Love of the Land: Lebanese president won't ask Hizballah to disarm

Lebanese president won't ask Hizballah to disarm

Thank you very much!

Marisol
Jihad Watch
09 May '10

He won't ask them, let alone order them, as he should. His explanation is that it would not be appropriate at a time of heightened tension between Lebanon and Israel, but why the elevated level of tension in the first place? That stems from Hizballah's ongoing existence as an Iranian- and Syrian- supported state-within-a-state that, at this point, is probably all but better armed than the Lebanese government. Hizballebanon Update. "Sleiman says he won't ask Hizbullah to disarm," from the Daily Star, May 10:

BEIRUT: Lebanese President Michel Sleiman said the government cannot ask Hizbullah to give up its arms at a time of heightened Israeli tension and before agreement on a national defense strategy was reached.

Israeli allegations last month that Syria had transferred long-range Scud missiles to Hizbullah fuelled security concerns, although Lebanon and Syria both denied the charge, while Hizbullah's leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has refused to comment.

Hizbullah is on the United States' terrorism blacklist, but it is also part of the Lebanese government. Syria says it only gives Hizbullah political backing and that Israel may be using the accusation as a pretext for a military strike.

Israel launched a 34-day war against Lebanon in the summer of 2006 during which the powerful group fired thousands of mostly short-range rockets against Israel."To demand now, in this regional atmosphere full of dangers and the drumbeats of war that Israel is banging everyday, and before we reach an agreement on a national defense strategy to protect Lebanon, we cannot and must not tell the resistance ... 'Give us your weapons and put it under the state's command,'" Sleiman was quoted as saying in the Ad-Diyar newspaper on Saturday.

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Love of the Land: Lebanese president won't ask Hizballah to disarm

Love of the Land: Iran, Hezbollah, and the Bomb

Iran, Hezbollah, and the Bomb

William Harris
The Weekly Standard
07 May '10

When Iran gets the bomb, the nuclear club will have a crucial new feature. Without an Iranian bomb and barring regime change in Pakistan, we know that no nuclear power will transfer a device to a private army of the religious elect like Hezbollah in Lebanon. With an Iranian bomb, such assurance instantly ends. This is a looming, tangible state of affairs--in contrast to the hype about loose nuclear materials at the April 2010 Washington nuclear security summit.

Proponents of containing a nuclear Iran in and around the Obama administration conceive of deterring Iran in standard realist style. The Islamic Republic of Iran, however, has become a hybrid of the government of God and ruthless militarized mafias. It is well practiced in long-range subversion, intimidation, and weapons smuggling. It may be confidently expected to shred so-called containment, especially when equipped with a nuclear aura and facing the quivering potentates of Arabia.

In any case, Iran has a strategic extension across the Middle East to the Mediterranean that puts it beyond containment. On February 25, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah met in Damascus to celebrate their alignment and its achievements. The Syrian-Iranian partnership has enabled the Syrian ruling clique to go from strength to strength in dealing with the West and the Arabs. Syria only looks forward to more gains from the partnership as Iran moves toward the bomb. At the tripartite summit, Assad mocked Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's call for Syria to steer away from Iran.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: Iran, Hezbollah, and the Bomb

Love of the Land: What the Scud crisis revealed

What the Scud crisis revealed

Hussain Abdul-Hussain
NOW Lebanon
06 May '10
Posted before Shabbat

The question as to whether Hezbollah has received Scud missiles from Syria remains unanswered. What is clear is that the crisis reinforced the fact that Hezbollah remains the sovereign power in Lebanon, a situation that Syria is keen to exploit, while the Lebanese state has gone on a walkabout.

It has long been known that Hezbollah was replenishing most of its depleted weapons stock after the 2006 July War. One UN report after another has highlighted the Syrian-Hezbollah breach of Security Council resolutions 1559 and 1701.

In September 2009, the intelligence community in Washington was circulating substantiated reports about Syrian training of Hezbollah fighters on launching anti-aircraft missiles. In mid-January 2010, I published a story about this activity and reported that intelligence had proof that trucks of missiles were stationed on the Syrian side of the Lebanese border, with Damascus reluctant to order the trucks in after receiving indirect threats from Tel Aviv that such a step would put Syria at risk of Israeli retribution. The story received little reaction but also no denial at the time.

