THE REAL WORLD

An Arab Dissident
Practicing law cost Beirut's Muhammad Mugraby his freedom.

BY CLAUDIA ROSETT - WALL STREET JOURNAL
Wednesday, August 13, 2003 12:01 a.m. EDT

Summers in Beirut are hot and damp, and in the basement prison of the Palace of Justice, where the accused await their hearings, temperatures climb to well over 100 degrees. Sweltering in that prison right now is one of the Arab world's most enlightened and courageous attorneys, Muhammad Mugraby. He was arrested Friday on charges of "impersonating a lawyer."

That's almost funny, coming from the Syrian-backed rulers of Lebanon, who for years have busied themselves impersonating a sovereign, elected government.

But in Lebanon, where Syria's Baathist regime has the last word, politics is rough stuff and prison is no joke. The charges against Mr. Mugraby could bring a sentence of up to three years. The only upside to incarceration for the 64-year-old Mr. Mugraby is that it could help call world attention both to this extraordinary man and to the rich democratic potential he represents--which still survives in Lebanon, despite the terrorist enclaves and the stifling strictures of Syrian hegemony. For anyone wondering if there is hope for the Middle East, Mr. Mugraby's story is worth hearing.

Mr. Mugraby is, in fact, an entirely genuine lawyer, with four decades of internationally respected practice under his belt. A Lebanese citizen, he earned his law credentials back in the 1960s, during the era when Lebanon, then independent, was a fast-developing democracy and the brightest light in the Arab world. But civil war broke out in 1975. Syria intervened in 1976 and hung on through the comings and goings of America and Israel. Today, though the civil war ended 13 years ago, Syria, with its so-called Treaty of Fraternity, Coordination and Cooperation of 1991, remains a pervasive presence in a Lebanon that New York-based Freedom House rates "not free," with a judiciary "strongly influenced by Syrian political pressure." All of which has somewhat affected the practice of law in Lebanon, but has not yet utterly destroyed a certain amount of world-class principle and know-how.

Which brings us back to Mr. Mugraby, who holds degrees from the Lebanese University School of Law, where in 1960 he was valedictorian, and from Columbia University Law School, where in 1966 he earned his doctorate. He is a member of the International Bar Association and the International Association of Lawyers. He is licensed to practice law in Lebanon, and he recently went public with his interest in running this fall for president of the Beirut Bar Association--which his arrest may now prevent. Some of his colleagues suggest that is the most immediate reason Mr. Mugraby is now in jail. The deeper current here, as Virginia Sherry of Human Rights Watch notes, is that Mr. Mugraby, harassed by Lebanon's authorities for years, "has steadfastly refused to remain silent about Syria's repressive role in Lebanon and about corruption within the judiciary."

I met Mr. Mugraby last December, during a trip to Beirut. He had been recommended to me as one of the country's leading human-rights activists, and I was expecting a chat about local troubles. But what he said at the start of our conversation opened a perspective on principles worth pondering world-wide. He began by noting that beyond the direct harm done to particular individuals, the Syrian occupation was damaging because it leads the Lebanese to shrug off responsibility even for decisions over which they still have some control. He laid out a case for the vital role of individual responsibility in creating a healthy and thriving society. In a part of the world where it seems almost everyone cherishes a political cause built around personalized grievance, Mr. Mugraby has had little time for all that. His mission has been to underscore the need for a fair and impartially applied rule of law.

Nor was it just talk. Mr. Mugraby has lived by those principles. In the 1990s, he took on cases that many of his colleagues were afraid to touch--of Lebanese citizens who had disappeared into the prisons of Syria. He sought legal grounds on which to defend the rights of people dispossessed by the business deals of Solidere, a company that has prospered from rebuilding great swathes of war-ruined downtown Beirut, and in which Lebanon's Prime Minister Rafik Hariri has a major stake.

Last year, when the head of the Syrian and Iranian-backed terrorist group-cum-political party in Lebanon, Hezbollah, gave a speech demonizing the U.S., Mr. Mugraby seized the occasion to challenge the selective application of law in Lebanon. He noted that if Lebanese could be jailed for endangering national security by criticizing Syria, which has happened, then there should at least be equal penalties for jeopardizing national security by criticizing the U.S. His point was neither to smother nor to orchestrate free speech, but to stress that law should apply equally in all cases.

Mr. Mugraby is a Sunni Muslim, but in public life he identifies himself first and foremost as Lebanese. He has argued for years that the separation of religion and state is vital to the development of freedom, protected by the rule of law, in the Middle East--or anywhere else. He made this case again recently, in the March 2003 issue of the Fordham International Law Journal, insisting that "the achievements of the West should not be recognized as Christian in character, but universal in nature."

A telling anecdote about Mr. Mugraby comes from Joseph Boohaker, an Alabama judge of Lebanese ancestry, who has known Mr. Mugraby for more than 20 years. Judge Boohaker suggests that instead of jailing Mr. Mugraby, Lebanon should be honoring him as South Africa honors Nelson Mandela. Judge Boohaker recounts that when Mr. Mugraby's son, Ziad, was born, Mr. Mugraby went to apply for the obligatory identity card for the new family member, and was asked the all-important question in Lebanon: What was Ziad's religion? Mr. Mugraby replied that he was sure his son would decide how to handle that question when he grew up--his point being that religion is a matter of private choice, and has no place on a national identity card.

In recent years the Lebanese authorities have twice tried to revoke Mr. Mugraby's law license. In both cases Mr. Mugraby has appealed, in neither instance has the appeal come to a hearing. He has continued to practice law, and to set forth his principles. From prison this past weekend Mr. Mugraby wrote an open letter to his colleagues: "I realize I am supposed to pay a price because I have acted out of full conviction and solid faith that power can only be derived out of right, and that no right can be derived out of power. . . . I see myself proudly upholding all that I have done, especially since the suspension of my freedom proves to me more than ever that I have been, I am, and I shall continue to be doing the right thing." From people everywhere who value freedom, especially those who hope for it in the Middle East, he deserves support.

Ms. Rosett is a columnist for OpinionJournal.com and The Wall Street Journal Europe. Her column appears alternate Wednesdays