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: 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: 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.

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

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).

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

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?

Love of the Land: The Vision Thing

The Vision Thing

Emmanuel Navon
For The Sake Of Zion
03 March '10

The man whom George W. Bush used to dismissingly call “The Eye Doctor” seems to be doing fine without glasses. Bashar al-Assad, an ophthalmologist who inherited his father’s hereditary job only because his older brother was killed in a car accident, has turned the tables on the United States. Five years ago, he complied with the American injunction to pull his troops out of Lebanon. Today, he is publicly humiliating the United States.

In February 2005, the US withdrew its ambassador to Syria following the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. Assad’s involvement in Hariri’s murder was so obvious that former French President Jacques Chirac, a personal friend of Hariri (and long-term guest in his Paris apartment), has been boycotting Assad ever since. By recalling its ambassador, the US was also expressing its discontent with the fact that Syria hosts and shields Palestinian terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad, transfers weapons from Iran to Hezbollah in Lebanon, lets terrorists crossing into Iraq, supports Iran’s foreign policy goals, and cooperates with Iran and North Korea to develop nuclear capabilities (concerns about Syria’s suspected nuclear program were brought to the world’s attention by the Israeli bombing of an alleged nuclear facility in eastern Syria in 2007).

Last month, five years exactly after the scolding of the Bush Administration, President Obama nominated Robert Ford as the new US Ambassador to Syria. The rationale of the current US Administration is that Assad can be sweet-talked into trading his alliance with Iran for a deal with America. Obama’s gamble has produced immediate results, but not the expected ones. Shortly after the nomination of Ambassador Ford, Ahmadinejad paid an official and pompous visit to Damascus (where he also met with Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah). Baffled, Hillary Clinton asked Assad why he was doing the opposite of what her government’s policy was supposed to produce. Assad responded as follows: “We have a hard time understanding Clinton, either because of a translation problem or because of our limited capabilities.” Hillary Clinton is being pushed around by Middle Eastern machos and America is being ridiculed.

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Love of the Land: The Vision Thing

Love of the Land: State of denial

State of denial

NOW Lebanon
01 March '10

Three men, three visits. Lebanese President Michel Sleiman goes to Russia and is met by the deputy foreign minister – (this is apparently not a slight; he is merely the most senior Arabist). He negotiates the sale of a few aging attack helicopters and returns to announce a controversial national dialogue line-up. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Saad Hariri jets off to Doha to discuss the usual “bilateral relations and regional events.”

However, the most meaningful “state” visit in recent days was made by a man who holds no public office, but who is arguably the most powerful individual in Lebanon. Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah may have been set up as the fall guy in the latest chapter in Hezbollah’s glorious struggle against the Zionist entity (as usual, no one else is prepared to take on Israel), but the fact remains that Hezbollah is the de facto power on the ground, and it was in Damascus that Lebanon’s real future was mapped out.

A formidable regional alliance is taking shape, and the Americans are not getting a look-in. US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton says she wants to drive a wedge between Syria and Iran but wakes up the next day to find out that arguably the three most powerful men in the region meet for lunch, declare undying love and vow that Israel will be defeated in Lebanon.

All Lebanese who value their security and sovereignty should be very worried, but then again Lebanon is a country in denial. The air has been filled with martial rhetoric in recent weeks with the drumbeat of conflict getting louder. Israeli jets fly over our airspace with impunity, while the recent banquet in Damascus is a painful reminder to the Lebanese that they can hold all the elections they want, wave as many flags as they want, but when President Assad wants to hold its own brand of bilateral talks, a call is placed to Dahiyeh, not Baabda or the Serail.

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Love of the Land: State of denial

Love of the Land: The Northern Tinder Box

The Northern Tinder Box

Jonathan Spyer
GLORIA Center
28 February '10

The war of words is continuing. The latest salvoes were fired last week by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, and his Lebanese ally and client Hassan Nasrallah. Ahmedinejad reportedly told Nasrallah that if Israel attacks Hizballah, the response should be sufficient to lead to the closure, once and for all, of the Israeli 'case.' In the same week, Nasrallah promised attendees at a 'Resistance Martyrs Day' celebration that his movement would target Israel's infrastructure in the event of further hostilities. The Hizballah leader mentioned airports, factories and refineries as possible targets.