By mid-February 2010, the missiles had literally disappeared off the radar, which meant that they had either found their way to Hezbollah, or had been sent back to Syrian army depots. The State Department officially warned the Syrians against potentially shipping the missiles to Hezbollah on February 26.

On April 10, I reported the US warning to Syria, and retold the training story as the background. I also wrote that the prevailing thinking was that the missiles were Scud-D, and had most probably been shipped into Lebanon.

This time, all hell broke loose.

Newer reports have now surfaced that the missiles are actually M-600s, the Syrian version of the Iranian Fateh-110, rather than Scud-Ds. Whether the rockets actually made it into the hands of Hezbollah’s fighters could not be verified.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: What the Scud crisis revealed

Love of the Land: The Responsibility Belongs to Lebanese Government

The Responsibility Belongs to Lebanese Government

JINSA
Report #: 983
6 May '10

It could not have been more explicit.

Standing next to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Washington, Israel's Defense Minister Ehud Barak said if the situation in Lebanon flares into warfare as it did in 2006, Israel would not just blame Hezbollah. "The main responsibility lies with the Lebanese government. We make it clear once and again that we see the government of Lebanon and behind it the government of Syria responsible for what happens now in Lebanon. And the government of Lebanon will be the one to be held accountable if it deteriorates."

In Israel, BG Yossi Beidatz of Israeli Military Intelligence was equally clear in his presentation to the Knesset Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee. "Weapons are transferred to Hezbollah on a regular basis and this transfer is organized by the Syrian and Iranian regimes. Therefore, it should not be called smuggling of arms to Lebanon - it is organized and official transfer."

But Secretary Clinton, in her remarks to the AJC, maintained the fiction that the Lebanese government is not a party to the conflict in its own country:

We have spoken out forcefully about the grave dangers of Syria's transfer of weapons to Hezbollah. We condemn this in the strongest possible terms and have expressed our concerns directly to the Syrian government... Transferring weapons to these terrorists - especially longer-range missiles - would pose a serious threat to the security of Israel. It would have a profoundly destabilizing effect on the region. All states must stop supplying weapons to terrorist groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas. Every rocket smuggled into southern Lebanon or Gaza sets back the cause of peace.

"The cause of peace" is a relative term. There are those for whom the removal of Israel from the region would engender "peace."

(Read full report)

Love of the Land: The Responsibility Belongs to Lebanese Government

Love of the Land: Lebanon's Double Game is Coming to an End

Lebanon's Double Game is Coming to an End

JINSA Report #: 981
19 April '10

General Petraeus's widely remarked-upon but little-read testimony before Congress made note of:

Ungoverned, poorly governed and alternatively governed spaces. Weak civil and security institutions and the inability of certain governments in the region to exert full control over their territories and conditions that insurgent groups can exploit to create physical safe havens in which they can plan, train for, and launch operations, or pursue narco-criminal activities. We have seen these groups develop, or attempt to develop, what might be termed sub-states.

He cited Lebanon.

For years, the Government of Lebanon has cried to the world that it is abused by Israel because it is too weak to control its territory (as if no fault accrues to that). And the world reliably denounces Israel's efforts to protect its own population from the depredations, first of the PLO and then of Hezbollah, emanating from Lebanese territory. And even when it was understood that Israel had been provoked beyond reason (2006), the Government of Lebanon was treated as if it was twice a victim-first of Hezbollah and then of Israel.

That's not quite the case. Lebanon, like the Palestinian Authority, is both terrorist and state sponsor of terrorists. There are those who consider Hezbollah to be the army of Lebanon, allowing Lebanon to be a confrontation state without taking the responsibility for being one. Lebanon claims victim status when it is convenient, but provides money, territory, and diplomatic and political support to terrorist groups the rest of the time. Hezbollah's politicians are in the Lebanese parliament and hold a "blocking third" in the cabinet (enough to veto policies of the elected government). Hezbollah's army operates with the express permission of the Lebanese government and a good case can be made-and Israelis have made it-that Hezbollah is actually the armed force of Lebanon.

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Love of the Land: Lebanon's Double Game is Coming to an End

Love of the Land: SCUDs and Syria

SCUDs and Syria

Elliot Abrams
National Review Online
19 April '10

According to recent news stories, Israel believes that Syria is supplying SCUD missiles to Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon. Should Israel bomb Syria to stop them? As the charges and threats from both sides multiply, the story of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701 is worth recalling.

