausible. Indeed, the key to disarming those militias is more likely to lie in a new political agreement with their party bosses, in conjunction with a wider national-unity power-sharing agreement capable of shrinking the base of the Sunni insurgency. But the mounting sectarian violence and the passions stoked by Lebanon make the prospects for such a deal right now more remote than ever...
...Earlier this year, the U.S. had been poised to explore a new avenue in the quest to stabilize Iraq - direct talks with Iran. Plans to talk were eventually scrapped amid mounting tensions over Tehran's nuclear program. But if tamping down sectarian violence by reining in the Shi'ite militias has become an urgent priority to prevent a civil war, the U.S. may yet have to reconsider the prospects for reaching agreements on the immediate future of Iraq with the Sadr movement - and rethink its unwillingness to deal with Iran...