Communal thinking

It is a fairly small country to host such diverse communities, particularly when they behave as tribes residing within the confinement of their own territory. Primary tribal thinking conforms a community and a group of people into thinking, believing, and behaving the same way. There is a strong adherence within this group to religion, politics, values, ethnicity, etc. Anything outside this group, or even within this group that might think otherwise is either a traitor or considered literally insane.

“Giordano Bruno was burnt at the stake in 1600 in Italy by his own tribe (the Catholic Church) for his beliefs. These included that the earth orbited the sun and that the stars were distant suns surrounded by their own planets, and that these planets might foster life of their own” (Aquilecchia, 2023). Even if this reality was real and sound to other tribes, his particular beliefs were regarded as a threat.

There is a strong fear of the “other,” of what “others” might do to the tribe, to affect it, change it, or weaken it. Humans evolved throughout the ages to become more individualistic, independent, pursuing dreams, careers, ambitions, but this is not always true, at least not everywhere.

What was initial referred to as tribal thinking and belonging, today more characterized by communal, is still very palpable in Lebanon. According to a piece published in the New York Times,  “The primacy of the individual is still resisted by many cultures, particularly in much of Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America. For if you enshrine the self above all, there’s the danger of dead-ending in solipsism, disavowing the responsibilities of public life in pursuit of a perfected solitude, as if being in the world and being true to oneself are at odds.”

Communities, like tribes require leaders and control. There are a set of rules and behavioral guidelines that need to be followed, and the hierarchy that presides in such tribes makes it easier to manage people. They are in fact small clusters of governments believing to be the highest authority to rule a designated land.

In this Lebanese context, the reference to tribal behavior is not to depict a negative behavior but to showcase that tribalism is instilled, deeply, within the roots of each community, it is an acknowledgment of a group’s identity, of belonging to a specific point of reference or a political/religious persona for that matter.

A small jump in history will help better shed light on the geographical behavior and why this fact seems to be engraved deeper from a generation to another.

The Lebanon we know today is a cluster or small districts that were quite literally mapped out together by the Sykes Picot agreement (Jazeera, n.d.), whereby the British and the French had deliberately redrawn the Middle East and created artificial nations. “The borders of the Middle East were drawn during World War I by a Briton, Mark Sykes, and a Frenchman, Francois Picot. The two diplomats’ pencils divided the map of one of the most volatile regions in the world into states that cut through ethnic and religious communities.”

According to George Antonius (The Economist, 2016), an Arab historian, this was  “a shocking document. [Sykes-Picot] is not only the product of greed at its worst, that is to say, of greed allied to suspicion and so leading to stupidity, it also stands out as a startling piece of double-dealing.”

The drastic division that the agreement had is still tangible today. One can argue that the rise of terrorist activities was just a matter of time, that the explosions of communal competition was a disaster in the making, that the pieces that were put together will eventually shatter to their original and natural state. These tribes and areas were forced into coexistence.

The agreement was signed in 1916. Such divisions and tribal allegiances are as visible today as they were back then. If the Middle East were truly a melting pot, this argument would not stand, but unfortunately, we are far from seeing those dividing lines, blur, on the contrary, time is not weakening differences, it is actually fueling it.

It’ll take years if not centuries for communal or this superior feeling of belonging starts to fade. It’ll take one person at a time to leave the clan and settle elsewhere to pursue a life of their own. One person at a time, and eventually the tribe/community will no longer be so cohesive. Unfortunately for Lebanon, tribal belonging is also being used to further enshrine a leader’s power and role; pushing community members to believe that “without this leader, all our rights will be lost.” Tribes in Lebanese are in reference to the communities that so blindly feel connected through a historic event or, as mentioned, a political/religious leader.

But this communal belonging did not manifest itself due to the Sykes-Picot agreement. Once the mandate ended in 1943, post-mandate Lebanon expanded territorially, which undeniably changed the constitution of the population and its balance.

The aim of France’s Lebanon was to provide the Maronite community with everything that was needed to form a strong Christian ally in the Middle East. They provided the capital Beirut with access to the sea, which was known as Mount Lebanon, and added to it former Ottoman districts of Tripoli, Sidon and the Bekaa Valley to create what was known as the Greater Lebanon as an enlarged state incorporating agriculture lands, ports, mountains and sea. The Maronites were no longer the majority, with time this fact became even more palpable, Maronites today (Minority Rights Group, 2021) account to 21% of the Lebanese population.

