Orientalism revisited – a review of Robert Irwin’s ‘Lust of Knowing’

In short, rather than a convincing refutation of Said’s work, Irwin has actually (albeit maybe unwittingly) produced a useful companion to ‘Orientalism’ (including both the prevalent criticisms of the work and a list of errata). ‘Lust of Knowing’ would have been even more useful if Irwin had resisted the mean-spirited and often disingenuous personal attacks that mar an otherwise informative and well-researched historical account. The book is also a warm celebration of a scientific discipline whose obvious and abundant mistakes can sometimes be explained as part of the normal dialectic of the scientific method, but more often seem to be simply a regrettable product of ‘the individual being largely confined to thinking in terms of the public discourse imprisoning him’ – although of course simultaneously demonstrating that ‘public discourse is for a large part created by the intellectual contributions of individuals’…

Syrian advances and Lebanese prisons

‘”Syria appears to continue to deploy troops on Lebanese soil in the remote and rugged hills north of the town of Rashaya al-Wadi, despite Damascus having ended its military occupation of Lebanon in April 2005,” reports the Jane’s article. The report goes on to say that “Syrian positions in Lebanon appear designed purely as a forward defensive line in the case of any Israeli advance and not as conduits for weaponry smuggled from Syria to Hezbollah. The militant Lebanese Shiite organization receives much of its armaments along the border in the northern Bekaa Valley adjacent to Shiite areas under the group’s control. Further commercial satellite imagery obtained by Jane’s from DigitalGlobe from Dec. 24, 2006 and March 12, 2008 suggest that Syria has undertaken a moderate increase in its equipment and therefore its activity at the apparent Syrian military bases on Lebanese soil. The new equipment includes what appears to be towed and self-propelled artillery and a T-54/55 tank. “Human intelligence verification of the increase in activity is impossible,” according to the Jane’s report, which goes on to say that “in late 2005, the Lebanese Armed Forces sealed off the hills to the east of Kfar Qouk. An LAF checkpoint at the junction of the only road leading to Deir al-Ashayer bars all but local residents from reaching the village. The nearby village of Halwa is also sealed off by the army. Although there are no Syrian army bases in the vicinity of Halwa, there are several small outposts manned by pro-Damascus Palestinian groups such as Fatah Intifada and as-Saiqa. These outposts are linked to Syria by un-patrolled dirt tracks used by commercial smugglers as well as militants for resupplying equipment and personnel.”‘

‘Illegal migrants, drug addicts, sex workers and those accused of crimes against national security are particularly at risk of abuse which, according to interviews conducted by ALEF, ranged from electrocution to rape. ALEF also claims Lebanon has not lived up to its international legal obligations as a party to the UN Convention Against Torture, and a signatory of the Optional Protocol to the same convention. “Despite the framework of legal obligations which Lebanon is a part of, torture has been practiced by the Internal Security Forces against the majority of arrested persons,” the report says. In addition, Lebanon has failed to issue regular reports to the Committee Against Torture, the UN monitoring body in charge of ensuring states’ compliance to the convention. The report also criticizes the poor condition of Lebanese prisons which it claims are “under-staffed, under-resourced and over-crowded.”

Jabal Mohsen & Bab al-Tabbaneh

Nicholas Blanford confirms the clan-feud rather than politically orchestrated nature of the recent clashes, as well as the salafi aspect in the case of Tripoli that I mentioned in an earlier post: ‘While national political leaders blame their opponents for starting the clashes, most of the recent sporadic outbreaks of fighting in north Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley in the east appear to have been symptoms of old rivalries and localized disputes spinning out of control rather than deliberately orchestrated military campaigns. Take Jabal Mohsen and Tebbaneh – two quarters living cheek by jowl in the center of Tripoli, Lebanon’s second-largest city. The residents of both districts have been feuding since the 1975-90 civil war when they fought on opposite sides. Today, the residents of Jabal Mohsen, who are mainly Alawites, an offshoot of Shiite Islam, are supporters of the opposition led by the militant Shiite Hezbollah. The most popular political party in the Tebbaneh district is the Sunni Future Movement, the largest component of the March 14 parliamentary coalition. But many residents here adhere to the Salafi school of Islam, some of whom believe an ideology that brands Shiites – including Alawites – as apostates.’

