Following the assassination of George Hawi on Tuesday, we again heard a familiar leitmotif from opposition spokespersons: that the execution was the work of the intelligence apparatus - a remnant of the old Syrian-dominated order in Lebanon. It probably was, but the argument lost much of its resonance because the paramount accusers are on the verge of bringing back to the second most senior office in the state Nabih Berri, who embodied that old order as well or better than any other.

The message in the Hawi hit was easy to discern. On the day after the Hariri- and Jumblatt-led opposition took a decisive step, through their election victory, in eliminating the Syrian edifice in Lebanon, they were reminded that the risks are high. But the opposition is missing that it has done itself no favors by so selectively changing what remains of the previous system. Either much more will have to go, or the regenerative process will die in the egg.

Walid Jumblatt and Saad Hariri have indicated they are planning Berri's political resurrection, though everything about Michel Aoun's victory two weekends ago, and subsequent international displeasure with a Berri comeback, suggested the plan needed to be shelved. With President Emile Lahoud better anchored in his Maronite community, and protected by a volatile Aoun who knows well he could not enter Baabda under the current parliament, the plan to eliminate the president was decisively dented. In that case, why insist on the contentious Berri? His support was vital when Jumblatt and Hariri required a two-thirds majority in Parliament and the Council of Ministers to oust Lahoud. But surely that doesn't hold today. Or does it?

There is also something else. Aoun's victory was also, in a strange way, a vote for change, though vaguely defined. When Jumblatt accused the general's voters of taking Lebanon back to the eve of the war, he was spouting nonsense. It wasn't war the electors wanted, nor were they Christian extremists, as Jumblatt insisted; rather, they wanted an end to the war, and to the domination of those politicians the war left behind. In seeming to recklessly perpetuate itself, the political class forming the anti-Syrian opposition after Rafik Hariri's murder lost much of its integrity.

Is that fair? No, since all politicians naturally seek to protect themselves when they can. But those in power - decent and indecent, opposition and pro-regime, Christian and Muslim - have disregarded the deep disgust pervading Lebanese society, the result of the high - far too high - expectations accompanying Syria's departure. It is to Aoun's credit, no matter how destructive and demagogical he is, to have picked up on that.

And now the opposition is set to perpetuate its errors if it brings Berri back. Whoever killed Hawi may well have been sending word down that the plan to change Lahoud is a dangerous one - that the intelligence network must not be tampered with. If so, it suggests the president's ouster is still in the cards for Jumblatt and Hariri, no matter how confessionally divisive it might be. Instead of taking time out to rebuild what remains of the coalition that once defied Syria (which means finding common ground again with the partisans of Michel Aoun), some in the opposition may be moving stubbornly ahead with a confrontation they may win, but at a terrible cost to national unity.

Jumblatt may have less sterling reasons for defending Berri. The speaker's departure would leave the Druze leader as a main focus of all that was wrong with the old order. By controlling the legislative agenda, Berri will not only shape a wide range of policies in the coming months, he will also ensure that the former Syrian system doesn't collapse too quickly over the heads of those who were once its most outstanding representatives - especially Jumblatt. What we are witnessing is the iron solidarity of the threatened: Jumblatt and Berri, alongside Hizbullah, with possibly the unproven Hariri in tow, are seeking to recreate the Syrian-led system minus the Syrians.

Cheekily, Jumblatt, by supporting Berri, is telling the Christians: "If Lahoud stays, then so does Berri." The reality, however, is that if Berri stays, it will be much more difficult to eject Lahoud. In protecting himself, Jumblatt is also bolstering the president, since the institutional dikes the Druze leader needs to put up to ensure he won't be swept away by the ambient desire for change in the "new" Lebanon - with Berri as legislative keystone of this project - are the same ones safeguarding Lahoud. Between Jumblatt, Lahoud and Berri we may soon have a Mexican standoff of disheartening proportions, each man pointing a gun at the other, ultimately imposing stalemate on all.

In practical terms, what can Berri do to the major issues on Lebanon's medium-term agenda? Let's guess. It seems doubtful the speaker would make reaching a new election law a priority; after all he has no interest in molding a consensus now on electoral districts, preferring to delay this until the last moment to ensure he has leverage to protect his cut in the South. What would his means be? The Taif Accord calls for elections at the level of the mohafaza, or governorate, but it also says this must follow the redrawing of the administrative map. Agreeing new administrative divisions will be extraordinarily difficult, and Berri could manipulate the likely snags to postpone an early compromise on an election law.

It is equally likely that Berri will hold up privatization, given that both he and Hizbullah have a substantial share of supporters in the bureaucracy. Nor would Jumblatt see any problems with this, as he has little stake in downsizing the state; on the contrary, like others he has been adept in the past at using government funds to distribute patronage to his Druze community. Only Saad Hariri, in the constellation of major pie cutters, is keen to privatize, regarding this as a prerequisite for the economic health needed to protect the foreign investors his father attracted to the country in the past 11 years.

On a host of other vital issues, Berri promises gridlock. He is not the man to advance deconfessionalism, to help engage the international community on Resolution 1559 and the issue of Hizbullah's disarmament, or to address the increasingly insistent matter of corruption. One suspects he's being brought back to derail those issues, which might buy him support among the power centers in Lebanon; all except one: the public, which plainly expects better.

But no one in the political leadership seems to give a damn about the public. On the contrary, they're wagering on its demobilization. That's why George Hawi's death came even more cheaply than Samir Kassir's. It was a blip on a public radar reading that oscillates between revulsion and indifference. Perhaps some politicians might remember that when the next bomb goes off under their car.