On Aug. 11, 2006, the United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 1701 as part of an effort to end the war then raging in Lebanon between Israeli and Hezbollah forces. The resolution was the product of long negotiations involving primarily the United States, France, and the governments of Israel and Lebanon. The final text made crystal clear — over and over — that supply of weaponry by Syria to Hezbollah was prohibited. Relevant provisions of the text read as follows:

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Love of the Land: SCUDs and Syria

Love of the Land: Syria seeks a military return to Lebanon

Syria seeks a military return to Lebanon

Michael Young
Daily Star (Beirut)
15 April '10

Michael Young is opinion editor of THE DAILY STAR

When Syria’s President Bashar Assad withdrew his army from Lebanon in 2005, there was a naive belief he had accepted the new situation and would be satisfied merely with reasserting Syrian political influence in Beirut. In fact, his ambition always was, and remains, to return Syria militarily to Lebanon.

In recent weeks, the US has accused Syria of transferring advanced weaponry to Hizbullah. Kuwait’s Al-Rai al-Aam newspaper and Israeli media have suggested this may include Scud-D missiles. There have also been reports, including statements by Israeli officials, that Syria has sent the party anti-aircraft missiles, including possibly the advanced SA-24 Igla. Damascus has denied this, but in 2007, when Hizbullah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, said the party had acquired a new “surprise” weapon against Israel, many believed that he meant an advanced anti-aircraft capability.

It is hard to accept as credible Syria’s denials that it has sent improved weapons to Hizbullah when Assad has repeatedly stated that he would not allow the “resistance” to be defeated. Senator John Kerry, a prominent defender of American engagement of Damascus, is said to have raised concerns about the weapons when he last visited with the Syrian president. Why is Damascus upping the ante in Lebanon today?

Let’s go back to April 2007 to understand Assad’s frame of mind. At the time, the Syrian president received UN chief Ban Ki-moon, in Damascus. The two men discussed several issues, then Assad made this comment: “In Lebanon, divisions and confessionalism have been deeply anchored for more than 300 years. Lebanese society is very fragile. [The country’s] most peaceful years were when Syrian forces were present. From 1976 to 2005 Lebanon was stable, whereas now there is great instability.”

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Love of the Land: Syria seeks a military return to Lebanon

Love of the Land: Syrian Scuds to Hezbollah? Obama is on the case!

Syrian Scuds to Hezbollah? Obama is on the case!

Elder of Ziyon
14 April '10

In response to reports from various quarters that Syria has been transferring Scud missiles to Hezbollah, which would be able to hit virtually any target in Israel, the Obama administration showed what it's made of. Here is what White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs had to say on the matter:

Q Robert, let me ask you a foreign policy question because the Israeli government yesterday contended that Syria is sending long-range Scud missiles into Lebanon into the hands of Hezbollah, a game-changing -- in their words -- military maneuver that they’ve found extremely destabilizing to the region. U.S. officials expressed some other similar concern. Give me the administration’s evaluation of that. And in the context of what some have described as a rough patch in U.S.-Israeli relations, how does this fit?
MR. GIBBS: Well, as I have said many times up here, we are -- we have an unbreakable bond with the Israeli people --

Q Even when they’re wrong?

MR. GIBBS: -- and in ensuring their security. We are obviously increasingly concerned about the sophisticated weaponry that is allegedly being transferred. We have expressed our concerns to those governments and believe that steps should be taken to reduce any risk and any danger of anything from happening.

Q How has that message been sent and what does this do to the administration’s attempt to engage the Syrians in this more complex discussion about Middle East peace?

MR. GIBBS: Well, again, we have relayed our concerns.

Q At the highest level?

MR. GIBBS: We have.

Q At the highest level?

MR. GIBBS: Yes. And again, obviously this is a -- you heard the President speak yesterday about Middle East peace, his desire to have this nation remain focused on that goal. The potential destabilizing effect, the alarming effect that this has, we’ve expressed our great concern about that.

Love of the Land: Syrian Scuds to Hezbollah? Obama is on the case!