Ferry Biedermann, in the Financial Times, discusses the mixed blessings and uncertain future of the economic upturn after the Doha accord – which made shares at the Beirut stock exchange jump up too – and discusses the severe current problems of inflation and price rises: ‘But some warn that Lebanon is now headed even more rapidly for a price crunch as inflation mounts and outside money flows in. Real estate prices in Beirut jumped between 15 and 20 per cent in the weeks immediately following the Doha agreement in May, according to Raja Makarem, a real estate consultant. The accord ended more than a week of fighting between supporters of the western-backed government and the Hizbollah movement and its allies, and pointed a way out of 18 months of political deadlock. Prices have reached some $3,000 per square metre in Beirut and some agents are asking as much as $4,000, even outside the much more expensive downtown area. (…) But even if all goes well, the optimistic trends in both real estate and tourism mask a more complex truth. Large-scale investors, who virtually stopped launching new projects in the country after the war with Israel in 2006, have so far not returned. Mr Makarem, a real estate consultant in Beirut, notes that money from the Gulf and other Arab countries is coming in the form of small-scale private purchases, not large developments. “It will take time before Lebanon can attract big Arab investors again.” The only exception is the country’s small stock market, dominated by the real estate and banking sectors. Foreign investors seem to be confident that the market offers good value. (…) “We don’t have industry that can compete and we don’t have agriculture. We have services,” says [minister of tourism Joe Sarkis]. Much of the activity in tourism and real estate is the result of one of the less favourable developments in recent years: a massive outflow of human capital from the country. Many Lebanese head for jobs abroad, especially in the Gulf countries. In crisis years, such as 2006 and 2007, expatriates have returned on family visits and have even continued to buy real estate. But much more important for the national economy is the money they send back in remittances, now estimated at $7bn annually. While this allows some families to survive, those who do not have relatives abroad or who are not directly employed in the real estate or tourism sectors may experience worsening economic conditions. Concerns about rising prices, food, fuel and, in the real estate sector, making rents and housing unaffordable, are almost unanimous. “We are facing a price explosion,” says Charbel Nahas, an economist. For most wage-earners, this will not be offset by the two-thirds increase in the minimum salary voted through by the outgoing government last month, he says.’

Go back to start – do pass by the bank…

So all those bags of dollars distributed by the emir of Qatar to the mafioso clanlords ‘leading’ this country have only bought a few measly weeks of semi-peace after all. While the politicos have been jostling for cabinet positions for a month or so, the economy keeps going downhill and someone somewhere keeps paying hooligans and snipers to stoke unrest in the streets. The fighting has now moved to Tripoli where the pro-government sunni forces (presumably assisted by some assorted international jihadi brothers) have been battling it out with the opposition (mainly SSNP) alawites in the Jabal Mohsen and Bab al-Tabbaneh neighbourhoods, along the very same frontline that saw heavy fighting during the second week of May. Mortars, RPGs and even snipers were all invited to the party. Up to now, nine dead and some forty wounded have been counted and a combined police & army action has been going on for a while in an effort (not universally welcomed, it would seem) to stop the fighting. Is this what Condoleezza Rice brought along on her ’surprise visit’?
A bomb has also exploded in Ain al-Hilwe, the Palestinian camp near Saida. The link is to a crappy article, I know, but I couldn’t resist it, especially as they call Jund ash-Sham ‘Yund al-Shams’ and describe the salafi jihadis as a ‘grassroots sunni organization’ (which is technically true, I suppose… the factual information in the article, apart from that, is correct though).
Meanwhile, the gulf states are showering even more money on the country, as they pledge to contribute half of the funds to reconstruct Nahr al-Bared (at a fraction of what it reportedly cost them to buy Nabih Berri in Doha, of course), as well as ‘15 nearby villages‘. Would those be the villages inhabited by Lebanese who demonstrated last year not to rebuild the camp in their backyard, perchance?
On an only slightly lighter note, it seems that even a European football cup is not safe from politicization by the Lebanese: while the maronites overwhelmingly support(ed) the French, the shia have a distinct preference for Germany. The orthodox christians tend to side with Russia and Greece. It is actually beyond me why the Lebanese – who in general prefer basketball to football anyway – should even feel compelled to choose one European country out of the lot to support, buy they do so, and fervently. Cars decorated with the respective flags are all around and there is no public place in sight that hasn’t put up a screen showing all the matches. One team that doesn’t attract a lot of support, though, is the Italian one. Both times they won a cup – in 1982 and 2006 – all hell broke loose in Lebanon immediately after…
The Lebanese do have a national football league, by the way, but it plays its matches without an audience present – not allowed for security reasons. Of course, any old team is, you guessed it, either supported or owned by a specific political/sectarian faction. So let’s just play it safe and ban public matches altogether…

