Gulf news  by Joseph A. Kechichian, Beirut: For nearly a century, academic works touted the analysis that
Western powers “created artificial nations” in the Eastern
Mediterranean, allegedly because Syria, Lebanon and Palestine were
deprived of historical legacies.

For just as long, Arab
nationalists and Islamists alike focused on the “Sykes-Picot order”, and
argued that the time was long overdue to erase the 1916 accord among
two leading colonial powers that divided the region to serve their
narrow interests.

Beyond simplified analyses, critical assessments
of the agreement overlooked the notion that Lebanon (as well as Syria
and Palestine) were not “artificial creations” but, on the contrary,
benefited from the deal to join the nation-state system, still the most
successful business model that functioned, protected citizens, and
allowed for the creation of wealth even if the major powers sought to
protect oil resources and communication lines.

Lebanon came into
existence in 1920 and gained full independence from France in 1943
though historians perceived wartime alliances that emerged throughout
the area with fear.

That was natural given nearly 600 years of
Ottoman occupation, though the Arab Revolt that mobilised hundreds of
thousands fell victim to local ambitions as Sharif Hussain sought
recognition of his “Arab Kingdom”, which neither Britain nor France
accepted.

It was then that Sykes-Picot came into being and, in the words of
Lebanon’s pre-eminent historian, Kamal Salibi, “France gave up her claim
to the vilayat [province] of Mosul in return for a major share in … the
Iraq Petroleum Company … [and] direct control over the coastal parts of
the vilayat of Aleppo and its share of the vilayet of Beirut.”

This
was, of course, imperial perfidy that, in the words of George Antonius,
stood as “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”. Still, for Paris, the agreement defined territories it
claimed in Syria and along its Mediterranean coastline.

Lebanon,
perhaps the lone success of the 1916 accord, was nevertheless caught in a
string of wars that crippled its political institutions not because of
any demographic shifts that favoured a growing Muslim population — even
if some of that was accurate — but, far more important, because Syria
never reconciled itself to its creation as an independent state.

For
decades, Syrian nationalists believed that Lebanon was an integral part
of their country, sent their military to occupy it in 1976 — remained
in occupation for nearly three decades — and even claimed that the
Shebaa Farms in southern Lebanon were part of Syria.

A century
after Sykes-Picot, Middle Eastern borders remained volatile. Syrian
nationalists continue to call for unity schemes to replace the
imperialist legacy. Most recently, Daesh said it wanted to “smash
Sykes-Picot” when it established their so-called Islamic caliphate state
on territory it captured in Iraq and Syria in 2014. In a prophetic 2014
essay, Jihad Al Zein lamented in his Al Nahar column that “practically speaking, Lebanon has lost the Sunni northern coast and the Shiite northern Bekaa”.

If
one wanted a wider symbolic image, it would be this: only Mount Lebanon
and the area of Ashrafieh in Beirut remain effectively a part of
Lebanon politically. Syria’s national movement has effectively retaken
all those regions forcibly lopped off by the French imperial power and
joined to “Greater Lebanon”.He concluded his prescient essay by stating:
“We do not wish to be annexed to the wider Syrian entity. We want to
remain within ‘Greater Lebanon’.”