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