Lebanese Fearful After Leader's Murder

It's hard for them to remain relevant if they remain silent.

Zaki,

A few more weeks and Hezbollah will call for free elections again, and may win

This is the exact reason why I doubt Hezbollah has anything to do with it. Pierre Gemayel is not important at all (he barely won his seat the last election, and that is only due to political deals between parties). I will not even talk about his party (which is formed by his grandfather) because it's beside the point right now.
In summary, it doesn't make any sense for Hezbollah or Syria for this matter to want to assassinate this specific guy. The other reason might be to create chaos. The question is about who does benefit from that. The suspects can vary greatly in this case and since I'm away from home I'm not sure I can provide a deep analysis about that. Regardless, if what you said is true, about Hezbollah being able to win the elections (which actually quite possible, since they did last elections), then I don't see why creating trouble is to their own benefit.

Now regarding the stories about Hezbollah wanting veto power and all this hype, I will relate to you the little I know from reading the news occasionally and talking with my friends and family in Lebanon: While my brother for example told me how angry he is about what Hassan Nasrallah is doing and that he's going to cause a civil war, a friend of mine (a leftist) disagrees. She said it's not true that Nasrallah is asking for veto power and that he's actually working with other parties too (i.e. asking for their representation too). These parties include the Awn party and the communist party among others. The idea is that the people in the government right now do not really represent the majority of the people. So, when you read in the press about them being the majority, it only means that they are the majority in the Parliament. Since they are the majority and corrupt, they are being able to take very dangerous decisions affecting the whole country and we will not be able to do anything about it, thus the urgency of the new elections. I guess they were also asking for a change in the system which my friend claim is not a veto power; only more power for non-represented elements (not only Hezbollah).

I just wanted to mention that because people commenting here know nothing about the internal affairs of Lebanon and their comments are only driven by personal biases whether they are with or against Hezbollah.

Thanks for this analysis, Zeina. I think you're pretty close to the truth.

Actually, Zeina, last time we talked about Nasrallah I was misinformed. I still believe he is a dangerous man though... all politicians in Lebanon are.
In any case, what Nasrallah is asking for is not democratic (That's why it makes sense). In a democracy, the majority rules. The only time you have a coalition government is when there's no clear majority in the parliament. Now you know I can't care less about democracy. It's a ridiculous system, and it doesn't work in Lebanon anyway. The majority can't rule here because we'll end up with a civil war. Nasrallah wants every political force in Lebanon represented in the government, but that's only because his allies are not represented. He will never get that anyway. The Lebanese don't want to share the country. Each group wants to rule the other, and that will probably be the cause of their demise. Of course, I might be wrong... I sure hope I am. Do you think we'll ever have a communist minister? That would be so cool! :o)

If you pay attention to my comment, you will notice that I did not say that Hezbollah was involved in this, but rather they can profit from this outcome. I think this was sub-contracted by a someone who wanted to create chaos, and it does not necessarily means that he's Syrian.

Nasrallah has a plan with Lebanon, and I am positive that he would ideally want to take full control of the nation. The Israel troops pulling out was such a blow to Israel, and Nasrallah profited from it. After they left, you could see Hezbollah in the streets handing out money to individuals who lost everything. I know he wants to push Israel more and more, basically he wants them to make bigger mistakes, as they did by invading Lebanon yet again. He will probably work with Iran's Ahmadinejad.

Nasrallah wins the war (Economist.com, Aug 17th, 2006)

Things are really looking grim. I am neither for or against Hezbollah, I just want them to coexist with others, and Israel is not making it easy by over-exaggerating constantly. You don't invade with a country because two soldiers were kidnapped. You work with the authorities of that country and use diplomacy first. Don't give me that "oooh, they wouldn't cooperate, we had to invade". Yeah, as if invasion made things so much better.

You don't invade with a country because two soldiers were kidnapped. You work with the authorities of that country and use diplomacy first.

Exactly. Israel has wanted control of the Litani River since the early days of Zionism, and they thought they could pull it off this time. The kidnapped soldiers were just an excuse for the land grab.

Here we go again back to stupid talk. Israel never did and does not occupy any part of Lebanon. Except for the security zone that they left on their own about 5 years ago. All they want is a peaceful boarder and to make sure the only water source they have is not blocked or poisoned. All Hizbolah wants is to turn Lebanon into another Iran.

Yes, and he belongs to a fascist party, but that doesn't mean it's OK to assassinate him. I think this is very bad news for Lebanon and I'm very weary of the consequences.