Lebanon Eyewitness: Watching Iran and Hezbollah's Public Diplomacy (Khatib)

Iran’s latest public diplomacy event has not won Iran new hearts and minds in Lebanon --- [although] those supporting Iran used the occasion to display their loyalty and gratitude --- but it did send a strong message about Iran’s primacy in the local politics of Lebanon to Iran’s dissenters and supporters alike, and an image of solidarity to the Shiites of the Middle East at large. With Iran’s influence on the formation of the next Iraqi government taking precedence over other external influences (neither the USA nor Saudi Arabia has managed to push its own preferred candidates for the position of prime minister), and with Bahrain’s forthcoming parliamentary election witnessing arrests of Shiite activists ahead of the election, Ahmadinejad’s visit to Lebanon is perhaps Iran’s shrewdest public diplomacy statement about where it stands, and where it wants to be in the region’s political game.

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