Love of the Land: Realpolitik in Our Time

Realpolitik in Our Time

J.E. Dyer
Contentions/Commentary
14 April '10

Jennifer’s dissection of the New York Times piece on the emerging Obama Doctrine is masterful. One thing I would observe about “realpolitik,” however, is that its self-conscious practitioners tend to leave big piles of unintended consequences in their wake. In that sense, Obama is indeed in the realpolitik mold. Invoking realpolitik has, moreover, become a form of shorthand for commentators who want to express approval of an essentially weak foreign policy without going to the trouble of explaining why weak is the new strong.

On the unintended-consequences front, Syria has now requited the Obama realpolitik approach with a transfer of Scud missiles to Hezbollah. Syria’s Scuds are old but retain the effectiveness to pose a serious threat to Israel’s population. They are, in fact, a population threat and not a military one: they aren’t accurate enough for precision targeting. They were originally designed to create havoc behind an enemy’s front lines in a theater-scale war. In the hands of a terrorist organization, they will be used to amplify the anti-population threat posed by shorter-range rockets. Scuds carry a significantly bigger payload than the Katyusha rockets frequently used by Hezbollah and can deliver chemical as well as conventional warheads. Syria is known to have a chemical weapons program, but I consider it unlikely that its leadership will supply chemical warheads to Hezbollah – at least for now.

News outlets are not overstating the matter in assessing that this move changes the military balance in the Middle East. It puts state-level military might in the hands of an unaccountable sub-national terrorist group. Israel is now faced with the dilemma of what and how much to do about it. The worst option is to do too little.

A quiescent geopolitical environment – one in which he doesn’t expect to face consequences – is what enables Bashar al-Assad to do this. The Scud transfer is the first of the threatening moves augured by the Arab League summit in March, where indignation over Israeli policy in Jerusalem was the unifying theme. And among Syria’s objectives with this weapons transfer is probing the U.S. reaction. American policy has set boundaries since 1945 on what other nations consider possible in the Middle East. Assad is calculating that the implications inherent in this weapons deployment do not exceed the tolerance limits of Obama’s America.

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Love of the Land: Realpolitik in Our Time

Love of the Land: Let Them Meet Steel

Let Them Meet Steel

Michael J. Totten
Contentions/Commentary
14 April '10

As Noah pointed out yesterday, Syria is now being credibly accused of shipping Scud missiles with a range of more than 430 miles to Hezbollah, placing Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and the Dimona nuclear power plant inside the kill zone. Lebanon’s Prime Minister Saad Hariri has been forced under duress to visit Damascus and make amends with his father’s assassins, as has Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, effectively terminating whatever independence Lebanon scratched out for itself in 2005. At the same time, Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad contemptuously taunts the president of the United States, whom he clearly perceives as a pushover. “American officials bigger than you,” he said of President Obama’s attempts to talk him out of developing nuclear weapons, “more bullying than you, couldn’t do a damn thing, let alone you.”

Yet the Obama administration still seems to think engagement with Syria and the suggestion of possible sanctions against Iran may keep the Middle East from boiling over.

President George W. Bush lost a lot of credibility when the civil war and insurgency in Iraq made a hash of his policy there. It was eventually obvious to just about everyone that something different needed to happen, and fast. Replacing the top brass in the field with General David Petraeus and his like-minded war critics just barely saved Iraq and American interests from total disaster. The president himself never fully recovered.

If Obama’s squishy policies are misguided, as I think they are, it’s less obvious. The Middle East isn’t on fire as it was circa 2005. But it should be apparent that, at some point, all the pressure that’s building up will have to go somewhere. When and how is anyone’s guess, but there’s little chance it’s just going to dissipate or be slowly released during peace talks.

The Iranian-led resistance bloc is becoming better armed and more belligerent by the month. And the next round of conflict could tear up as many as six regions at the same time if everyone pulls out the stops. A missile war sparked between Hezbollah and Israel, for instance, could easily spread to Gaza, Syria, Iran, and even Iraq.

Love of the Land: Let Them Meet Steel

Love of the Land: Peace talks, Bashar’s war by other means

Peace talks, Bashar’s war by other means

Tony Badran
NOW Lebanon
13 April '10

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is known to have a penchant for brinksmanship. Calculating that he has nothing to fear from a timid Obama administration, he is upping the ante in his direct military support to Hezbollah in Lebanon. The latest brazen act may involve the shipment of Syrian Scud D missiles to his Shia allies.