Desperate for a scoop…

‘EXCLUSIVE: Hezbollah poised to strike?‘ All of a sudden, there is this talk about Hizbullah ’sleeper cells’ in Canada. Somehow, this scoop was limited to ABCnews, and look what they actually say in the article: ‘There is no credible information on a specific target, according to the officials. Suspected Hezbollah operatives have conducted recent surveillance on the Israeli embassy in Ottawa, Canada and on several synagogues in Toronto, according to the officials.’(…) Latin American (sic) is also considered a possible target by officials following Hezbollah’s planning.’ Naharnet, doing its own enquiries (or so they present it on their website – but these are actually lines copied out of the ABC article), has this to report: ‘When asked about the alleged Hizbullah threats, Stockwell Day, Canada’s Public Safety Minister, confirmed that Canadian authorities were keeping an eye on the organization. “It’s something that’s watched,” he said. However, Canada’s National Post quoted one of the federal police force’s top national security officers in Ontario, Jamie Jagoe, as saying “at the present time there is no known specific threat to any specific location in the city of Toronto or anything like that. We have many ongoing investigations involving listed terrorist organizations. I can’t get into specifics.” Special Agent Richard Kolko of the Federal Bureau of Investigation similarly characterized the report. “Hizbullah remains a threat to security in different parts of the world. The FBI Joint Terrorism Task Forces conduct investigations into different groups that potentially pose a threat to the U.S. or our interests overseas; however, the FBI and DHS (Department of Homeland Security) have no specific intelligence about any group or so-called sleeper cells planning an attack,” Kolko said.’

In other words, apart from the fact that some cop spotted some random ay-rabs in the neighbourhood of some equally random Israeli embassy or a synagogue, nothing has actually happened. The article is full of no-brainers and irrelevant quotes such as ‘While US officials say there is no credible information of a Hezbollah attack on American soil, the Homeland Security Secretary, Michael Chertoff, told Fox News two weeks ago, that “they make al Qaeda look like a minor league team.”‘ Yes well, it’s his job to spread fear, isn’t it? Who makes this shit up? The ‘investigative team’ of ABC, John Esposito and Brian Ross, apparently – so desperate for a scoop they’ll print any old rumour and recycle any old quotes to dress it up in. Oh, on the positive side, they did get the one concrete fact in the article right: ‘Hezbollah, which means ‘Party of God’…

In other duh… news:

Former US ambassador Jeffrey Feltman apparently had the same reservations I mentioned in an earlier post about the proposed new location of their Lebanese embassy, and such is the scarcity of comon sense in US foreign policy circles that he actually had to wage a serious battle against the administration: ‘In cable after cable, Feltman argued it was unsafe to construct the new embassy on property that was bought for that purpose in 2004 but had later fallen into the hands of Hizbullah. Higher-ups in Washington were insisting on going ahead with the project. Finally, last July, it was put on hold. “Ambassador Feltman challenged this decision and repeatedly appealed directly to the highest levels of the State Department“‘

Venezuelan foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro to US: “If they want to search for terrorists, look for them in the White House“.