Hizballah second in command Naim Qassem joined in this week, describing Israel as 'worse than Nazism,' and the 'leader of international crime under the sponsorship of the U.S. and major world powers.' Qassem reiterated his movement's rejection of any diplomatic option vis a vis Israel, saying that "What was taken by the force of occupation can only be regained by the force of the resistance."

The self-confident, warlike tones of these leaders are by now familiar. But what, if anything, is revealed by these most recent statements?

Some analysis has suggested that the heightened rhetoric may presage an attempt by Iran to heat up the northern front in response to the hardening international stance to Iran's nuclear program. While nothing should be ruled out, a number of factors should be borne in mind in this regard. Hizballah and its backers are well aware of the broad contours of Israel's likely response in the event of further aggression by the movement on the northern border. The message has been adequately transferred that a future conflict would not remain within the parameters of a localized Israel-Hizballah clash in southern Lebanon.

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Love of the Land: The Northern Tinder Box

Love of the Land: Learn To Deceive Hezbollah

Learn To Deceive Hezbollah

Tariq Alhomayed
Asharq Al-Awsat
21 February '10

The comments made by Ali Mekdad, a member of the Hezbollah parliamentary bloc on the reactions of some of the March 14 Alliance leadership regarding the telephone call between the President of Iran and Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah were extremely funny. In this telephone conversation, Ahmadinejad spoke to Nasrallah about the necessity of resistance, being ready against any possible aggression, and stressed that "this readiness must be at a level that they (the Zionists) will be finished off and the region will be rid of them forever if they want to repeat previous mistakes." Of course, Nasrallah's answer to Ahmadinejad was clear and unequivocal, and he said that "the resistance is in good condition and does not fear Israeli threats."

The Hezbollah parliamentary bloc member, MP Ali Mekdad, responding to some of the March 14 Alliance fears, namely that Lebanon will be transformed into an arena for Iranian interests, began be describing those who fear Lebanon being exploited as being "mouthpieces." Mekdad also sarcastically and derisively told them "if you are not proficient in political analysis, then we ask you to enter any school or university and learn!"

The truth is that it is up to the Lebanese people who want to deal with Hezbollah not to go to school or university to learn political analysis but instead to learn deception, as this will allow them to better understand Hezbollah and how to deal with them. The consequences of events does not require that they be shared or analyzed, but that the Lebanese people be extremely aware of everything that Hezbollah says, and of course everything that the Iranians President says, because Ahmadinejad and Nasrallah are moving in the same direction.

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Love of the Land: Learn To Deceive Hezbollah

Love of the Land: Iran’s war is not our war

Iran’s war is not our war

Hanin Ghaddar
NOW Lebanon
19 February '10

Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah Thursday night sent a shudder down the backs of the Lebanese. Ahmadinejad reportedly told Nasrallah during the call to be ready to confront Israeli threats. “Israel should be dealt with once and for all for the sake of the region,” he said.

The now-infamous phone call – which came in the wake of escalating threats being exchanged among Syrian, Hezbollah, Hamas, Iranian and Israeli officials as of late – has increased fears of a new war breaking out on Lebanese soil between Israel and Iran’s proxies.

But though all sides have been stepping up the belligerent tone, the real chances of a war taking place are still low. Analysts do not see a new conflict breaking out in the region in the near future for many reasons, one of which is that the US prefers to maintain a certain level of stability in the Middle East in order to focus on sanctions against Iran. Also, Hezbollah chief Nasrallah prefers to avoid a war, knowing that the Shia in Lebanon, who accepted the “divine victory” of 2006, might react differently were a new wave of destruction and violence to take place above their homes. As for Israel, the IDF would have already attacked Hezbollah if it were certain of its chances of winning.

