Lebanon: Who sacrificed who at Annapolis (part I- editorial comments)

Following Annapolis two line of thoughts have appeared regarding Lebanon in the aftermath of Annapolis.
The first, and most shared one is that the US has cut a deal with Syria handing over Lebanon (incl. the Hariri Tribunal) to them in return for support in Palestine and against Iran. This viewpoint is supported by General Sleiman surprising emergence as a compromise candidate.
The second viewpoint, is that no such deal has been cut but that Syria had an interest to start getting out of the Iranian axis and that it did so at Annapolis. Logically, therefore Syria stopped looking dangerous to the US. The emergence of Sleiman is then a reflection of this organic development.
This blog has decided to look into the arguments during the coming days. Polibel will publish a series of posts looking at question of Who Sacrificed who at Annapolis. This question bears particular importance, simply because Lebanon is the geopolitical barometer of the Middle East.

Lee Smith from the Weekly Standard, offers an apologetic (from US perspective) answer in his latest column "The Price of Annapolis", 30.11.2007.
His message is that there was no "deal", but that Syria manage to get away with its terrorist tactics because the US was so focused the Palestinian Peace process. Click here to read the article.