ABSTRACT
Modern Lebanon's character as a conglomeration of sectarian communities began with the Islamic conquest of the Roman Levant between 636 and 640 CE. The Crusader presence in Mount Lebanon for almost two centuries (1099-1291) gave the mountain communities—Maronites, Druze, and Shi'as—a critical opportunity to consolidate. The independence of Israel cut economic ties between the Arab world and most of the former British Mandate for Palestine, leaving a gap that the Lebanese filled. The Syrian regime swiftly tightened its hold on Lebanon. Lebanon's government and post-Ta'if parliament mainly comprised Syria's allies and clients. Despite abuses, Lebanon's constitution has guaranteed basic rights, including equality before the law, personal liberties, political rights, and freedom of the press, association, speech, and assembly. The participation by Lebanese factions in Syria's civil war increasingly brought the war into Lebanon. In 1932, an Orthodox Christian, Antoun Sa'adeh, founded the Syrian Social Nationalist Party, which promoted a Greater Syria comprising Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Israel.
