By Faiza Saleh Ambah
Special to The Washington Post
Monday, July 24, 2006; A12

JIDDAH, Saudi Arabia, July 23 -- The war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon has created widespread public support for the militant Shiite group among people across the Arab world, but leaders appear uneasy about the conflict and fear it could boost the influence of Hezbollah's patron Iran, analysts say.

Thousands of Egyptians and Jordanians have protested the Israeli assault, now in its second week, and hundreds of Saudis have signed petitions demanding a cease-fire. Many in the region have praised Hezbollah for its willingness to fight Israel.

But analysts say the governments of Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt want a weakened and disarmed Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia that sparked the Israeli assault by kidnapping two Israeli soldiers on July 12. Leaders have criticized Hezbollah, which has since fired hundreds of rockets into Israel, for the cross-border raid and blamed it for provoking the massive Israeli offensive.

Adding to the tension is the widespread concern in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan -- all U.S. allies -- about Iran's growing regional influence, analysts said.

"There are two things that are wrong here: Hezbollah is armed, and its allegiance is to Iran. This doesn't help stability in Lebanon, and it makes it worse that Iran is trying to put Hezbollah in its sphere of influence, which extends from Iraq to Syria to Lebanon," said Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi writer and an adviser to the Saudi Embassy in Washington.

Jordan's King Abdullah, whose country hosts more than 1 million Iraqi refugees, the majority of them Shiites, has often warned about the ascendancy of Shiite dominance in the region. Iran and Iraq are predominantly Shiite, as is Hezbollah.

Abdullah "wants to stop the spread of Shiite influence in the region. He thinks Hezbollah's decisions are made in Tehran, and that Hezbollah's actions were timed so as to distract from international pressure on Iran's nuclear program," said Riyadh Mansour, international affairs editor at Addustour newspaper in Jordan.

While rebuking Hezbollah, most Arab governments hope the United States, through Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, can persuade its ally Israel to cease hostilities, analysts say, because each day the assault continues, they lose popularity and the respect of their people.

"Arab governments want Rice to come and impose a cease-fire because their citizens are watching Lebanese people being killed and injured on television every night, and Arab governments feel deep embarrassment," said Abdel-Monem Said Aly, director of the al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo.

Photos of Lebanese toddlers killed by Israeli missile strikes and lying dead amid the rubble have been on the front pages of daily papers across the region, and activists have circulated dozens of e-mails with graphic photos of Lebanese civilians and children killed or wounded in the strikes. Satellite stations al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya have broadcast blanket coverage of the crisis.

The ongoing conflict has exposed the weakness and powerlessness of Arab governments, said Khalid al-Dakhil, assistant professor of political sociology at King Saud University in Riyadh. "They can't fight, and they can't bring peace. Not only can they not stand up to Israel or the United States; they're not even able to get a cease-fire."

As Israel has continued its attacks on Lebanon's infrastructure, and Hezbollah has fought back, support for the Shiite militia has spiked across the region, turning its leader, Hasan Nasrallah, into an Arab hero. In demonstrations in Cairo and Amman, Jordan, protesters carried giant posters of Nasrallah and burned Israeli and U.S. flags. They also criticized their governments for not supporting Hezbollah.

The fact that Arab governments have not stepped in to end the assault, or even threatened to, has made their populations question why they spend so much on weapons, said Sulaiman al-Hattlan, editor in chief of Forbes Arabia. "Regional governments buy billions of dollars in weapons. Their people are now asking, what is all this military equipment for, is it just to keep their own populations in check?"

Political justifications for the fighting have failed to ease the anger about the destruction in Lebanon, Hattlan said.

"Iran could be using Hezbollah as a political tool, but to the man and woman on the street, watching the carnage in Lebanon on their television sets every night, that kind of political justification is not convincing to them," he said.

Though the United States, Israel and others have designated Hezbollah and Hamas, the militant Palestinian group, as terrorist organizations, many Arabs view them as the only Arabs willing to resist and engage Israel, a widespread view shrewdly exploited by Nasrallah, who has been in hiding since the strikes began.

In an al-Jazeera interview broadcast several times Thursday and Friday, Nasrallah, wearing glasses and a black turban, with a large yellow and green Hezbollah flag behind him, appeared calm and unruffled. Despite several attempts on his life and daily Israeli missile strikes on Hezbollah positions across Lebanon, Nasrallah smiled and laughed, and said his morale and that of his fighters was high.

Nasrallah said Hezbollah would not release the two Israeli soldiers except as part of a swap for Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails, and defined survival as victory for his group. He also described Hezbollah's role as the only viable counter to Israel.

"A defeat in Lebanon will end the region's resistance movements, the Palestinian cause and impose Israel's conditions for a settlement," he said. "A defeat for us is a defeat for the whole Muslim nation."

Saudi lawyer Bassem Alem said Hezbollah's popularity stemmed from its "ability and willingness to strike at Israel, which has been killing Palestinians and Lebanese and grabbing Arab land for decades with impunity." The war on Lebanon has "created a clear and undeniable schism between the Arab public and the region's rulers," he said.

Though Hezbollah's popularity in the Arab world has for the most part been widespread across borders and sects, in Saudi Arabia the response to the Shiite militia has been more nuanced.

A leading Saudi Wahhabi cleric, Abdullah bin Jibreen, this week issued a fatwa, or edict, saying it was a sin to support or pray for Hezbollah, which strict Wahhabis view as an infidel group because it is Shiite. Bin Jibreen, a member of Saudi Arabia's higher religious council, said that he viewed Hezbollah as an enemy doing bidding for Iran, and that through it Tehran was trying to extend its influence in the region.

Saudi writer Yousef al-Dayni said the reaction of most Saudis has been confused and blurred by the government's position on Hezbollah and bin Jibreen's fatwa. "Some activists and intellectuals want to follow the government line and blame Hezbollah. Some believe this is a war between Iran and Syria and Israel, through Hezbollah by proxy. Some have called for the support of Hezbollah, and others just want to support the Lebanese people," he said. "The extremists influenced by bin Jibreen's fatwa believe this is a fight between Jews and Shiites and the rest of us should not get involved."