Druze leader Walid Jumblatt has announced his departure from the March 14 coalition.
Jumblatt takes with him a bloc of eleven votes, which greatly dents the victory of pro-Western March 14 coalition in the June parliamentary elections. Jumblatt has stated that his bloc will not be joining the pro-Syrian March 8 bloc, but will maintain a centrist stance with President Sleiman.
Jumblatt’s Progressive Socialist Party has been losing ground in the areas it once considered strongholds, and this move will insure that he is courted by all sides in major political decisions going forward.
Some point to the departure as a loss for the United States and a win for Hizballah, which may prove to be the case, but Jumblatt only left March 14 after the United States and Saudi Arabia demonstrated their willingness to reconcile with the Assad regime. It is unlikely that Jumblatt would have done so if this had not been the case, and its unclear how stalwart a supporter of March 8 he would be if Washington and Riyadh changed their minds about Damascus.
The thing most clearly demonstrated here is that political alliances in Lebanon are as fluid as ever.