HA-news that actually does seem to have happened: ‘Several explosions were reported in the Jezzine Mountain range, which is a Hizbullah stronghold in south Lebanon, and witnesses reported that Hizbullah ambulances evacuated several casualties. A police official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Naharnet at least three explosions were heard in the remote region, about 46 kilometers east of Sidon, provincial capital of south Lebanon. The official said police could not establish the exact nature of the blasts because Hizbullah does not allow security forces into the area. However witnesses reported observing ambulances of Hizbullah’s Islamic Health Authority racing into the area and making return trips with sirens wailing. The ambulances, according to several witnesses, did not head to Sidon, where the closest hospitals are located, but drove to south Beirut where Hizbullah operates private hospitals.’

As well as: ‘Any withdrawal from Shebaa Farms “will not change the fact that Lebanon needs the resistance,” Hizbullah MP Hassan Fadlallah said. “Any Zionist withdrawal from the Shebaa Farms would be a big achievement for the resistance for this would be the result of its role and its pressure,” Fadlallah said. Hizbullah, which forced Israel’s pullout from south Lebanon in May 2000 after two decades of occupation, sees itself as the legitimate ‘resistance’ to the Jewish state. Fadlallah also accused the international community, particularly the United States, of involving itself recently in the Shebaa Farms issue “for aims linked to the resistance” – a reference to demands for Hizbullah to disarm.” “Those who think that putting the Shebaa Farms under international supervision could put pressure on the resistance…delude themselves,” he added. During a surprise visit to Lebanon Monday, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she believed it was time to resolve the Shebaa Farms dispute in conformity with U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701. Meanwhile, the opposition’s follow-up committee said in a statement that the “resistance weapons are not subject to bargaining or compromise.”‘

Odds and ends

Yesterday, the motorcade transporting Michele Sison, the US attache (until she is officially accepted as ambassador by the president) was attacked by stone-throwing local people in Nabatiyeh in the south of Lebanon, conveniently labeled ‘Hizbullah supporters‘, as if 90% or more of the population of the south is not… Shouts of ‘mawt li-’amrika, mawt li-’isra’il’ accompanied the attack, which ended without hurting anyone. Contrary to what this report says, Sison was actually visiting one Abdullah Bitar, one of maybe ten people who receive bags of money from the US to make up the ’secular shia alternative’ to Hizbullah and Amal (as if the latter isn’t secular anyway). This group, which is about as representative for Lebanon’s shia as Ahmed al-Chalabi is for Iraq’s shia, is led by Ahmad al-As’ad, who hails from a previously ruling family of feudal landlords who the shia, as the only community in Lebanon to do that, have overthrown decades ago. The US at the forefront of supporting democracy as always! But then again, these are no doubt the ‘moderate’ shia… Meanwhile, the US has discovered that the Chavez government in Venezuela is sympathetic to fellow US enemies such as Hizbullah. Of course, rather than calling this political opposition, the US insists on labeling it ‘proof of an international terror network’. Duh…

The Lebanese army has today hosted a ‘reconciliatory meeting’ in its nearby barracks for the rival clans of Saadnayel (sunni) and Taalabaya (shia), inviting anybody who is anyone in the villages along, and reportedly brokering a ‘gentleman’s agreement‘ whereby both sides agreed to stop shooting at each other (and, adhering to the iron law of war, killing only passers-by).

