In Beirut, a Crisis Settles Into a Routine

BEIRUT -- On the 124th day of Lebanon's deepest crisis since its civil war ended in 1990, lawmakers from across the divide gathered in the parliament. There was no session; the speaker has refused to call one, in a test of wills between the government and its opposition. So in the entryway, each side's representatives approached a podium and reiterated their demands, a little ritually.

The rest of the lawmakers then spent the morning in a scene that approached the surreal, given the stakes: Across a marble floor, they kissed the cheeks of their avowed enemies, shared cigarettes, exchanged jokes and engaged in the kind of small talk that prompts chuckles.

"We're all lovebirds," quipped Ali Bazzi, a member of the opposition.

Lebanon's standoff has entered its fifth month, and the questions driving it are still decisive for the country's future: Whose patrons -- the United States, France and Saudi Arabia for the government, Syria and Iran for the opposition -- have the biggest say in its politics? Which community -- Sunni Muslim or Shiite Muslim -- is ascendant? What posture should Lebanon take toward Israel?

But as the weeks pass, the unusual has become ordinary -- a blessing and a curse for a country rarely free of crisis. The sense of routine has removed the crackling tension of the confrontation's early weeks, but many believe it has made resolving it seem less urgent, as well.

While representatives of each side joked in the parliament Tuesday, a sit-in downtown convened by the Shiite movement Hezbollah and its allies in the opposition displayed yet another element of permanence: Protesters divided into 11 teams and played their weekly soccer tournament in a deserted parking lot. Some of their tents have wooden doors, satellite television and even solar panels. Dozens of businesses in the city center have shuttered, because the protest keeps customers away, but a mile or so farther off other nightspots are booming, packed with revelers well past midnight. Partisan media still deride the other side as illegitimate -- be it Prime Minister Fouad Siniora's cabinet or President Emile Lahoud, who is allied with the opposition -- but many people have simply turned down the volume on their televisions.

"Life goes on," said Raymond Asseily, who runs a music store near the American University of Beirut. "We are Lebanese, and we have had 30 years of crisis since the civil war began in 1975.

"It will never stop. This crisis will never stop," he added. "There may be a solution, but it will only amount to a 'meanwhile.' "

"I'm ready to talk about anything but politics," interjected a customer, 42-year-old Nabil Mroue. "I'm sick of politics."

Even Hasan Nasrallah, Hezbollah's leader, appeared to suggest the crisis could become a permanent status quo.

"The dialogue is deadlocked. What do we do?" he said at a ceremony Sunday in Beirut's southern suburbs. "We don't want a civil war. If the stalemate continues for a while until a solution is found or we go to a civil war, then let the stalemate continue."

The latest incarnation of the crisis began Dec. 1, when Hezbollah and its allies -- followers of a former Christian general, Michel Aoun, and the Shiite Amal movement of the parliament's speaker, Nabih Berri -- launched a sprawling protest in downtown Beirut.