Political deadlock in lebanon its widening the sectarian divide and leading toward riots and violence politicians of failed to form a government in the position of Prime Minister remain state so who can lead the country out of crisis this is inside story. And welcome to the program. Now they had been more than 40 days of largely peaceful protests and lebanon but as the political stalemate continues the country is sliding into town while and in recent days the demonstrations attend more violence on sunday supporters of the 2 main shia groups attacked protesters in beirut and then unrest followed in other parts of lebanon with various sectarian backgrounds sunni leader and caretaker Prime Minister saad hariri says hes not going to form the next government heres an example of what can happen when rival groups meet in the street hustle him better come through what happened yesterday is what people from the Amal Movement in his pillow were protesting we didnt talk to them or anything when we were sitting inside the tents and some people started here on the street suddenly rocks and bottles started to fall on us beyond we surrounded and protected the amal and hezbollah groups through petrol on us and the tents caught far while young people and women were in it. To another change which they surrounded because all of us were inside of a. Supporter shot in the year to disperse people in the army also fired a shot in the so they left if the army how to. Lift. Correspondents anahata has more from beirut. About a month ago the Prime Minister resigned he said he did the opposite he did the call from the streets but the president asked him to stay on in a caretaker capacity and ever since the ruling elite those who are in power have been negotiating with him on the shape of a new government he is a popular leader he is also some new leader in lebanon and this is a country which is theres a deep divide between sects and if one sect feels that they have been left out of power then that is dangerous despite what we have been seeing in the streets the. Protest movement at the end of the day like ive mentioned if someone like leaves office then the Sunni Community will feel that he has been the scapegoat why should he be the only one who doesnt return to office why not the christian leader the president of the country michel aoun the or the leader of the House Speaker why dont they leave office and heed the call from the street now how do you say that hes no longer interested hes blaming really his partners in government saying that you have been blaming me for standing in the way of a solution that i have been insisting that im the only one who should return to office so no im stepping out of the way you can form a government on your own what has just done really is put the ruling elite the hezbollah led alliance in a corner because if they go ahead and form a government it will be considered a one sided government which is unlikely to get the support of the International Community well lets take a just how we reached this current political crisis nationwide protests began in october against high living costs Poor Public Services and government corruption and by the end of the month Prime Minister saad hariri had stepped down reforms or proposed a new Prime Minister but it wasnt enough to appease protests and former finance minister Mohammad Safadi was forced to abandon his bid to leave the government meanwhile normal life has. Been put on hold across the country the unrest has disrupted banks schools and universities all of which have at times been forced to close their doors. Well joining me now are our guests fastly and bear in bay ridge we have even had the name net whos a political commentator on skype in cambridge massachusetts we have rami khouri who is a professor at the American University of beirut and also a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy school and also in beirut we have half an eunice whos an author of trends of business and is also a professor of International Business management a warm welcome to you all now i do want to start with this announcement by saudi arabia that he doesnt want to form a government he doesnt want to be the new Prime Minister rami did this come as a surprise was his who are really thinking here nobody knows what her is thinking except her really and whatever his thinking changes every once in a while because hes a politician in a very violent her country goes through a very tumultuous period a lot of the actions and statements that were getting from either individuals or political groups where there are sections underground or media statements is all political jockeying essentially because youve got 2 big camps in lebanon one of them is trying to radically change the governance system of the National Values of lebanon as manifested in its policies which is the protesters and their allies and then youve got the other which is the some of the traditional parties who are. Not really happy with the protest and theyre trying to maintain the old system more or less as it is with with moderate changes and therefore any statements that you get your fear like how the it is or are partly designed for political drama. Partly they represent serious frustration as well because the countries of origin to a terrible economic collapse of muslims themselves well lets take a closer look at that statement from saad hariri and the one that you just heard. Least he said im sticking by the rule not to me but someone else to form a government that meets the aspirations of young men and women and then he went on to say what is more dangerous than the Major National crisis and shop economic crisis our country is passing through and which is preventing us from dealing with these 2 and to try and crises is the stage of chronic denial being expressed on several occasions over the past few weeks now abraham let me ask you who is he accusing of this chronic denial here well basically hes trying i think hes basically trying to add to to send a