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Lebanon’s National Dialogue began in early March 2006 as an effort to generate consensus between the country’s major parliamentary factions – namely the March 8 and March 14 coalitions – on several controversial issues, most of which related to the broader debate over Syria’s role in Lebanese politics. MP Boulous participated in the Dialogue as a member of the independent Christian bloc within the March 14 coalition, and in support of MP Boutros Harb, one of the fourteen principal politicians attending the talks.

According to Boulous, Dialogue participants unanimously agreed to support the UN investigation of the Hariri assassination. The participants further agreed that weapons outside Palestinian refugee camps would be collected by August 2007, and that relations with Syria would be normalized, while Lebanon’s sovereignty would remain protected. Finally, and as a consequence of Hezbollah’s opposition to any demarcation of the Lebanon-Syria border, dialogue participants agreed to delineate the border nominally. Any substantive border demarcation would be delayed so long as Israel continued its occupation of the Shebaa Farms.

Among the Dialogue’s principal failures was its inability to determine a successor to President Emile Lahoud. Boulous described the participants as “very much in conflict” concerning both Lahoud’s replacement and the question of the constitutionality of Lahoud’s term extension. The March 14 coalition considered Parliament’s extension of Lahoud’s term in 2004 to have been the result of Syrian pressure. Similarly, the Dialogue’s participants were unable to resolve the broader question of Hezbollah’s role in the Lebanese polity. In outlining Hezbollah’s justifications for maintaining its armaments, Boulous cited Israel’s occupation of the Shebaa Farms, its refusal to present Lebanon with maps to the landmines left in 2000, its continuing imprisonment of Lebanese citizens, and its incursions into Lebanese territory. Subsequently, Boulous speculated that one of Hezbollah’s aims in maintaining an armed resistance toward Israel was to reduce popular pressure on the Syrian and Iranian governments to confront Israel directly.

Following the June 25 capture of Cpl. Gilad Shalit, the issue of Hezbollah’s arms dramatically increased in salience, while debate over a clash between the group and Israel consumed subsequent negotiations. Boulous described the concern among participants that Hezbollah would open a “second front,” potentially dragging Lebanon into conflict with Israel and, at the very least, disrupting a summer tourism season essential to the Lebanese economy. However, Boulous explained that Hezbollah had assured the Dialogue participants that “nothing would happen, at least until the end of the summer.”

According to Boulous, the significance of the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict lay in its shattering of “closely held certainties.” These certainties included the myths of “the invincibility of Israeli arms” and the infallibility of Hezbollah’s Secretary General, Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah, who later said that he would not have ordered the capture of the two Israeli soldiers had he foreseen Israel’s reaction. The conflict also dispelled the notion that both Syria and Iran were indispensable to Lebanese foreign policy, as evidenced by the fact that the conflict was ultimately resolved by the UN Security Council. Finally, the conflict did away with the idea that the Lebanese polity could survive peacefully while also accommodating an armed Hezbollah.

The UN’s continuing investigation of the assassination of Prime Minister Hariri presented an additional complication to Lebanon-Syria relations, especially given what Boulous characterized as a lack of full Syrian cooperation. While the report stopped short of issuing indictments, and could perhaps best be described as “a snapshot of the investigation,” Boulous expressed his satisfaction that the logistics of the assassination were determined and that the violence and terrorism in events surrounding the assassination shared a “commonality of motives.”

Ultimately, Boulous presented a series of issues, the resolution of which, he argued, should consume not only future Lebanese politics, but also the attention of the international community. These include the Lebanese presidential elections, the dispute over the Israel-occupied Shebaa Farms, and the enforcement of Resolution 1701 and other UN Resolutions dealing with the Israel-Palestine conflict. Boulous stressed the “centrality” of the Israel-Palestine conflict, particularly in its capacity to beget terrorism and produce regional instability, and argued that its resolution was a prerequisite for a solution on the border disputes between Lebanon, Syria, and Israel. Finally, while he did not comment on specific democratization efforts, Boulous insisted that the “international community stands or falls depending on a liberal Middle East.”