Assad’s move appears to have followed his recent tripartite summit with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. It also comes after numerous reports in recent months about a steady increase in the quantity and quality of Syrian-supplied weapons to Hezbollah – from anti-aircraft systems (outdated models, like the SA-2, but possibly also the man-portable SA-18 and SA-24 Igla) to longer-range, Syrian-made surface-to-surface missiles (the M-600/Fateh-110). It is unclear whether Israel views items on this list as strategic game changers.

This development has quietly set off a seemingly heated discussion in Washington. Capitol Hill is not amused, and according to two reports, the confirmation of Robert Ford as ambassador to Syria has been placed on hold. The incident reportedly has led to the State Department’s summoning of Syria’s ambassador, Imad Mustapha, to relay to him a message about the severity of the situation. Reportedly, the Israeli government warned the United States that the transfer of such weaponry could lead to conflict with Syria.

Through such behavior, Assad has confused those who had high hopes for “engagement” of Syria. The believers only have themselves to blame. Assad’s determination to increase the weapons supply to Hezbollah is a strategic decision. As one Syrian official put it to the Qatari daily Al-Watan, “a strategic decision has been taken not to allow Israel to defeat the resistance movements.” Assad himself affirmed this principle on Hezbollah’s Al-Manar TV a few weeks ago.

Assad has been doubling down on “resistance” both in his rhetoric and in Syrian material support – exceedingly so ever since the US voiced its desire to improve relations with Syria in the hope of prying it away from Iran and ending Syrian backing for Hezbollah and Hamas.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: Peace talks, Bashar’s war by other means

Love of the Land: What are nations really for, then?

What are nations really for, then?

Hazem Saghiyeh
NOW Lebanon
12 April '10

MP Nawwaf Moussawi deserves nothing but respect for telling Kuwaiti daily Al-Rai, “If things comes down to a choice between the Resistance and any kind of unity, then the Resistance would take precedence.” Moussawi said: “When it comes to its sustainability, survival, strength and progress, the Resistance’s history proves that it holds these elements above all other considerations.”

The Hezbollah MP deserves respect for being honest and describing things as they really are, as seen and applied by Hezbollah. Indeed, he did not say that the Lebanese unanimously agree on the Resistance, nor did he say that the Resistance is ready to dismantle its structure in order to preserve national unity. In so doing, he is departing from the deceit and lies that have become customary in this country.

Truly, the Resistance exists and shall endure, regardless of what the Lebanese think of the matter and regardless of how they may perceive their interests and the interests of their country. This is precisely the reaction of conquerors, which has but one logical completion: It is only by having recourse to force that you will do away with the Resistance. As for democracy, spare us this distasteful farce which is used only to serve the Resistance’s purposes, and if it contradicts them, then let us bid democracy farewell.

Moussawi’s statement is likened to two partners telling one another: I shall take my interest alone into consideration. As for our common interest, it concerns me only insofar as it serves my own.

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Love of the Land: What are nations really for, then?

Love of the Land: The Resistance Bloc Will Not Be Appeased

The Resistance Bloc Will Not Be Appeased

Michael J. Totten
Contentions/Commentary
21 March '10

Hezbollah’s reaction to Israel’s plan to build 1,600 apartments in a Jewish neighborhood in East Jerusalem might help President Barack Obama understand something that has so far eluded him: the Syrian-Iranian-Hamas-Hezbollah resistance bloc will not allow him to appease it.

“The scheme is yet another part of a Judaization campaign,” Hezbollah said in a statement quoted by the Tehran Times, “that targets the holy city of al-Quds [Jerusalem] and a provocation of Muslim feeling.” If Obama expected a little appreciation from Israel’s enemies for making the same point with more diplomatic finesse, he was mistaken. “The Zionist plan to construct hundreds of homes in al-Quds,” Hezbollah continued, “truly shows American cover to it.”

So not only is Obama denied credit for standing up to Israel’s government, he is accused of doing precisely the opposite.

Anti-Americanism is ideological oxygen for partisans of the resistance bloc. They will no sooner let it go than they will stop breathing. Their entire worldview and political program would turn to ashes without it, much as Fidel Castro’s would without socialism. When the United States doesn’t follow the script, they just lie.

