This paper explores the Congressional passage of the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act (SALSRA) of 2003, addressing the question to what extent, and in what ways, the passage of the legislation can be interpreted as an outcome of ethnic lobby influence on Capitol Hill, or, alternatively, to what extent it can be seen as a function of changing US interests in the aftermath of 9/11. Based on field (interview) research in both the US and Lebanon, as well as a survey of archival material from Lebanese-American organizations, and government documents, the paper explores the activity of the Lebanese American organizations that lobbied in favor of the Act, including the fifteen organizations that endorsed a 2002 advertisement in the Congressional newspaper "Roll Call" in favor of the legislation. The dynamics in the case of SALSRA are illustrative of the full spectrum of Lebanese-American diaspora organizations and their diverse policy positions. The stance of Jewish American and Arab American organizations on SALSRA is also taken into account, but the focus is on the Lebanese-American Council for Democracy, a US organization of supporters of General Aoun; the US Committee for a Free Lebanon, closely linked to the US neo-conservative political establishment; and the American Task Force for Lebanon, which testified in opposition to the Act before Congress. The paper discusses the intersection between ethnic lobby goals and positions, and the US national interest, as defined at the time under the George W. Bush administration, dynamics which resulted in the passage of the Act. The paper also addresses the arguments in favor of and against construing the passage of the Act as a litmus test for the relative influence of ethnic lobbying organizations.