Power in Lebanon isn’t about track records, courageous leadership, or bold vision. It’s about leverage—the ability to obstruct, disrupt, or threaten effectively. If you can halt parliamentary sessions, shut down the airport, or flood the streets with armed supporters, you hold power. This dangerous metric rewards destruction over construction and has kept Lebanon in a perpetual state of crisis.
As discussions about reconstruction take center stage, it’s crucial to examine this entrenched culture—not just in Lebanon but across the region. This is why the moment following our new government’s vote of confidence in parliament feels so significant. For the first time, obstruction seems nearly impossible, opening a rare opportunity to build and move forward rather than clinging stubbornly to failed tactics of the past.
This isn’t just a Lebanese phenomenon—many fragile states and conflict-prone societies operate on similar rules. But in Lebanon, this logic has been deeply entrenched in the political, economic, and even social fabric of the country. The ability to wield disruption as a weapon has been systematized, legitimized, and even romanticized. Worse yet, it has made some completely live in denial, insisting they were victorious even after signing a surrender.
The Power to Break, Not Build
At the heart of this issue is a political class that has always seen governance as a zero-sum game. The goal isn’t to create a better system but to secure enough leverage to either force others into concessions or prevent them from advancing without consent. Hezbollah exemplifies this strategy perfectly. It has operated outside the state while holding veto power over its decisions, maintaining an armed force beyond the reach of Lebanon’s legal and political institutions. But that reality is fading, if not entirely gone. Even Naim Qassem, in a speech during Hassan Nasrallah’s funeral, admitted as much.
When Michel Aoun’s bloc boycotted parliamentary sessions for two years to prevent a president from being elected, they were ultimately rewarded with the presidency. Even now, after 15 years in power with nothing to show for it, his son-in-law’s only real political agenda revolves around securing the “Christian share” of seats. When Hezbollah and its allies paralyzed government functions in 2011 by walking out, they successfully collapsed the cabinet.
Even during the October 17 uprising, protesters realized that blocking roads and disrupting daily life were far more effective at pressuring the government than any traditional form of political participation—because those channels had already been rendered useless. The system is structured so that disruption becomes the only viable tool for change—an indictment of the system itself.
A System Built for Permanent Stalemate
The Lebanese system rewards veto power and obstruction, creating a political culture where compromise is seen as weakness. Other countries have opposition parties that challenge those in power through policy debates or electoral strategies. In Lebanon, opposition is expressed through threats: If you don’t give me what I want, I will shut everything down.
This extends beyond politics into business and daily life. Economic monopolies are protected not by market forces but by the implicit threat of chaos if they are challenged. Entire industries operate on wasta, the unspoken understanding that power comes from being able to manipulate and exploit the system, not from contributing to it.
The result is a country perpetually frozen, unable to move forward because every faction—political or otherwise—holds the power to bring everything to a halt but has no incentive to build something sustainable. After all, why put in the work when your entire platform is based on “the others are stealing, so we must take our share too”? And sadly, partisans buy into it. The focus is always on how to weaken the perceived existential enemy, never on how to strengthen ourselves to better withstand future crises.
Hezbollah proudly flaunted its rockets but had no plan for the hundreds of thousands of Lebanese who would be displaced as a result. It was left to ordinary people—many of whom had suffered under Hezbollah’s rule—to take in the internally displaced, left stranded by Nasrallah’s unilateral decision to launch an all-out war against Israel.
This culture of disruption as power extends beyond Lebanon. Take the Houthis, for example. Their entire identity revolves around their ability to cause chaos—whether it’s launching missiles at Saudi Arabia and the UAE or, more recently, reveling in their ability to disrupt maritime traffic in the Red Sea. They frame these acts as victories, yet they offer no real vision for governance, no strategy for economic development, and no plan to improve the lives of Yemenis. Their only currency is disruption—one that punishes not just their adversaries but the very Arab countries they claim to defend.
And then there’s the Iranian regime, the patron of this entire ecosystem of destruction. Tehran loves to promise post-war reconstruction aid for Lebanon, Syria, and even Gaza, yet it can’t even keep the lights on at home. But when it comes to weapons? The regime always seems to find the money. While Iranian citizens struggle under economic collapse, their government spared no expense to prop up Bashar al-Assad’s slaughterhouses and ensure Hezbollah’s grip on Lebanon and Syria remained well-stocked. Before it all crumbled under the weight of its own corruption and decay, Hezbollah once fashioned itself as a "resistance movement." Today, it has fully morphed into a mercenary force, serving the highest bidder in whatever conflict Tehran deems beneficial for the negotiations it strives for with the West.
The parallels are clear: whether it’s Hezbollah, the Houthis, or the Iranian regime itself, power is defined not by the ability to build, but by the capacity to destroy. And as long as this remains the measure of influence in the region, real progress will remain just out of reach.
Breaking the Cycle
Lebanon’s real crisis is not just economic or political—it is cultural. The idea that power is measured by one’s ability to obstruct rather than create has shaped the country’s trajectory for decades. And while Hezbollah’s role in this dynamic is undeniable, so is the complicity of every major political faction that has operated within the same logic. On brinksmanship, on freezing the status quo, even if it meant working with Riad Salameh to literally steal our deposits and savings from our bank accounts.
Breaking this cycle requires a fundamental shift in how power is conceptualized. It requires a move away from transactional politics where concessions are only made under duress. It means abandoning the glorification of "strong leaders" who prove their strength by their ability to disrupt and threaten. It means rejecting the idea that chaos is the only available currency in Lebanese politics.
The challenge is immense because the entire system—from its sectarian structures to its patronage networks—thrives on maintaining the status quo. But as Lebanon continues its freefall, the alternative is clear: either we redefine power, or we remain trapped in this cycle of self-inflicted paralysis.
This is why Nawaf Salam and Joseph Aoun worked so hard to ensure there would be no clear “obstructing third”—yet another Lebanese political invention designed to paralyze governance. Without it, the cabinet has at least a fighting chance to begin the reconstitution of a Lebanese state—one that Hezbollah and its collaborators from the sectarian parties have meticulously dismantled over decades.
In other words, let’s redefine strength and success as building ourselves up—our institutions, our economy, and our capabilities—rather than measuring them by how much “pain we inflict.” Especially when that pain is negligible compared to what we’ve endured: over 4,000 killed and $10 billion in damages.
Let’s try building for once instead of destroying. We’ve seen where destruction leads—it has never served us. So why not choose a different path this time?
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