These governorates, mainly administrative divisions, date back to centuries before Lebanon’s full independence and have grown to further represent the sectarian residence of the various Lebanese communities. They were viable under the French mandate that ruled Lebanon starting 1923, back then the Maronites were the French’s protegés.

Ottoman Rule

But it’s not the French who instilled this division. The French inherited this from a region that was heavily and directly ruled by the Ottoman Empire. This is where the real divisions started. To further prove how deep these divisions and tribal belonging go to, we need to look beyond the French mandate. We need to go all the way back to the 16th century.

It is important to note that under the indirect Ottoman rule in 1516, Lebanon actually flourished and gained strength. The Ottomans through the Maans, a Druze feudal family, and the Chehabs, a Sunni family who converted to Christianity, ruled Lebanon until the middle of the 19th century.

In 1618, at the hands of Prince Fakhr Eddine, a Druze, Lebanon was on the right track: he modernized the cities, built an army, pushed Lebanon’s borders and managed the different religious communities peacefully, uniting the Druze and Maronites. Such progress and connection to Europe, the ruler brought Tuscan engineers and architects for advancement, away from direct Ottoman rule, which was unacceptable – in order to crush his moves, the Ottomans ordered the Governor of Damascus to attack the ruler. Fakher Eddine was executed in Constantinople in 1635. The unity between Maronites and the Druze lasted, but barely.

Under the Ottoman rule, which lasted until the 1860s, the Lebanese were oppressed, economically with high taxes to be paid to rulers, and had limited capabilities offered by the empire in terms of businesses. By then the Maronites and Druze communities had broken away and were engaged in repetitive civil wars in 1840 and 1860.

Back then there was no “Lebanon”, there were districts, Beirut, Saida, Tripoli and Mount Lebanon. Although there was a high internal exodus in search for a better life and better opportunities, the discrepancy between Mount Lebanon and the rest of the areas was flagrant. With a remaining connection to Europe and the West, Lebanon became increasingly tainted with the western culture and traits, from languages, clothes to architecture, beautifully identified by Karam Rizk (Syro-Lebanese Migration (1880-Present): “Push” and “Pull” Factors, n.d.) as “the irreversible Occidental orientation of Lebanon.”

What comes next will mark the Lebanese nature par excellence and become an actual trademark to the Lebanese nationality.

Lebanese Emigration

We’re in the 1870s; searching for a better life and wanting to flee the local complicated strife – with an undeniable attraction to the west – the Lebanese had no choice but to emigrate. Many left their country, especially Christians… they went to Egypt, parts of Africa, as well as North and South America. They worked hard, opened diverse businesses and were savvy merchants. They would send their remittances back home which constituted back then the backbone of the Lebanese economy. This is still true today.

According to online reports (Shehadi, 2022), “Lebanon is now the world’s most remittance-dependent country, with the payments accounting for a gigantic 53.8% of its gross domestic product in 2021. While it is difficult to determine the full extent to which Lebanese families receive money from abroad, an estimated 15–30% of households in 2022 rely on remittances as a source of income, up from 10% in 2018 and 2019.”

But emigration is not a new phenomenon. As we saw, it’s been part of the Lebanese identity before even its inception. Being a double-edged sword, forced coexistence with a highly volatile political equation is a bad recipe for stability. This is what has always driven Lebanese, specific communities too, to leave in search of a better future.

Segregation for weakness

The direct Ottoman rule was cruel and cunning. In order to rule successfully over such vast lands, headquarters needed to follow the strategy of “divide and conquer”. In other terms the Ottoman Empire purposely divided Lebanon into districts to weaken them and erase any potential common identity they might have for a Lebanon that Fakhr Eddine had initiated.

As previously mentioned, the key to enforcing such a belonging to a tribe was to add a sectarian and religious variable to the equation. And so every district would be sealed with its own political representative/ruler who would conveniently represent the sect. The perfect recipe for any upcoming conflict.

The people became geographically and demographically divided. What adds to the intricacy of this situation is religion which is in direct connection to politics. The political leader became the de-facto religious representative in government.