message to the other Political Parties his previous allies as we see now that hes hes not in good terms and hes not ok with the kind of conditions that have been theyve been trying to put for him to form the government we see that this has all kinds of interplay between themselves and for their internal going negotiations in between the ruling elite to reach a certain condition whereby they can form a government us build the old way that they have been using prior to the revolution this is the way they dealt with the other and now we can see how this is also manifesting on the streets with what we call rough negotiation sending out. Kind of. Trying to to bring back the sectarian and civil war memories to enhance the negotiation conditions in between themselves but i do want to come to that violence in a 2nd but before we get there has and i want to ask you because hariri is saying that hes chosen to do this to expedite the formation of a new government is this likely to speed things up or could it just delay things even further. It would definitely delay things even further because its an interplay between the traditional parties as one of the guests has just mentioned and many accusations to have years that hes awaiting a certain pay regional password or an international password until the next step becomes. Actually 11 on we have we have never been in this volatile uncertain complex and ambiguous country this is a Decision Makers by ourselves we always wait a certain password we always wait a certain deal which is which is usually cooked at the regional level for example at in saudi arabia and i thought if or in a doha or even internationally while awaiting the talks between maybe russia and the us between the p 5 plus one countries and other regional or International Powers so i think that this interplay gives have you the more time to know how the how the International Agenda is being depleted and what would the destiny of lebanon and until then the things in the streets are escalating and destress can never be controlled its beyond the control of the traditional parties because everything 11 is sectarian everything in lebanon can be politicized well there are now ostensibly consultations thursday and so let me ask you then rami other actually any real alternatives to hariri and theyre all of a lots of backroom deals being done here and as you said it does look like a lot of this is about trying to place pressure on hezbollah what is the next move now well its not only hezbollah as well as the main party but youve got president s for d some. Smaller groups so you have 2 major camps really shape the political landscape. In lebanon there are of course many doctors lebanon is a country of anything lebanon is a country of amazing human talent and ive been there for many years and are sure every day its just extraordinary the amount of human you have even if youre. Strange you got a sunni or shia or a christian there are hundreds of people who could run these posters up the question of are there personalities or alternatives its a question of will the political power structure of the sectarian oligarchic system that has run the country for 3040 years will it be flexible enough to meet some or many of the demands of the masses of people in the streets who probably represent over a half a country i would guess is there any but stability in the traditional power structure or theres a traditional structure as weve seen recently with the street demonstrations of so theres an assist on keeping the old very unsure and the crisis them which is the whole reason why half the countries are on the streets i should ensure that syria has shown wanting to jonathan has or hasnt i feel yeah i get yeah i guess that we scored 0 on flexibility and agility that i did and powers who have been in and government or in parliament or heading the maples or since the major power structure of the country want the want to resign or dont want to give they give up very quickly it will take months and months especially that as i said before we can decide we can decide on our own so and even the protesters demands are not clear there is no consensus on a clear fiscal policy oriented policy or whats the alternative of the current government maybe chaos would be the other the other alternative as long as there is no clear leadership on the side of the protests or of the protesters then the other parties wont give up and its clear that they wont be giving up especially that we have a great driver lead between the Major PoliticalPolitical Parties 11 on the christian parties amongst themselves and between the christians and the muslims and the the sunni muslims and the shia muslims and its being translated on the streets yesterday we have we have seen the confrontation on the border lines between. Christian how you populate a diner and highly populated muslim neighboring city which is a show year this would have been bloody confrontation if the army didnt you saw. I think that things are escalating. Basted month yeah and i feel like you dont agree. Yes i think this is the kind of narrative that the political position of political power is trying to disseminate this is the kind of discourse that exclusively put all of the all of the players in this and that in the within the ruling elite and the store to leave the revolution and the kind of play as a major player now in the equation for i believe that despite the fact that many of the. Of the 3rd of the violence thats been happening on the street as a son mentioned has been initiated by. The ruling elites groups but nevertheless we have to to look on the other side and see the respond of the of the of the protesters they have been sticking to the peaceful protests and they buy they and today we have a set and for the mothers and and there are many to to send a clear message that we will not go back to the civil war and the members of the civil war this is the kind of. Narrative that the additional powers are trying to disseminate to create ok how