‘If a cat dies in Lebanon, the world knows about it. Here in Yemen, we are forgotten.’ This is an excellent introductory article by Rannie Amiri about the not very publicized 4-year old civil war in the north of Yemen, which nevertheless fits the US/Saudi-sponsored Lebanon-Iraq pattern of pitting shia (of the zaidi variety in this case) against sunni: ‘Yemen’s president Ali Abdullah Saleh (a non-Hashimite Zaidi) accuses the (…) “Houthis,” of seeking to restore Hashimite Zaidi rule in the north, sedition, and “sharing intelligence with foreign powers” (an unsubtle reference to Iran). The Houthis reject these allegations and maintain they are fighting against the institutionalized discrimination and disenfranchisement of the Zaidi community, the increasing promulgation of anti-Shia Salafi/Wahabi ideology in Yemen, and the government’s establishment of closer ties with the United States. (…) In a June 7th Washington Post article, Ellen Knickmeyer reports that the Yemeni government is doing its utmost to both suppress and prevent coverage of the fighting in Saada. This has occurred by impeding independent observers from assessing the war and denying local and foreign journalists access to the area. Cell phone networks to the region have been cut and relief efforts hampered. “To even speak of going to Saada is to get a death sentence” remarked Abdul Karim al-Khiwani, editor of the Zaidi weekly Al-Shura. Al-Khiwani managed to escape the death penalty, but in a verdict decried by human rights groups as well as the U.S. State Department, he was found guilty of sedition and “forming an armed group.” On June 9th he was sentenced to six years in prison with hard labor. His real crime? Covering the Saada rebellion and publishing the photographs of destroyed villages. As one might surmise, a humanitarian crisis is unfolding in Saada. Abdul Malik al-Houthi told the IRIN News Agency that food supplies were not reaching the north as the World Food Program struggles to feed the 77,000 internally displaced civilians (Knickmeyer reports 100,000). From these accounts and those of widespread destruction of homes, businesses and mosques, Saada is effectively under siege. The death toll in the war between the Yemeni government and the Zaidi rebels now numbers well into the thousands. Indeed, the struggle of al-Houthi’s forces in north Yemen is not unlike that of Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza and Muqtada al-Sadr’s followers in Baghdad. All have demanded an end to the collusion between the ruling authority and the United States and/or Israel; endured or are presently enduring a humanitarian crisis; are accused of being under Iranian influence, and feared by the leaders of the Sunni Arab states for using the ballot box to achieve political legitimacy.’

Back in Lebanon,in the meantime, the cabinet negotiations are far from concluded. Aoun recently proposed to limit the prime minister’s powers, which prompted the entire M14-chorus to start a round of Aoun-battering, while the move was rejected even by his opposition partners. To get a taste of the outrageous and immensely involved kowtowing that’s going on, have a look at this summary of one day’s proceedings in an-Nahar.

President Suleiman has rejected Israel’s recent preposterous demands for peace talks with Lebanon, saying Israel has to comply with UN resolutions 425 and 1701 and stop occupying Lebanese territory (i.e. the Shebaa farms) before any bilateral talks could be held. Here’s what Lebanese political analysts have to say about the ‘peace offer’: ‘By extending his hand to Lebanon – and Syria – Olmert is angling to keep himself relevant by scoring points at home and with his United States allies by showing his ostensible engagement for peace, said Oussama Safa, executive director of the Lebanese Center for Policy Studies. “The Israelis are benefiting from what is happening with Syria through Turkey,” Safa said. “They’re good points for the Olmert government. They are taking advantage of this … to throw the ball in Lebanon’s lap.” In addition, Olmert is endeavoring as well to burnish his credentials as premier before the bribery scandal possibly brings him down, Safa added. “He’s trying to stay afloat a little bit,” Safa said. “The scandal has really dragged Olmert beyond repair. He’s been a lame duck since the 2006 war.” Wednesday’s move also could represent an Israeli bow to US wishes to help out Prime Minister-designate Fouad Siniora, whose March 14 coalition has been a favorite of the administration of US President George W. Bush, said Fadia Kiwan, director of the school of political science at St. Joseph University. “Israel may be under pressure of the Americans to show that they have good will toward Lebanon,” she said. US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice spent the weekend in Israel and on Monday made an unannounced visit to Lebanon, where she said “the time has come” to deal with the Shebaa Farms, an area occupied by Israel and claimed by Lebanon. Hizbullah has long cited the liberation of the Shebaa Farms as a reason for its men to keep their arms, and the US and Israel could see the attempt to settle the Shebaa Farms issue and initiate peace talks as part of their larger strategy to weaken Hizbullah and the group’s sponsor, Iran, Safa said. That strategy, however, is a dead end, Safa added, because Hizbullah would simply attribute an Israeli withdrawal from Shebaa to the power of the resistance’s weapons – yet another rationale for not disarming as called for by many in the March 14 coalition and mandated by UN Security Council Resolution 1701. “There’s no way to weaken Hizbullah – they are the strongest” party in Lebanon, Safa said. “They will declare victory, no matter what. No matter how you turn it, Hizbullah will cash in.” Hizbullah officials have said recent moves on the Shebaa Farms should not be used a pretext to take away the group’s arms.’

