Future is brightening

Is there a path for progress in Lebanon after installing a new president and prime minister? New leaders are trying to make headway against the backdrop of a ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel while neighbouring Syria tries to establish its own new government.

It was my privilege to chair at the House of Lords a panel discussion with the renowned expert Prof Lina Khatib, organised by CMEC director Charlotte Leslie . I will sketch some of the points of the discussion here but recommend you turn to a coming podcast on the CMEC site for the very illuminating examination of what's at stake.

With parliamentary elections due in 2026, President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam need to show they can steer the state through the economic crisis, bringing the IMF onside. Both are united in the belief that the writ of the state must be asserted and Hezbollah, after its stinging blows, can adapt to the new realities.

In this way the shift out of Iran's orbit can be confirmed.

Prof Khatib has written in The National on Syria's challenges as its seeks to unify the country. She wrote the new president Ahmad Al Shara urgently needs to forge genuine political inclusion for all its people so that no community feels disempowered and foreign actors cannot use local grievances to advance their own agendas. The international community must insist on transitional justice while also assisting Syria with its economic revival.

To Prof Khatib, Mr Al Shara is involved in a precarious balancing act. On the one hand, he needs to stand up to the destabilising actions of Iran, its proxies and Assad regime loyalists. These forces are pursuing their goals by taking advantage of the political and economic setbacks faced by Alawites resulting from decisions such as Mr Al Shara’s dissolution of the Syrian Arab Army and the general exclusion of sect members from Syrian state structures.

On the other hand, Syria’s interim president needs to rein in his loyalists, she added. There is a real risk of Mr Al Shara repeating the scenario he went through in the not-too-distant past, when HTS was fighting not just the Assad regime and Iran-backed forces, but also other Sunni extremist groups, such as Hurras Al Din, pushing them into submission or disbandment.

It is believed the message was well heard by those close to the Syrian president who want to see stability for Syria.

Exploiting dreams

If you haven't been exposed to our exposé of the international reach of the people smuggling networks bringing tens of thousands to the UK, please follow this link.

Up close, the rewards for those running the networks seem like easy pickings. A British court this week has heard another example, where an Egyptian trafficker was claimed to have made more than £12 million ($15.5 million) from sending thousands of migrants across the Mediterranean.

Ahmed Ebid, 41, arrived in the UK on a small boat in October 2022 but just three weeks later he was organising the movement of migrants from Libya to Italy in craft with hundreds crammed on board.

The former fisherman was linked to the smuggling operation after he made calls to satellite phones on board the migrant boats. Those numbers were then used to call the Italian Coastguard, telling it the location of the migrant ships so they could be towed to safety and those on board taken ashore.

The UK’s National Crime Agency bugged his home in west London and recorded calls he made organising smuggling, in which he referred to boats in code as “cars”, and he was eventually arrested and charged in June 2023.

Caveat emptor

Europe's generals are meeting to gameplan a cobbled together security guarantee for Ukraine absent the US. The politicians are lining up a huge hike in defence spending. But the what ifs abound now that America is bailing on the Western bloc.

With great uncertainty caused by policy shifts in the White House since Donald Trump’s inauguration in January, Europe has finally absorbed the wake-up call that it’s only been talking about for a decade and a half. The resources that the continent’s leaders plan to allocate to its defence will be substantial, and many hope that these will be transformative to Europe as a military power.

However, there is an immediate crunch for the continent as it looks to spend some of this money on supporting Ukraine. Given the uncertain nature of its ties with the US, is there a guarantee that it won’t be put on a short leash by Washington when it buys American systems? French President Emmanuel Macron feels very strongly about this. In the manner of the post-Second World War general-turned-president Charles de Gaulle, Mr Macron is seized by the importance of Paris as a player in defence and strategic affairs.

Thinking through what Europe’s rising defence spending should look like is complicated by the US’s dominance in the technology domain, especially as the future of the battlefield will involve autonomous weapons, nano sensors and acoustics.

The full argument is here.