The most disturbing part for the Lebanese, then, is witnessing Nasrallah taking orders from the Iranian president and stepping up his war-like rhetoric while ignoring the people and institutions of the country he lives in. This at the same time Iran is facing sanctions and possibly even attack. All this leaves some in Lebanon wondering whether another round of national dialogue dedicated to putting together a national defense strategy would be at all worth it.

“What we want is a retaliation that is up to the level of [slain Hezbollah commander] Imad Mugniyah,” Nasrallah told a rapt crowd during the Resistance Martyrs Day celebration on Tuesday. “We do not want retaliation for the sake of retaliation, rather to protect all the leaders, cadres and the entire cause which was conveyed by Imad Mugniyah.”

The leaders, cadre and cause he was speaking of protecting all belong, obviously, to Hezbollah, not to Lebanon as a whole. Nasrallah then outlined a complete military plan to confront Israel, targets and techniques included. He did not mention at all the rest of the Lebanese, the state or its institutions.

(http://www.nowlebanon.com/NewsArticleDetails.aspx?ID=147634)

Love of the Land: Iran’s war is not our war

Love of the Land: Resistance Conference in Beirut Declares Resistance's Victory, U.S. Policy's Defeat in Region

Resistance Conference in Beirut Declares Resistance's Victory, U.S. Policy's Defeat in Region

The Beirut Conference: A Show of Strength by Resistance Organizations, Syria, and Iran


Y. Yehoshua
MEMRI
10 February '10

The first conference of the Arab-International Forum for Support of the Resistance was held January 15-17, 2010 in Beirut. Over 3,000 individuals from the Arab, Islamic, and Western world were in attendance; figuring prominently among them were leaders of the Palestinian, Lebanese and Iraqi resistance movements, and representatives from Iran and Syria.

The guest list included: Hizbullah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, Hamas Political Bureau head Khaled Mash'al, and Iraqi Scholars Association chairman Sheikh Harith Al-Dhari, who represented the Iraqi resistance. There were also senior officials from Islamic and Arab countries, including Iranian Vice President Mohammad Reza Mir-Tajeddini, who read a letter from Ahmadinejad; a Syrian Ba'th Party official representing Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad; and numerous Lebanese officials, including a representative of Lebanese President Michel Suleiman, a representative of Lebanese Prime Minister Sa'd Al-Hariri, and former Lebanese prime minister Salim Al-Hoss. Also among the participants was International Union of Muslim Scholars head Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi, as well as officials and intellectuals from various Western countries. The latter included British MP George Galloway, as well as former U.S. attorney-general Ramsey Clark and American attorney Stanley Cohen, who for years have been active in providing legal defense for accused terrorists.

During the conference, in what was in effect a show of strength by the elements of the pro-Iran camp, participants underlined the right to armed resistance against the Israeli and American occupations, and also the importance of the resistance in thwarting the West's policy vis-à-vis the Middle East and creating a just world order. The official website of the conference explained that the idea to convene it was born of the increase in pressure and in attempts to eliminate the option of resistance to occupation after the resistance "proved its great effectiveness in thwarting the hostile plans in Lebanon, Gaza, Iraq, and Afghanistan."[1] The conference's concluding statement called for coordination among all the resistance movements, and declared the resistance in Lebanon, Palestine, and Iraq to be a model for ways of "countering the terrorism being implemented by Israel and the U.S."[2]

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Love of the Land: Resistance Conference in Beirut Declares Resistance's Victory, U.S. Policy's Defeat in Region

Love of the Land: It won’t just go away

It won’t just go away

Now Lebanon
New Opinion
18 January '10

When asked about the Irish question, Oliver Cromwell was alleged to have said, “If we forget about it, it will go away.” That was in 17th century England; over 300 years later the English are still trying to answer the Irish “question”. If the great parliamentarian were alive today, he might have a word or two to say to the Lebanese, many of whom appear to have forgotten about quite a lot.