The prisoner swap between Hizbullah and Israel is meanwhile rumoured to be imminent and to take place in Germany rather than in Naqura on the Lebanese-Israeli border as is customary. The latter is good news for the local beach house and restaurant owners, who habitually face a weekend of forced cancellations whenever a prisoner swap happens… (Notice, by the way, how the ‘unbiased’ BBC talks only with Israeli family members of the captured soldiers, and barely mentions the Lebanese kidnapped by Israel who are to be released under the same deal).

And finally: Lahza is a project that distributed cameras among Palestinian children living in the camps in Lebanon, asking them to take pictures of camp life seen through their eyes. The results are currently being displayed in an exhibition in Beirut. Menassat features some of them in this article.

Bekaa clashes and Syrian advances

Last night, clashes broke out again – as they regularly do – in Taalbaya and Saadnayel. These are actually two tiny villages (basically a line of houses along the road between Chtaura and Baalbek) in the Bekaa. Apart from lying on a frontier between sunni and shia areas, these villages and the surrounding area seem to be populated by some particularly belligerent clans who probably hate each other’s guts since the days of the Ottoman empire and have now conveniently sided with the opposite parties of the political spectrum – like the Junblatt and Arslan families, the two ‘aristocratic’ clans of landlords who have been vying with each other over the leadership of the druze for the past four centuries or so and now continue to do so under the rather unconvincing monickers of ‘Progressive Socialist Party’ (Junblatt, M14) versus ‘Lebanese Democratic Party’ (Arslan, M8). Anyway, during the Hizbullah actions in May, these very two villages were also the scene of serious clashes and the conflict has obviously not been resolved yet. Last night, three people were killed and four wounded there in fighting that lasted from late evening to early morning and included RPGs and mortars. The Lebanese army felt compelled to move in its elite troops in an effort to end the fighting. Mustaqbal has claimed the fighting started when Amal and Hizbullah fighters attacked the army, and subsequently engaged the local population to cover up the fact – but this report is not taken over by any less biased news outlets, so it’s probably just M14 propaganda… The victims, predictably, are all civilians who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Bashar al-Assad, meanwhile, seems mightily pleased with the Doha accords, as well as with the recent French courting of his government, and has been repeatedly announcing his willingness to open an embassy in Lebanon (reportedly – and not coincidentally one might presume – in the exact location of the former US embassy in Ain al-Mreisseh, which was spectacularly destroyed by the ‘Islamic Jihad Organisation’ during the civil war, in 1983). This is more important than it sounds, as it indicates that Syria is willing to finally renounce its claim on Lebanon as a Syrian province. The two countries have never had official diplomatic relations. Assad does tie the opening of an embassy, as well as his announced visit to Lebanon, to the formation of the national unity government.

The US embassy has reportedly been busy buying up land near Baabda (almost next to the presidential palace in fact) to relocate its premises there, presumably in the not so near future, as no building activities or even groundworks seem to be in evidence. The embassy is now located in Aukar, on the road to Jounieh, inconveniently far from Baabda or even the Grand Serail, but safely tucked away in solid christian territory. The proposed new location will be within easy reach of crude homemade missiles, possibly even simple RPGs, from Dahiyeh…

Roundup of the past week

I’ve been off the blog for a while, so here’s an extensive roundup of what has happened lately.

Firstly, formation of the national unity government: much quibbling and parlaying has been going on without any actual result, although Siniora yesterday promised ‘good news’ for the middle of the current week (but someone or other has been promising the same thing every few days). On the other hand, Rice is making a ’surprise visit’ to Beirut today, so any kind of bad shit could be about to explode. (US leaders always make ’surprise visits’ to countries where they know they will in all probability suffer an assassination attempt or two if they’d make an ‘announced visit’, and after their visit, ’stuff’ invariably happens.) Depending on which source you care to read, the obstacle to the formation of the government is either the ‘opposition’ – in particular Aoun, or the ‘majority’, through instigating ‘political violence’ and then blaming it on the opposition. In the first case, Aoun/the opposition camp (again, depending on the sources) either adamantly claims or studiously tries to avoid the important but immensely problematic finance and foreign affairs ministries. It is not easy to determine which is actually the case, especially given the tendency of even the most unimportant political figures on either side of the political landscape to come out with confusing, nonsensical or just plain empty statements at any given moment. In any case, as yet little or no actual progress seems to have been made.