If we extend a hand in friendship, they’ll bite it and try to chew off a finger. If we take their side once in a while to appear evenhanded, they’ll twist the truth until it looks like a sinister plot, then they’ll bite us again.

A couple of years ago Hezbollah stretched a banner across an overpass near Lebanon’s international airport that said, in English, “All our catastrophes come from America.” Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah would have an awfully hard time climbing down from that high a tree even if his Iranian masters would let him — and they won’t. They’ve been calling Israel the “Little Satan” and the U.S. the “Great Satan” since Jimmy Carter, of all people, was president.

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Love of the Land: The Resistance Bloc Will Not Be Appeased

Love of the Land: Bankrupting Terror

Bankrupting Terror

AishVideo
15 March '10

Shurat haDin's Nitsana Darshan-Leitner is the voice of Victims of Terror. By suing Hamas and other terror organizations, she is hitting them in the wallet, trying to put an end to terror.



Our Mission

We tend to think of the fight against terrorism as a burden that falls mainly on the shoulders of government—our military, diplomatic, homeland security, and law-enforcement agencies. Yet there is one area where private citizens can play a leading role: In stopping the flow of funds to terror organizations. Beginning in the 1990s, Western countries, and especially the United States, passed laws making it possible for victims of terror to sue the regimes that sponsor terror, banks that transfer funds to terror groups, front organizations that pretend to serve charitable causes, and even the terrorists themselves. For the first time, terror victims and their families have a chance to fight back through the courts.

Visit Shurat HaDin's website at www.israellawcenter.org

Love of the Land: Bankrupting Terror

Love of the Land: Criminal Naivete: A 1936 Article Shows The Costs of Believing Dictators' Lies

Criminal Naivete: A 1936 Article Shows The Costs of Believing Dictators' Lies

Graphic: Stephen Hughes

Barry Rubin
The Rubin Report
07 March '10

There needs to be a much clearer understanding of why the West—and especially its political elite and intellectuals—has so much trouble comprehending the world, especially the Middle East.

Two of the most important themes are naiveté and the conviction that no one can really be a revolutionary, willing to die for an ideological belief. Radicalism is simply illogical in their eyes and an extremist is simply a moderate who has not yet been sufficiently engaged in dialogue or offered enough concessions or goodies.

So officials, journalists, and experts proclaim that an Islamist Turkey has no choice but to be friendly to the West, and Iran’s regime must act “logically” and not be aggressive; that the Palestinians must want to make real peace with Israel and that Hizballah is now a moderate party playing Lebanese parliamentary politics only; that Syria without doubt has to be ready to throw Iran overboard to be buddies with America; and so on.

It’s a good educational tool to look at how this basic type of thinking has worked in the past. Some time ago, I posted the 1920s’ New York Times article explaining that Adolf Hitler was going into retirement in Austria and wouldn’t be a problem in future. Now we have another example. But first I want to emphasize that the point here is not to laugh at the mistakes made by people in the past—everyone makes mistakes—but to consider why mistakes were made so they can be avoided in present and future.

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Love of the Land: Criminal Naivete: A 1936 Article Shows The Costs of Believing Dictators' Lies

Love of the Land: Hezbollah's Penance: The Shiite Militia Works to Rebuild its Tarnished Image

Hezbollah's Penance: The Shiite Militia Works to Rebuild its Tarnished Image

David Schenker
The Weekly Standard
05 March '10

Last week in Damascus, just days after the highest ranking visit from a U.S. official in years, Syrian President Bashar Assad hosted a state dinner for his Iranian counterpart Mahmoud Ahmedinajad. Welcoming Ahmedinajad so close on the heels of the U.S. diplomatic good will gesture was a pointed Syrian slight to the Obama administration, but the icing on the cake was Assad’s other guest of honor at the feast: Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

For Damascus and Tehran—the last two U.S.-designated state sponsors of terrorism in the Middle East—Hezbollah has long constituted a strategic asset and a point of pride. More recently, the organization successfully worked to broaden its appeal throughout the region. And indeed, after the Shiite terrorist organization fought Israel to a standstill in 2006, Hezbollah’s stature in the Arab world skyrocketed. Not only was Nasrallah the most compelling Arabic orator, Hezbollah became the most positive personification of Shiites in the largely Sunni Muslim region.