For a while many of our politicians have kissed and made up with their so-called former rivals, and while senior diplomats have echoed their respective nations’ approval of the reconciliations, there is still the little “question” of Hezbollah, its weapons and its martial posture, which, if the rhetoric of the last few days is anything to go by, is becoming increasingly belligerent. In fact such is the level of saber rattling that we have to ask ourselves who is running the show in Lebanon.

Sunday saw the wrapping up of a three-day Arab and international forum in Beirut on supporting the Resistance. In the final statement, the delegates called for Arab states to announce the failure of the Middle East peace process and adopt a “confrontational” approach with Israel. Nothing new there you might say, but it was the call for the “strengthening of resistance culture in educational curriculums, literature and arts” that will send a shiver down the spines of Lebanese who have witnessed firsthand what the Resistance has achieved in recent years.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: It won’t just go away

Love of the Land: Hassan Nasrallah made four mistakes

Hassan Nasrallah made four mistakes

Michael Young
Daily Star (Lebanon)
31 December 09

In his Ashoura speech this past weekend, Hizbullah’s secretary general, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, irritated many Christians. He recommended that they take stock of their situation, especially, as he described it, the mistaken wager that some Christians once placed on Israel; but also, Nasrallah implied, their more recent dependence on the West in general and the United States in particular.

Nasrallah urged Christians “not to accept that some of them push [the community] toward suicide built on artificial fear and the [fear] of a bogeyman raised constantly and daily.” He went on to advise that Christians engage in “a calm dialogue between themselves … over their present and future choices to benefit from the experiences of the past.”

At one level, Nasrallah’s statements were interpreted as a warning to those Christian parties, above all the Lebanese Forces and the Kataeb, who have opposed the government’s legitimization of Hizbullah’s weapons. It is in this vein that Samir Geagea, the head of the Lebanese Forces, responded that Nasrallah’s comments suggested that there was no need for a national dialogue over the weapons, even though such a process was approved during the Doha conference of May 2008.

However, there was something far more disturbing in what Nasrallah said, much more illustrative of Hizbullah’s impossible relationship with the Lebanese system. Echoes of this we heard several weeks ago, when the secretary general read his party’s new program. It is that Hizbullah today is challenging a key foundation of post-Independence Lebanon as a place between East and West, belonging to neither but also – and this was always understood – open to, and ambiguously even a part of, both.

There has long been in Hizbullah’s actions and public discourse a desire to turn Lebanon against the West, or at least to widen the rift between the two. Nasrallah’s mention of Israel was but a pretext, since Christians long ago, and quite sensibly, gave up on an Israeli alliance. The assault on Lebanon’s Western sympathies began during the 1980s when Hizbullah and its precursors abducted Americans and Europeans in Beirut, several of whom were murdered or allowed to die; and it continued during the postwar period, when the party used resistance against Israel as a byword to justify the broader rejection of American and European influence in Lebanese affairs. At the time this found favor with Syria, which saw the attitude as reinforcing Syrian exclusivity in shaping Lebanon’s future.

After 2005, and the Syrian withdrawal, Hizbullah went a step further. Because the party was obliged more than ever before to anchor itself in Lebanese realities, without a Syrian Army protecting its back and allowing it to focus on the conflict with Israel, it became imperative for Hizbullah to mobilize anti-Western sentiment nationally. The endeavor was mostly unsuccessful, until the party was rewarded when it pushed Michel Aoun and his Christian followers into a confrontation with the United States and, to a lesser extent, with the Europeans, by forcing the general to make a priority of defending his affiliation with Hizbullah.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: Hassan Nasrallah made four mistakes

Love of the Land: Shameless Islamist Doublespeak Rages On

Shameless Islamist Doublespeak Rages On

Hezbollah's "New" Manifesto in Context

Raymond Ibrahim
Middle East Forum
Pajamas Media
24 December 09

To English audiences, jihadists talk of ending oppression; to Arabic ones, they talk of oppressing the infidel.

"Al-Qaeda's Zawahiri Accuses Obama of Trying to 'Enslave' Arab World." So reads the headline of a recent Fox News report, which goes on to quote Zawahiri saying things such as "Obama's policy is nothing but another cycle in the Crusader and Zionist campaign to enslave and humiliate us, and to occupy our land and steal our wealth."

