Although it is now to a large degree defunct, the U.S. Committee for a Free Lebanon (USCFL), founded in 1997 by investment banker Ziad Abdelnour, describes itself as the "Cyber-Center for Pro-Lebanon Activism." The USCFL was part of a network of tightly linked hardline and neoconservative organizations that helped champion an expansive war on terror after 9/11. The group was also one of the leading proponents of the "Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003," which President George W. Bush signed on December 12, 2003. Since the bill was signed into law, USCFL's website has gone largely unchanged, with only a few postings since late 2003. The USCFL includes on its site links to another mostly defunct effort of the right, the Middle East Intelligence Bulletin, which until July 2004 was jointly published by USCFL and the Daniel Pipes-led Middle East Forum (MEF).
Like Ahmed Chalabi, who was chief of the London-based and previously U.S.-financed Iraqi National Congress (INC), Abdelnour is an expatriate investment banker. (For more on Abdelnour's business dealings, see "THCG Appoints Senior Investment Bankers," Business Wire, December 14, 1999). Abdelnour has also lobbied the Bush administration and Congress for a U.S. foreign policy that mirrors the hardline position of Israel's Likud Party, specifically its call to eliminate Hezbollah and obstruct Syrian intervention in Lebanon. In the middle of the 2006 summer war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, the USCFL founder told New York Times reporter Landon Thomas Jr.: "'There is no other way but to absolutely annihilate Hezbollah,' Mr. Abdelnour said. 'I bleed when I see my country suffering like this, but you can't build a Hong Kong and harbor terrorists. The Lebanese cannot have their cake and eat it, too'" (New York Times, August 1, 2006).
A self-described "non-profit, non-sectarian think tank," USCFL claims that it aims to rid the Middle East of "dictatorships, radical ideologies, existential conflicts, border disagreements, political violence, and weapons of mass destruction." To help advance its goals, the organization enlisted the support of a number of core neoconservative figures. The USCFL's "Golden Circle," a group of "core activists and supporters" who provided "invaluable support toward the Lebanese cause at large and in shaping U.S foreign policy toward Lebanon," included many who occupied posts in the George W. Bush administration, including Elliott Abrams, Richard Perle, Paula Dobriansky, Michael Rubin, Douglas Feith, and David Wurmser. Other prominent neoconservatives in the Golden Circle were Frank Gaffney of the Center for Security Policy (CSP), Jeane Kirkpatrick, Michael Ledeen, David Steinmann, Rachel Ehrenfeld, and Eleana Benador. Also included in this circle of those who have donated $1,000 or more to USCFL is Rep. Eliot Engel (D-NY), the congressional representative who was the main sponsor of the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003.
Golden Circle members were a well-connected right-wing bunch; organizations associated with them included the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), the Center for Security Policy, the Middle East Forum, the Hudson Institute, and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs. USCFL has a long list of "strongly recommended" readings by authors including Bill Kristol, Pipes, and Abdelnour.
In 1999, Abdelnour founded the Middle East Intelligence Bulletin (MEIB), which was USCFL's monthly online publication. In 2002, Pipes of the MEF became a co-publisher. Gary C. Gambill, an MEF and Freedom House associate, was editor, and Rubin served on the editorial board. The bulletin concentrated on "internal political developments in the Middle East, especially those that are thinly covered in other English-language publications." Its last issue, published in June/July 2004, contained articles that linked Hezbollah to the West African diamond trade, extolled the purported successes of the Bush administration's democracy agenda in the Middle East, and assessed the commitment of Turkey's leading Islamist party to pro-Western foreign policies.
In 2000, Pipes and Abdelnour wrote a report that advocated the use of U.S. military action to force Syria out of Lebanon and to disarm Syria of its alleged weapons of mass destruction. Virtually all 31 signatories of this MEF report, which was used to persuade Congress to introduce and pass the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003, were USCFL members. (See Daniel Pipes and Ziad Abdelnour, "Ending Syria's Occupation of Lebanon: The U.S. Role?" Middle East Forum, 2000.)