That was 2006. Today, while Hezbollah remains a formidable “resistance” force, in the past two years, a number of setbacks have tarnished the organization’s carefully cultivated image in Lebanon and the broader Arab world. Hezbollah’s military prowess may not be in doubt, but now for the first time, Lebanese and other Middle Easterners are starting to question the organization’s once unscrupulous morality. Nearly three decades after its establishment, the resistance has institutionalized and bureaucratized, and Hezbollah is starting to resemble other, corrupt Lebanese organizations.

The problems of the Party of God, Hezbollah's English translation, started in May 2008, when the militia violated its cardinal rule and turned its weapons—allegedly intended for use against Israel—on Lebanese citizens, when the organization invaded Beirut. Continuing this trend, three months later the militia opened fire (accidentally, Hezbollah says) on a Lebanese army helicopter, killing the co-pilot. Then, in November 2008, a 49-member Hezbollah cell was arrested in Egypt, accused of plotting attacks against Israeli tourists and Suez Canal shipping. (Nasrallah responded to the arrests by publicly calling on Egyptians to topple their government).

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: Hezbollah's Penance: The Shiite Militia Works to Rebuild its Tarnished Image

Love of the Land: The apartheid libel

The apartheid libel

JPost Editorial
02 March '10
Posted before Shabbat

Israeli Apartheid Week kicked off on Monday, promising Israel-bashing, mostly on college campuses.

The sixth international Israeli Apartheid Week kicked off on Monday, promising 14 days of Israel-bashing in about 40 cities around the world, mostly on college campuses. Organizers say the events will “educate” about Israel’s so-called “apartheid system” and encourage BDS (boycotts, divestment and sanctions) against the Jewish state. Punishing Israel into submission will lead to the end of “colonization” of Arab land, the beginning of equal rights for Arab-Palestinians, the dismantling of the security barrier, and instituting the right of return for Palestinian refugees.

Naomi Klein, the Jewish anti-globalization savant who has in recent years branched out to include demonizing Israel in her repertoire, pointed out in the opening speech of last year’s extravaganza that “serious movements have serious enemies,” arguing that the fierce opposition to Israeli Apartheid Week proved its importance. According to that reasoning, perhaps it would be better to simply ignore the festivities and allow the whole thing to blow over.

Problem is, if left unchallenged, proponents of the apartheid analogy are liable to stifle free speech and trample open debate on campuses by using intimidation and bullying tactics. They recently prevented Ambassador Michael Oren from finishing a speech at UC Irvine, and on the same day in Cambridge they interrupted Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon, allegedly shouting in Arabic, “Slaughter the Jews.” Meanwhile, Cambridge University’s Israel Society bowed to pressure from Muslim students to cancel a speech by historian Benny Morris.

(Read full article)

Related: Speaking of Apartheid and "Israel Apartheid" week

Love of the Land: The apartheid libel

Love of the Land: Talking to Terrorists

Talking to Terrorists

Lee Smith
Tabletmag.com
03 March '10

“If you can talk to an insurgency that kills Americans, it should be easy to talk to ones that don’t,” Mark Perry tells me on the phone. Perry is author of the recently published Talking to Terrorists: Why America Must Engage With Its Enemies, a book documenting his meetings with terrorists around the Middle East, including officials from Hamas and Hezbollah. But his favorite template for successful engagement with terrorists is the Sunni insurgency in Iraq that eventually partnered with the Americans and turned against al-Qaida in Iraq. Perry argues that al-Qaida is the one terrorist group we shouldn’t be talking to, since it has no natural constituency and no interest in the democratic process. The others, Perry says, are “national resistance movements.”

Perry, who has lived and traveled in the Middle East for several decades, started talking to terrorists during the second intifada, when he built relationships with Hamas leaders like Ismail Haniyeh, Abdul Azziz Rantissi, and Mahmoud al-Zahar. These contacts would eventually lead to Perry’s partnership with former British intelligence official Alastair Crooke of the Beirut-based Conflicts Forum, an organization that regularly meets with terrorists and arranges meetings with non-active Western policymakers and diplomats. Perry left Conflicts Forum in the wake of Iran’s June presidential election, when he and Crooke found themselves on opposing sides. “He wrote an article on the June elections that showed disregard for the demonstrators,” says Perry. “And I wrote a piece castigating the regime and showing admiration for the opposition.”

