Lebanon Gets Dragged In

May 15, 2012 -- In my most recent post on Syria, I wrote that one “likely result” of a salafi Sunni political surge in Syria would be “a new [Lebanese] civil war, with a beginning epicenter most like in and around Tripoli.” I didn’t realize how soon this would become apparent.

Apparently, according to the Associated Press, battles broke out Saturday night between Sunni and Alawi groups in Tripoli, which is Lebanon’s second-largest city. At least five people are known dead and more than a hundred are wounded.  These battles involved thousands of people, and they were not exactly spontaneous—which is very bad news.

I won’t further review the news from Lebanon: Get a hold of the newspaper and read it for yourself, or follow along at Via Meadia if you would prefer more of a digest. All I will say is that given the deeply embedded cultural tradition of the blood feud in Lebanon, these several dozen casualties are very likely to lead to several hundred dozen more over the next few months. The actual numbers will depend not only on internal dynamics in Lebanon, but also on the playing out of the bloody mess in Syria. The longer that goes on, the more Syria’s neighbors are going to suffer.

Of course, I don’t expect the predictions I make here always to come true within 24 or 48 hours. And I don’t ever relish predictions about nasty and needless death coming true. But I have to admit that it is satisfying to be able to call the shots and then watch them hit targets so quickly. Some may ask: How did I know? How could I possibly have predicted Tripoli as the epicenter of new violence in Lebanon? Short answer: I know just a little something about the country, and I remember the Lebanese Civil War in some detail. Actually, as calls in this region go, this was an easy one. Alas, not every opinion on the internet is created equal…