The report alleged that "Syrian rule in Lebanon stands in direct opposition to American ideals," and it lamented Washington's habit since 1983 of engaging rather than confronting the regime, the only government on the State Department's "terrorism" list with which Washington has full diplomatic relations. The so-called Lebanon Study Group urged a policy of confrontation, beginning with tough economic and diplomatic sanctions that could not be waived by the president and, if necessary, military force. "The Vietnam legacy and the sour memories of dead American Marines in Beirut notwithstanding," the group wrote, "the United States has entered a new era of undisputed military supremacy coupled with an appreciable drop in human losses on the battlefield." The group also warned: "This opens the door to a similar decision to act for Lebanon's endangered freedoms and pluralism. But this opportunity may not wait, for as weapons-of-mass-destruction capabilities spread, the risks of such action will rapidly grow." This argument was eerily similar to those made by hawks prior to the U.S.-led Iraq invasion. "If there is to be decisive action, it will have to be sooner rather than later" (see Jim Lobe, "Calls to Attack Syria Come from a Familiar Choir of Hawks," Foreign Policy In Focus, April 16, 2003).
The Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003, which received overwhelming support in both the House and the Senate, is a public law that aims: "To halt Syrian support for terrorism, end its occupation of Lebanon, stop its development of weapons of mass destruction, cease its illegal importation of Iraqi oil and illegal shipments of weapons and other military items to Iraq, and by so doing hold Syria accountable for the serious international security problems it has caused in the Middle East, and for other purposes." It is designed to punish Damascus for its alleged links to terrorist groups and its alleged efforts to develop weapons of mass destruction. It bans all transfers of "dual-use" technology to Syria.
The act also recommended an arsenal of sanctions against Syria, including: reducing diplomatic contacts with Syria, banning U.S. exports (except food and medicine) to Syria, prohibiting U.S. businesses from investing or operating in Syria, restricting the travel of Syrian diplomats in the United States, banning Syrian aircraft from operating in the United States, and freezing Syrian assets in the United States. Although the bill obligated the executive branch to enact at least two of the recommended sanctions, it does permit the president to waive the sanctions if it is determined that they would harm U.S. national security (see the text of the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003, http://www.gotc.org/pdf/act2003.pdf).
Commenting on passage of the act in the House, analyst Ian Williams observed that it "could be dismissed as mere pandering by legislators eager to prove how earnestly pro-Israel they are in the run-up to a costly election campaign." But, "in fact, the honorable gentlemen and women have lent their names and votes to a set of assertions that paves a forensic trail for tanks on the Road to Damascus. ... The Accountability Act, and a host of statements from the usual suspects in the administration, invoke every spurious reason for action against Damascus that led to the current quicksand in Baghdad. Support for terrorism, possession of weapons of mass destruction, and indeed harboring Iraqi Ba'athists and the missing weapons. Congressmen who may well oppose the idea of another war would find it difficult to deny their votes of alleged Syrian perfidy that matches anything concocted against Iraq" (Ian Williams, "Road to Damascus," Foreign Policy In Focus, November 24, 2003).
Following the bombing that killed former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, the USCFL released a statement on February 14, 2005 that concluded that "Syria's days are numbered." According to USCFL, "With the killing of Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in Lebanon, Syrian Ba'athists are out of control. Who's next? It is anybody's guess at this time given the timid policies of the United States vis-à-vis Syria. Syrians are killing Americans, Iraqis, and Lebanese and we still 'talk' to them through diplomacy. Please join us in being as voiceful as you can by writing and appearing on every media outlet you can think of to push for the agenda of REGIME CHANGE in Syria. This is the ONLY way to save the United States from the egregious Ba'athist policies, to liberate Lebanon, and to save Syrians from the Nazi Ba'athists. Obviously, with Prime Minister Hariri joining the opposition and teaming up with Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, his block was going to win the majority of the seats for Beirut and win the Christian vote ... which was the only way for the Syrians to stop him."
The USCFL promoted several petitions to further its goals. One such petition, written by Abdelnour and addressed to "All Lebanese Citizens Everywhere," declared that "Regime Change in Syria and Lebanon Is an Absolute Must."
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Contact Information:
U.S. Committee for a Free Lebanon
445 Park Avenue, 9th floor
New York, NY 10022
Fax: (212) 202-6166
www.freelebanon.org
info@freelebanon.org
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