The situation in Lebanon has been rapidly deteriorating, with Israeli bombing and a rising death toll.
Israeli talk of a ground invasion has been overt: in spite of American, British and European calls for ceasefire.
As the out-of-control Israeli government has opened up its second front, this time bombarding a foreign, sovereign state, some have expressed ‘alarm’, some have advised restraint.
This is all surface-level platitudes. As was the case with the eleven months of assault on Gaza, foreign governments and officials appear to give lip service to the pretense of reigning in Israel’s operations, but in reality nothing is done to actually stop anything.
Britain, America and the West’s nonchalantly dismissive attitude towards the International Court of Justice illustrates this perfectly.
Meanwhile the UK and other foreign entities’ activities in Lebanon are something that hasn’t come under much scrutiny since the Israeli regime has begun its attacks on the country.
But there’s something very curious to look at.
What hasn’t been much reported is that the British government has been putting Lebanon under pressure for some time to agree to something called a ‘Memorandum of Understanding‘ that would give Britain unrestricted access to Lebanese territory.
As reported by The Cradle on September 12th, largely citing an Al-Akhbar report of September 11th, this agreement would include the deployment of British soldiers in Lebanon.
According to Al-Akhbar’s reporting, there was resistance to this idea in the Lebanese army, with a representative quoted as saying the proposal raise ‘concerns about Lebanon’s sovereignty and independence, with the scope of the mission of the British armed forces unclear, which increases the state of uncertainty…’
This seems like a reasonable reaction to the UK’s proposal: given the role of British and other foreign forces in the catastrophe in Libya, for example, it’s fair to say that British troops moving freely around the sovereign state of Lebanon sounds like a request that warrants caution.
But it gets worse: and more suspect.
Alleged clauses in the British memorandum include granting British military personnel immunity from arrest or prosecution.
And stipulating that if any British personnel were to be detained, they must be immediately handed over to UK forces.
Al-Akhbar interpreted that ‘The memorandum guarantees that, in the event of a misinterpretation or non-compliance with the terms, Lebanon will not be able to resort to any international court or third party to resolve the dispute…’
The Lebanese government in Beirut has reportedly said that the proposal would constitute a violation of Lebanon’s sovereignty.
On the surface of it, the UK’s request is about facilitating the safe evacuation of British citizens from Lebanon.
Which appears to be what’s happening right now, in fact, according to latest reports that UK citizens are being urged to get out of Lebanon.
However, there’s two problems with that being the sole pretext.
Firstly, if it’s just about evacuating British citizens, then why the insistence on British personnel being immune from prosecution – and why do British troops need to move freely all over the country?
Secondly, this British request isn’t merely in response to the presently unfolding crisis.
The September 11th report was raising concerns *prior* to Israel’s hostile actions in Lebanon: the pager and electronics attacks hadn’t happened yet and the bombing campaign hadn’t started.
Which indicates some pre-knowledge on the UK government’s part.
Moreover, the UK’s Lebanese memorandum reportedly predates even the events of October 7th last year: and was being reported on by Al-Akhbar in November last year.
Clearly, Britain was anticipating the situation in Lebanon far in advance, even though Israel’s military focus at the time was squarely on Gaza.
The RAF has also sent some 80 warplanes from its Cyprus bases to Lebanon since March. Declassified UK reported on this in June, noting that ‘the flights had the capacity in total to transport over 23,000 UK military personnel to Lebanon.’
It does seem to be the case that British forces have a relationship with Lebanese state forces, which may be partly geared towards maintaining security and stability: and presumably countering the influence of Hezbollah, which the UK has proscribed as a terrorist organisation since 2019, despite Hezbollah’s presence in government and some state institutions.
But, given what is presently happening in the beleaguered country, it’s hard to imagine that whatever the UK wants to do in Lebanon isn’t in accordance with Israel’s agenda.
Also, the US has sent an unspecified number (‘a small number’) of troops to Lebanon too – again, for the stated purpose of evacuating American citizens.
The US already has a reported 400,000 troops in ‘the region’, however.
Meanwhile on the subject of Lebanon’s sovereignty, clearly it is being violated on multiple fronts: by Israel on one hand (both now and in the past: including invasions of Lebanon and actual documented massacres), and even – some do argue – by Hezbollah, especially in the south, with the weakened and ineffectual Lebanese state unable to exercise proper control of its territory.
The UK wanting to move its own troops freely all over the country – and be immune from any future prosecution – is arguably another proposed violation of sovereignty.
And it again demonstrates how a country like Lebanon isn’t afforded the true respect of a sovereign state by colonial or supposedly post-colonial powers.
The Middle East is still seen as a playground. The shady actions of foreign personnel – including British soldiers – in both Libya and Syria were a demonstration of that: in both those cases, said personnel had no legal basis for being on the ground in those countries during what were ostensibly ‘Civil Wars’ or armed uprisings.
The fact that British special forces were moving around Libya ‘disguised as Arabs’ in 2011 was something I covered in The Libya Conspiracy.
At least in the case of Lebanon, they’ve apparently asked permission. That’s something, I guess.
And look, it may well be that the Lebanese state actually wants British assistance in security matters and stabilisation. But it’s hard to envision that being the scenario when Britain’s ally Israel is currently bombarding the country and talking about a ground invasion.
And there’s no good reason I can think of why UK armed forces need to be ‘immune from prosecution’ if all they want to do is evacuate British citizens.
And in a week where Benjamin Netanyahu literally told the citizens of a foreign country to ‘evacuate their homes’, the notion of ‘sovereignty’ has clearly been tossed out of a window.
