THE MIDDLE EAST: Fires Burning

Only last July the flames of aggression blazed so high in the Middle East that the U.S. and Britain dispatched emergency fire fighters to Lebanon and Jordan, and the whole world scrambled for the summit in asbestos suits. Last week, on the strength of International Fire Chief Dag Hammarskjold’s diplomatic finding that the flames were now well under control, the U.S. and Britain announced that they would pull all their men out of the two little countries by month’s end.

To “keep under purview the adherence of all” Arab neighbors to the amity pledge they gave in last summer’s U.N. resolution, Hammarskjold set up in Jordan’s capital of Amman a new “U.N. organ,” in the person of Under Secretary Pier P. Spinelli of Italy. He in turn would have other watchdogs in Beirut and Damascus —but not in Cairo, where President Nasser insists there is no need of any.

Though his crown is as precariously perched as when the British arrived last summer, Jordan’s young King Hussein last week said he could now run his own show, released political prisoners in droves, and talked blissfully of his hopes for better relations with his Arab neighbors. Perhaps he counted on Nasser’s being too busy with his own internal problems, or too leary of Israel to start something.

As for luckless Lebanon, it showed signs of turning into an uglier situation than the one the U.S. went in to reverse. This time it is the Christian half of the populace, rallying closer to former President Camille Chamoun than they did when he was in office, who are the rebels. Chamoun now excoriates the U.S. for endorsing a regime that contains only his enemies. Just as Chamoun swung too Westward for Lebanon’s Moslems to stomach, now the rebelled Cabinet swings too far toward Nasser for Chamoun and the Christians to tolerate.

Led by a tough street mob belonging to the Christian Phalange,* the new rebels have tied up the streets and shops of Beirut with strikes and rioting more effectively than the Moslem rebels ever did. Last week, as more than a dozen Lebanese died, the new President, Fuad Chehab, was providing continuing proof of his immense capacity for doing nothing. As another 1,000 U.S. soldiers were evacuated, U.S. officials fretted over the danger of religious warfare between Christians and Moslems.

* Modeled after the disciplined Fascist groups its leader admired on a trip to Italy and Germany in 1936.