MGLE01: NATIONAL DIALOGUE DISCUSSES PRESIDENCY,

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BEIRUT 001338 SIPDIS SIPDIS NSC FOR ABRAMS/DORAN/SINGH/WERNER E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/01/2026 TAGS: PREL PGOV KDEM LE SY SUBJECT: MGLE01: NATIONAL DIALOGUE DISCUSSES PRESIDENCY, LEAVES ISSUE OPEN Classified By: Jeffrey Feltman, Ambassador, per 1.4 (b) and (d). SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. (C) According to six participants in the 4/28 session of the National Dialogue, the issue of Lebanon's presidency was discussed at length but not resolved. Rather than defer or close the topic in order to proceed to the next and final point -- Hizballah's arms -- on the Dialogue's agenda, the participants agreed to consider the presidency again on May 16, the next session. Amin Gemayel, Marwan Hamadeh, Walid Jumblatt, and Mohammed Safadi all expressed astonishment that March 14 leaders Saad Hariri and Samir Ja'ja' almost walked straight into a trap set for them by Michel Aoun and the pro-Syrians: Nabih Berri proposed that a delegation from the National Dialogue approach President Emile Lahoud, insist that he resign, and then offer him the choice among eight potential successors. While Hariri and Ja'ja' initially embraced the idea, Jumblatt, Safadi, and Gemayel derailed the idea. They subsequently noted that Lahoud would certainly pick Aoun from the list, making Lahoud a hero on the Christian street. If the March 14-dominated parliament refused to vote in Aoun, then the entire March 14 movement would be discredited. If they voted in Aoun, then he would work to undermine them. When Berri proposed that Maronite Patriarch Sfeir bless the list of candidates or even be given the choice of who succeeds Lahoud, Michel Aoun objected that the Patriach should be left out of the discussion. End summary. 4/28 NATIONAL DIALOGUE FOCUSES ON PRESIDENCY -------------- ¶2. (C) On Saturday, 4/29, the Ambassador met separately with former President Amin Gemayel, Minister of Telecommunications Marwan Hamadeh (allied with Druse leader Walid Jumblatt),and presidential aspirant Michel Aoun to discuss the previous evening's session of the National Dialogue. (See septel for Aoun's comments on topics not related to the National Dialogue.) The Ambassador also spoke by phone with Saad Hariri, Walid Jumblatt, and Mohammed Safadi. All six participants said that the four-house session was dominated almost exclusively by a discussion of the presidency. While there was some talk about Hizballah Secretary General Nasrallah's apparent second thoughts about SIPDIS border delineation in the Sheba'a Farms area (a decision from a previous Dialogue session),Berri papered over differences on that topic. BUT WITH NO DISCUSSION, TOPIC WILL COME UP AGAIN 5/16 -------------- ¶3. (C) While the presidency issue was not resolved in the Dialogue, nor was it closed: Dialogue participants will discuss the presidency in the next session, scheduled for May ¶16. Hamadeh commented that, contrary to Nabih Berris' public statements that the Dialogue should move onto Hizballah's arms even if a stalemate on the presidency pervailed, the Speaker seemed to relish keeping Emile Lahoud somewhat off balance by keeping the topic opened. The Ambassador noted that Berri might also be pandering to his Hizballah partners, in maintaining a focus on the presidency in order not to open up the questions of Hizballah's arms. DIALOGUE FOCUSES ON EIGHT NAMES -------------- ¶4. (C) According to the participants, after some preliminary comments, Nabih Berri started discussing names of presidential candidates, listing Aoun, MP Boutros Harb (also a Dialogue participant),and Nassib Lahoud as those in the lead. Safadi objected to the omission of his northern Lebanon ally, Minister of Social Affairs Nayla Mouawad. Others added more names, to the point where eight names were circulating in the Dialogue: Aoun, Harb, Lahoud, Mouawad, MP Robert Ghanem, self-declared candidate Chibli Mallatt, former Foreign Minister Jean Obeid, and Maronite League chief/happy gourmand Michel Edde. When the names of LAF Commander Michel Suleiman and Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh also emerged, Berri rejected them and cut off the discussion of the names. Some of our contacts argued that Berri had eliminated Suleiman and Salameh on constitutional grounds, as both would be precluded from serving as president without a constitutional amendment. But others, like Hamadeh, BEIRUT 00001338 002 OF 003 described Berri as thinking it ludicrous to keep adding increasingly unrealistic names to the list. AOUN REJECTS PROPOSAL TO ASK PATRIARCH SFEIR -------------- ¶5. (C) Berri then proposed that the Dialogue take the eight names to Maronite Patriarch Sfeir for blessing, and to see whether Sfeir might shortcircuit the Dialogue's work and select a candidate. After all, Berri noted, he would stand behind the Patriarch's choice. Aoun "practically leaped up from his chair," Jumblatt laughed, "howling, 