World Notes LEBANON

The death of Lebanon's body politic, so often declared, may yet prove to have been (slightly) exaggerated. Last week, meeting in an abandoned air base at Qlaiaat in northern Lebanon, 58 aging Deputies of the country's parliament elected Rene Moawad, 64, a moderate Maronite Christian lawyer who enjoys the backing of Syria, to the presidency. The vote was a crucial step toward fulfilling the conditions of the peace plan brokered last month by the Arab League.

Moawad is opposed by General Michel Aoun, commander of the fanatically loyal Christian army in East Beirut. Aoun is enraged that, as part of the peace plan, Moawad is willing to diminish Christian political power and let 40,000 Syrian troops continue to occupy large parts of Lebanon.

Aoun is too weak to expel the Syrians himself but strong enough to create havoc. Last week his backers rioted and even roughed up their own religious leader, the pro-Moawad Maronite Patriarch.