Tom Barrack has made more than one misstep – mistakes that some might even consider political sins. The issue is not simply what he told journalists at Baabda Palace, but the deeper political and strategic implications of his words.
At a time when the government is moving toward the point of no return on Barrack’s proposal, and after failing to secure Israeli guarantees or clear answers, his statements carried a weightier message than their surface meaning. They echoed remarks he made a month earlier about the region’s future map.
Barrack had already stirred controversy with his comments on Bilad al-Sham (Greater Syria) and Syria’s role in it, remarks that coincided with Israeli leaks claiming that Ahmad al-Sharaa had floated the idea of offering Tripoli in exchange for the Golan Heights. Now, once again, Barrack has touched raw nerves, suggesting that Israel no longer recognizes the Sykes-Picot borders and is seeking to redraw them.
It is hardly surprising that Israel would reject Sykes-Picot, since the state came into existence in 1948 – more than three decades after the Anglo-French agreement that set the region’s current borders. Nor is it surprising that Israel would pursue expansionist ambitions, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has voiced openly in recent years. What is striking, however, is that such ideas are being repeated not just in Israeli discourse, but by a US figure of Barrack’s stature. That repetition suggests more than rhetorical provocation; it points to major regional shifts already taking shape.
If talk of redrawing the map proves real, the project will not remain an Israeli one alone. It could encourage other actors to press for their own statelets: Druze, Shia, Kurdish, Alawite and Christian entities alongside the Jewish state, standing in contrast to the current Sunni-majority order. Such fragmentation would reshuffle all the political and sectarian cards in the region.
For Lebanon, the implications are particularly grave. Preserving the country as a unified state within its present borders is becoming increasingly difficult, with threats now emerging from the south, north and east. In the absence of effective diplomacy, tensions are only escalating.
The bottom line is that Lebanon faces three dangerous and even frightening months ahead – whether measured by political calculations or military risks. This will be a sensitive phase in the regional balance of power. For Lebanon, the only viable path forward is clear: it must be the state itself – not armed factions born of its weakness – that holds the reins of negotiation.
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