Two years earlier, Zawahiri was even more dramatic. Then he implored "blacks in America, people of color, American Indians, Hispanics, and all the weak and oppressed in North and South America, in Africa and Asia, and all over the world, to know that when we wage jihad in Allah's path, we aren't waging jihad to lift oppression from Muslims only; we are waging jihad … to lift oppression from all mankind. … This is why I want every oppressed one on the face of the earth to know that our victory over America and the Crusading West — with Allah's permission — is a victory for them, because they shall be freed from the most powerful tyrannical force in the history of mankind."

Unfortunately for al-Qaeda, its very own words — the Arabic ones directed at fellow Muslims which Westerners rarely see or read — unequivocally contradict its repeated attempts to portray itself as an organization out to spread Robin Hood-style justice and equanimity vis-à-vis a tyrannical U.S. For in these Arabic treatises, al-Qaeda makes it perfectly clear that, short of submitting to Islamic hegemony, the non-Muslim world is the enemy, ipso facto.

Yet doublespeak is definitely not the sole province of al-Qaeda; the decades-long Arab-Israeli conflict has furnished the world with some of the most flagrant examples of Islamist doublespeak — emanating from such players as Arafat, the PLO, and Hamas. Hezbollah offers a recent example:

According to Reuters, the terrorist organization's newly revised manifesto "tones down Islamist rhetoric but maintains a tough line against Israel and the United States. The new manifesto drops reference to an Islamic republic in Lebanon, which has a substantial Christian population, confirming changes to Hezbollah thinking about the need to respect Lebanon's diversity."

In fact, this "new" manifesto has been hailed as a progressive step forward for the terrorist organization: an AFP headline tells us that "Hezbollah strikes softer tone in second manifesto: [according to] analysts," such as one Paul Salem, head of the Beirut-based Carnegie Middle East Center, who asserts that the "manifesto is reassuring as it showsHezbollah's integration with Lebanese political life."

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Love of the Land: Shameless Islamist Doublespeak Rages On

Love of the Land: Nasrallah's call to psychological war

Nasrallah's call to psychological war

The Daily Star
Editorial
23 December 09

The 10-day period of Ashura, in this modern age, is one in which leaders of the Shiite community have ample opportunities and means to address the general public, whether about the past, present or future. The leader of Hizbullah has used this year’s Ashura season to advocate a “psychological war” against Israel. Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said the effort should counter recent Israeli maneuvers aimed at convincing everyone in the region that the country’s army is invincible.

Nasrallah’s proposal reflects the best of intentions; a psychological war against Israel requires patience and planning, which Hizbullah has exhibited in its military operations over the last few decades. Hizbullah cadres have been busy training, learning and doing, and become skilled at such tasks.

However, Nasrallah’s call to psychological arms appeared to be directed at Lebanon, and not just the supporters of the resistance – if Hizbullah were about to engage in a new psy-ops initiative, odds are that Nasrallah wouldn’t be announcing it in public.

Advocating a psychological war, by Lebanon, brings us back to the issue of the country’s diplomatic-defensive initiative, and the search for tools in this national psychological war. The most important tool here is Lebanon’s Christians, and to get them on board, we must enlist their help in building the Lebanese state, and especially its political-diplomatic presence. We’ve repeatedly called for upcoming sessions of National Dialogue to focus on a diplomatic-defensive initiative, which we need if a psychological war is to have any chance of success.

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Love of the Land: Nasrallah's call to psychological war

Love of the Land: Has Hizbullah Changed?

Has Hizbullah Changed?

Dr. Shimon Shapira
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
15 December 09

Has Hizbullah Changed? The 7th Hizbullah General Conference and Its Continued Ideology of Resistance

Some Western analysts believe the political manifesto published in the wake of Hizbullah's 7th General Conference at the end of November 2009 represented a fundamental change in Hizbullah policy.

