ABSTRACT
On 14 February 2005, the detonation of a truck filled with approximately 2500 kilograms of TNT ripped to pieces the armoured car of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, killing him and 22 others. The explosion left a crater three metres deep and could be heard all over Beirut, but it was its aftershock that changed the political map of Lebanon. The ‘Cedar Revolution’ that followed the attack ended almost three decades of Syrian suzerainty in Lebanon and produced two rival blocs, the pro-Syrian March 8 Alliance and the anti-Syrian March 14 movement, that have since dominated Lebanese politics. The Sunni–Shia divide, deepening across the Muslim world, ‘replaced the civil war’s Muslim–Christian divide to become the dominant schism’ in Lebanon. 1 The STL – a criminal court of an international character – was established to bring the perpetrators of the attack to justice, and the issue of the Court dominated Lebanese politics thereafter. Combined, these factors pushed tension in the multi-sectarian system to dangerous levels and paralysed the government on several occasions. Moreover, the staunch resistance to the STL by Hezbollah and the debate on disarming its militia further exacerbated animosity between pro- and anti-Syrian parties in Lebanon. 2