'No! No! No!'" Aoun told the Ambassador that the Patriarch had been very clear that it is inappropriate for him to choose a name, and thus Berri's proposal was "unacceptable." Gemayel and Safadi assumed that Aoun's immediate rejection stemmed from Aoun's knowledge that the Patriarch would never select him. (We believe that Sfeir would have refused to select a name in any case, given Sfeir's knowledge that he would unite all other would-be presidents against him.) ASKING LAHOUD TO RESIGN -- AND CHOOSE HIS SUCCESSOR -------------- ¶6. (C) Since the Patriarch can't choose, Berri suggested that, therefore, the National Dialogue should select a small committee to meet President Emile Lahoud. Representing all of the Dialogue participants, the committee would tell Lahoud he must resign. But to induce him to do so, the committee would also give Lahoud the list of eight presidential candidates, asking Lahoud to choose one to be his successor. Reportedly, there was good-natured joking among all the participants about who would be tasked with telling Lahoud to resign, with the elderly Ghassan Tueni and Michel Murr volunteering. Aoun joked that neither would come back from Baabda Palace alive. The Dialogue participants also laughed that it would be called the "'Fel' committee," after the Lebanese Arabic slang for "to go," used by those wishing to kick Lahoud out. To that, Hizballah Secretary General Nasrallah added that it could be the "'Feltman' committee" instead, noting the USG desire to see Lahoud. ¶7. (C) Returning to the business at hand, Berri pitched his idea. Aoun, Nasrallah, and Murr immediately agreed. Then Hariri and Ja'ja' said that they were in favor of it. "Blinded by his ambition," in Gemayel's words, even Boutros Harb concurred, despite any sober analysis indicating that Lahoud would never select Harb. Then Jumblatt, Safadi, and Gemayel went on the counterattack. How, they asked, could March 14 participants, who consider Lahoud to be occupying the presidency unconstitutionally, agree to give Lahoud the choice of his successor? The three of them convinced the March 14 participants, including Ja'ja, Harb, and Hariri, to back the idea that the committee would go to Baabda to demand Lahoud's resignation only, leaving the parliament to discuss the succession. Aoun, Nasrallah, and Berri rejected this approach, leading to the suspension of the talks until May 16. ASTONISHMENT THAT MARCH 14 WAS ON VERGE OF FALLING INTO A TRAP -------------- ¶8. (C) Jumblatt, Safadi, Hamadeh, and Gemayel all expressed astonishment and consternation that their March 14 colleagues, expecially Hariri and Ja'ja', would be so naive as to walk into a trap that Nabih Berri had cleverly set for them. After all, they explained, given that list of eight, Emile Lahoud would choose Aoun. In doing so, Lahoud's luster on the Christian street would be restored immediately. He would become a hero to Aoun's supporters. Then, the March 14-dominated parliament would be handed a cruel choice: do they follow the terms of the deal and elect Aoun, knowing that Aoun wants to destroy them through early parliamentary elections and other actions? Or do they back out of the deal, and thus be accused of treachery by placing someone else in the presidency rather than Aoun? Jumblatt argued that Berri doesn't want Aoun as president but came up with the perfect scenario by which Aoun wouldn't be president but March 14 would be nevertheless destroyed, clearing the way for a pro-Syrian figure like Jean Obeid. Hariri, speaking by phone, denied his colleagues' assertions that he was about to head into a trap, but he could not explain his reasons for initially backing Berri's proposals. ("See me in person," he urged, which we will.) BEIRUT 00001338 003 OF 003 COMMENT -------------- ¶9. (C) Prior to this session of the Dialogue, all sorts of (often contradictory) rumors were circulating: that Aoun would intentionally blow up this Dialogue with a venemous attack on the March 14 coalition, that Berri would close off discussion of the presidency almost immediately, that the entire Dialogue would be permanently suspended. None of that happened. After weeks of carefully avoiding any mention of names of candidates, the Dialogue has now in its peculiar ad hoc fashion blessed an initial list of potential successors to Emile Lahoud -- that's progress of sorts, even if none of the names were exactly s ecret before. But the Dialogue is no closer to resolving how a successor might replace Lahoud in the near future. And as we will cover septel, Michel Aoun is determined to undermine adn discredit the March 14 coalition by almost any means possible, suggesting to us that the 5/16 session of the Dialogue will come no closer to ending this frustrating Lebanese deadlock. This National Dialogue session also revealed the cracks within the March 14 coalition, with Ja'ja' -- for the first time we can think of -- being accused of the same naivete that many people have stated is a problem with Saad Hariri. End comment. FELTMAN