Still, Perry has not lost his enthusiasm for the Iranian regime’s violence-prone proteges, like Hezbollah. How, I asked him, can the Party of God be considered democratic if its forces overran Beirut in May 2008, when the democratically elected government made a decision that Hezbollah didn’t like? The government, explained Perry, “wanted to take away Hezbollah’s privileges, so they pushed back.” Apparently, the fact that Hezbollah members only killed a few dozen of their fellow Lebanese before handing over their positions to the Lebanese Armed Forces makes them democratic.

“I’m not a reconciliation freak,” says Perry. “I’m not a pacifist. The vulnerability of my book is that people may come away thinking that simply by talking or listening, the scales will fall from our eyes. I don’t think that’s necessarily true. Sometimes, you sit down with them and you’re thinking, Holy cow—conflict is inevitable.” Still, he believes that Hamas may be willing to make a transition similar to that of the Iraqi insurgency and come to the negotiating table with Israel.

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Love of the Land: Talking to Terrorists

Love of the Land: Bashar Assad: What you see is what you get

Bashar Assad: What you see is what you get

Syria’s president is not a ‘pragmatist’ but fiercely anti-Israel, which is why efforts to lure him out of Iran’s orbit aren’t working.


Jonathan Spyer
Middle East/JPost
03 March '10

In Damascus last week, the full array of leaders of the so-called “resistance bloc” sat down to a sumptuous meal together.

Presidents Ahmedinejad of Iran and Assad of Syria were there, alongside a beaming Khaled Mashaal of Hamas and Hizbullah General-Secretary Hassan Nasrallah. There were some lesser lights, too, to make up the numbers – including Ahmed Jibril of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC), a fossil from the old alphabet soup of secular Palestinian groups.

The mood – replicated a few days later in Teheran – was one of jubilant defiance.

The reasons underlying Syria’s membership in the “resistance bloc” remain fiercely debated in western policy discussion. It has long been the view of a powerful element in Washington – strongly echoed by many in the Israeli defense establishment – that Syria constitutes the “weakest link” in the Iranian-led bloc. Adherents to this view see the Syrian regime as concerned solely with power and its retention. Given, they say, that Syria’s ties to the Iran-led bloc are pragmatic rather than ideological, the policy trick to be performed is finding the right incentive to make Damascus recalculate the costs and benefits of its position.

Once the appropriate incentive tips the balance, it is assumed, the regime in Damascus will coolly absent itself from the company of frothing ideologues on display in Damascus and Teheran last week, and will take up its position on the rival table – or at least at a point equidistant between them.

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Love of the Land: Bashar Assad: What you see is what you get

Love of the Land: Dinner in Damascus: What Did Iran Ask of Hizballah?

Dinner in Damascus: What Did Iran Ask of Hizballah?

David Schenker/Matthew Levitt
Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Policy Watch #1637
02 March '10

On February 26, Syrian president Bashar al-Asad hosted Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad and Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah for a dinner in Damascus. Nasrallah is a routine guest in the capital, but the timing of this high-profile trip -- just a week after the United States dispatched Undersecretary of State William Burns to Damascus and nominated its first new ambassador in five years -- seemed calculated not only to irritate Washington, but also to highlight the central role Hizballah plays in Iran and Syria's strategic planning. Apart from serving as a pivot between Tehran and Damascus, however, the group also holds the power to engulf Lebanon and perhaps the entire region into another war through actions of its own.

Unfulfilled Promise of Retaliation

Two years after Hizballah military commander Imad Mughniyah was assassinated in Damascus -- prompting Nasrallah to declare an "open war" on Israel, the presumed perpetrator -- the group has yet to successfully retaliate. But it is not for lack of trying: in 2008, two Hizballah operatives and several Azerbaijani nationals were convicted of plotting attacks against the Israeli and U.S. embassies in Baku and sentenced to fifteen years in prison. The same year, Turkish authorities foiled as many as six possible Hizballah terrorist plots targeting Israelis and possibly the local Jewish community. Iranian intelligence agents were reportedly helping the group establish a network of operatives posing as tourists.

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Love of the Land: Dinner in Damascus: What Did Iran Ask of Hizballah?