They created the need for a ruler to protect them from “the others” and thus the tribal behavioral psychology would be constantly charged with fear and on alert to “defend and attack.” In no time, feudal sectarian fights erupted, that’s when the Europeans made their way to the region so stop the fighting and find a permanent solution.

The Ottoman Empire was forced to relinquish a few lands. Lebanon got its regional independence from the empire with its own administration and armed forces. This seeming independence allowed powerful local Lebanese families to reign over the lands and people. These are mostly the same names we see in the headlines today. Which unfortunately gave way to clientelism at its best and a intricate network of corruption and mismanagement of public funds which literally brought the country to its knees.

Lebanon flourished then but was put to the test again in World War I when the Ottoman Empire planned to occupy it and re-appoint a ruler. Bloody fights marked that era, until 1920, when the League of Nations gave France a mandate over Lebanon.

It wasn’t the Ottomans

But what is even more unbelievable is the fact that it was not the Ottomans who divided Lebanon. They were merely undoing Fakhr Eddine’s plan. 

We need to look further back. 7th century coastal Lebanon was home to several indigenous populations: military groups, the Mardaïtes, the Maronites who all established themselves on the land. Arab tribesmen came in after the Muslim conquest in Syria and settled there as well.

And of course, it didn’t stop there (Lebanon | People, Economy, Religion, & History, 2023) “In the 11th century many were converted to the Druze faith […] South Lebanon became the headquarters of the faith.” Shiites settled “on the northern and southern fringes of the mountains and in Al-Biqāʿ. In the coastal towns the population became mainly Sunni Muslim, but in town and country alike there remained considerable numbers of Christians of various sects.”

Lebanon and its regions changed hands throughout the centuries, of note is the 13th century. “Lebanon became part of the Mamlūk state of Egypt and Syria in the 1280s and ’90s and was divided between several provinces. Mamlūk rule, which allowed limited local autonomy to regional leaders, encouraged commerce. The coastal cities, especially Tripoli, flourished, and the people of the interior were left largely free to manage their own affairs.”

Yet another era where Lebanon was divided into districts and rulers, giving them enough independence to flourish but not enough to fully grow. That’s when the Ottomans walked in to defeat the Mamluks.

Modern-Day Lebanese Tribes/Communities

Granted, the tribes we know today are the 2.0 of all tribes, especially in Lebanon. They reside in specific areas, they cluster, they follow the same leader, the same religion, are hardly divided, and refuse to be betrayed or outgrown, even by their own blood. It’s the same division that has always been instilled since 7th century Lebanon.

It’s a pattern and it’s very visible throughout all of Lebanon’s history. Lebanon as we know it was never a united entity – it was always a cluster of districts forced to cohabit under agreements that were made for political gains. The nation was never one – and the coming together of the people never natural or intentional, they were always forced into accepting – if that is even what is currently happening.

We’re in the 21st century, if these lines were to get blurry, they would have by now. According to a World Bank report, “The Spring 2021 Lebanon Economic Monitor found that Lebanon’s economic and financial crisis ranks among the worst economic crises globally since the mid-nineteenth century.”

Today, like always, Lebanese witness on a daily basis a wave of immigration with people seeing no future prospect to survive. According to Al-Monitor (Damaj, 2021), “Lebanon is witnessing one of the biggest waves of emigration in its history as the country faces its worst socio-economic conditions amid a worsening political crisis; Turkey, Armenia, and Georgia have become new destinations.”

It’s a pattern, an actual broken record, that the Lebanese have been unfortunately so used to by now.

Kahlil Gibran (A Quote From the Garden of the Prophet, n.d.), Lebanese-American writer, poet, and philosopher, puts it poetically but with brutal honesty on paper:

“Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpeting, and farewells him with hooting, only to welcome another with trumpeting again.

If a nation so divided is given nothing and no reason to unite, no common goal to reach – then no political power can make them cohabitate peacefully without the threat of fragmentation and collision, constantly knocking on their door. Lebanon is as volatile as ever, with shattered communities, incompetent leadership, and a disjointed identity.

With so many identities, can they truly become a nation under one leadership or will Lebanon have to design itself a new political system under one big roof, that would capitalize on the disparities to enrich and build up, instead of control and break down?

By Marita Kassis