While its link to Iran as the ultimate source of authority was not mentioned in this or any previous political manifesto, this link - that is part of Hizbullah's essence - appeared in the "Open Letter" (Resala Maftuha) of 1985, which remains the founding manifesto of Hizbullah and continues to serve as the movement's ideological basis.

The preface to the latest manifesto describes the decline of the United States as the sole superpower and the retreat of American power throughout the world. In reflection of these global changes, Hizbullah offers its resistance to Israel and the United States as the model for emulation throughout the world.

Hizbullah's vigorous insistence that it retain an army of its own that does not heed the authority of the state but rather the representative of Iran's leader in Lebanon makes a mockery of the clauses in the political manifesto about Lebanon being the eternal homeland. Furthermore, by building a state-like system parallel to that of the Lebanese state, and one that relies on aid and funding from Iran and Syria, Hizbullah does not contribute to the strengthening of Lebanon.

The decision of the Lebanese government to recognize the continued legitimate existence of Hizbullah's armed militia demonstrates less a case that Hizbullah underwent a process of "Lebanonization," but rather that the Lebanese state has undergone a process of "Hizbullazation."

Hizbullah's alleged move toward pragmatism is based to a large extent on an Iranian decision to create a new atmosphere in Lebanon that will allow it to work unmolested. Iran is looking for strict silence in the Lebanese arena in order to enable Hizbullah to reconstruct its strategic capabilities (including long-range rockets and missiles) in Lebanon in order to make use of these capabilities at a time to be determined by Tehran.

Hizbullah wound up its clandestine 7th General Conference at the end of November 2009 that took place and lasted about four months. Hassan Nasrallah was again chosen to be Hizbullah's general secretary and, as with previous conferences, the movement published a political manifesto. Some Western analysts believe the manifesto represented a fundamental change in Hizbullah policy. Indeed, a few days after it was proclaimed, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband told the Beirut Daily Star, "carefully considered contact with Hizbullah's politicians, including its MPs, will best advance our objective of the group rejecting violence to play a constructive role in Lebanese politics."1 Later, British spokesmen denied they had changed their policy toward Hizbullah.

Hizbullah's 6th General Conference was convened in 2004 and, according to the movement's bylaws, the 7th General Conference was to have convened in 2007. However, due to the Second Lebanon War and the debates and internal struggles that erupted in its wake within Hizbullah, together with the death of Hizbullah military commander Imad Mughniyeh in a car bombing in Damascus in February 2008, the conference was postponed twice and was finally convened in 2009.2

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Love of the Land: Has Hizbullah Changed?

Love of the Land: For Hezbollah, Lebanon is an afterthought

For Hezbollah, Lebanon is an afterthought

Tony Badran
NowLebanon.com
08 December 09

Two things were unsurprising about Hezbollah’s political document,unveiled on November 30 by the party’s secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah, namely its content and characterization in the media. The document reaffirmed the party’s determination to defend its parallel state while simultaneously forcing its priorities on Lebanon’s state and society, without abandoning its ideological principles or strategic objectives.

A closer look at the document shows that what has been hailed as a “new” platform is in fact a point-by-point expansion of the principles laid out in Hezbollah’s founding document, the so-called Open Letter, of 1985. And what is not explicitly laid out in the document, Nasrallah clarified in his press conference, as did other Hezbollah officials in media outlets.

First and foremost, the party remains as determined as ever to safeguard its autonomous armed status in an open-ended way, reaffirming the “duality” between itself on the one hand and the rest of Lebanon on the other. In fact, as Nasrallah himself remarked to the assembled journalists, the “Resistance” (by which he meant Hezbollah’s autonomous armed status), “still holds first place.” The document’s section on Lebanon outlines Hezbollah’s conception of the country as being directly intertwined, both thematically and structurally, with the Resistance. In other words, there is no Lebanon without the Resistance. As Nasrallah’s deputy, Naim Qassem, put it in 2007, Hezbollah’s objective is to integrate the rest of society into the Resistance, not vice versa, as some are claiming.

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Love of the Land: For Hezbollah, Lebanon is an afterthought