are you going to tell how can you go and how can you go to year and all you have all of this is just just in a moment if i if i if i may ask just if i may ask so that its a diagnosis how can you make sure that all the proper that all the protests are for this peaceful for this peaceful kind of of evolution what about blocking the roads on very sensitive areas for example and now me which is which is the entrance to the south which is illusion which lets me imagine that he has actually a house and let me sort of this to be just him on the streets i dont want to answer about another example or not would you like when you want. To go ahead so. No for the police the for example the blocking the roads are always have been peaceful and there has been not a single violent against any person on the streets except from the from the from the from the from the powers themselves against the protesters so this is a big indicator of how this peaceful disappears that is of course this is one of the piece with one of the protests the tools to block the roads and despite despite it being a severe tool but it has been used and now they are not being as its been not been in use for quite a while in response to the people is the man lets get back one thing clear all the versions of been initiated. Was a gentleman gentleman i wanted anything but i really his own little light in all of green actually ive timidly this is about different narratives right everyones going to be pointing fingers at everyone else is and i really want to bring to us until very recently thats just hasnt let me finish up until very recently these had on largely largely peaceful protests and just in the last few days we have seen groups of primarily young men coming out and some of been vandalizing shops they have been setting cars on fire weve heard that theyve been chanting shia some of them are from hezbollah some of them are affiliated with them are we i mean the and theyve identified themselves as being that so rami let me turn to you here do you feel like this is a turning point for the movement a turning point for the protest movement and also for the dynamic on the streets. Yes it is certainly is a turning point to see even more than a turning point its really a moment of historical reckoning for the country of lebanon and lebanon is really different from other countries other iraq and theres many ways but in many ways its not the front its a country thats ravaged by poverty corruption mismanagement a political elite that treats its people almost with this day and they go on for 45 days now and theres no real serious attempt to form a government while the leader is. Declining and becoming stresses are growing and poverty is expanding the debt is booming so its a credible mirror of the incompetent and so the ruling elites in all almost all the countries not all of them so this is a moment that really challenges whether lebanon as a sovereign country can manage itself. Well we heard from one of the my colleagues that foreign people often determine everything that goes on in the country thats true but it happens with the consent of the lebanese so its the protesters are basically saying we want to stop the tradition of the last 304050 years of mismanagement and government and not because of any of ideological reasons we dont like iran we dont like saudi arabia no its because the 2 thirds of the country as is poor and i says are crossing him theres no hope for the young people and thats why youve got all these high school out there on the street so this is a historic moment where the lebanese really face themselves in the mirror and have to decide are they a serious country or are they basically just a bunch of sectarian clubs and militias that are going to keep dueling it out on the streets while the masses of people emigrate or suffer and thats the real question and i know you have strong feelings about this im going to go to you we havent had an official condemnation of the violence that weve seen from the house and nasrallah is that potentially being read on the streets as a tacit consent to continue with this kind of behavior. 1st id like to agree with guarding the. Behavior of the Political Parties or the political elite of the country that it guarding the level of unprecedented corruption they have a drive to which which has many to percussions at the economic level at the monetary level etc and my students are among the protesters and ive been with the protesters until the 4th day until a Prime Minister had his paper of the fall which is highly criticized yet we could have built on it because i believe that the solution is not on the streets not by blocking roads because this can be beyond the control of the protesters themselves and beyond the control of the traditional Political Parties it can be beyond the control and i dont like to have any evolutionary change and lebanon with with with a set amount of blood which we are fed of. Actually id like to have evolutionary change and the evolution of change can take place in 2 years from now in the next parliamentary elections regarding the protesters who are mainly who are a pro has been a lot of. Movement they might have been based on a sign sent by their major Political Parties or it could have been based on their. Own initiative done by them definitely against that doesnt represent the actually the lack of political statement by. Law and maybe it can raise some questions yet Many Political figures from hezbollah have condemned. But whether they have condemned it or not when you have a Political Party with more than a 1000000. 1000000 citizens who are the fraud this Political Party you cant control a 1000000 maybe a few 100 of these people want to want to resort to this. And maybe they are not educated enough maybe. They want to show that. Theyre very sure and theres a lot of. Going on here about what is motivating a lot of people but all 3 of you have talked about at the heart of all of this and the heart of this protest movement where economic