On the front of ‘political violence’ – and the parentheses are not accidental, because any small incident happening in Lebanon – a country where the majority of the population is well-armed, remember – is blown out of proportion and turned into a ‘political’ issue whenever it suits any of the political figureheads in the country. To give a concrete example, at the beginning of the week of hostilities in May, there were reports about ‘clashes between fighters of the opposition and the majority in El Mina’ (the mostly christian port area of Tripoli). An inhabitant of El Mina whom I know, and who had actually witnessed the ‘clashes’, later explained to me that it was basically two guys who had a drunken night brawl about a girl. One of them went home, returned with a gun and shot at the other. Nothing else actually happened in El Mina (as opposed to other parts of Tripoli) during the entire conflict. The violence of the previous week seems to be mostly in the same category, often also involving different families or clans continuing age-long feuds, sometimes – especially in the Bekaa valley – actually triggered by the police or army trying to arrest someone for decidedly unpolitical crimes with their family coming out in force to prevent the arrest. Whenever things like this happen in mixed sectarian areas (roughly 60% if not more of the country, really), it is easy enough for whomever is so inclined to paint it as a ‘political’ clash, especially as the political divisions (except among the christians and druze) largely run along sectarian lines anyway. The most amusing incident happened in Chiyah (part of Dahiyeh), where traffic on a main thoroughfare was blocked for 30 minutes while army sappers demined a black and red handbag which turned out to be loaded with… female underwear. If it wasn’t just a case of accidental handbag loss (or theft), it was the best practical joke I’ve seen in the country so far – the female underwear detail in Hizbullah-controlled Dahiyeh being an especially hilarious touch… On a less jocular note, it would however be unwise to ignore the real bitterness and feelings of humiliation, especially among (also non-islamist) sunnis, resulting from Hizbullah’s recent show of force, as well as the psychological effects of regular violence, continued political instability and lack of personal security or stable future prospects on the population at large.

In other news, Israel now seems to be willing to swap 4 jailed Hizbullah fighters as well as Samir Kantar for the two Israeli soldiers that it killed 1300 Lebanese people for… and more are getting mutilated and dying on an almost weekly basis as a result of the million(s) of cluster bombs Israel dropped all over the south of the country after a ceasefire was already negotiated. By the way, al-Ahram published this rather interesting article about the impending suicide/implosion of ‘Israel as we know it’. I often half-jokingly, half-seriously, give people asking me why I came to the Middle East the answer: ‘to witness the end of Israel’. This usually raises a few incredulous laughs. However: ‘When Amnon Rubinstein speaks, many people in Israel listen. As an intellectual who has held the posts of minister of education and of justice, Rubinstein commands the respect of the Israeli elite regardless of their intellectual and political leanings. And yet Rubinstein surprised Israelis when in an interview with Hebrew Radio in mid-April he anticipated that the Israeli state would not survive. Rubinstein is not the only person to have reached this conclusion. On the eve of the 60th anniversary of Israel’s establishment, Israeli intellectuals teemed with pessimistic predictions about the future. An increasing number of politicians and Zionists have begun to openly express the belief that the entity of Israel is on a path to oblivion. Since these predictions were made public, the Israeli press has dubbed them “visions of the end of time”. They have gained weight because they undermine the appearance of confidence that Israel’s leaders are keen to convey at any opportunity, but also because their proponents have played important decision-making roles or have long been connected to the establishment and are not merely members of elite intellectual circles on the margins of society. These intellectuals explain that their conclusion results from three basic factors: external threat; lack of confidence in the state’s future; and severe polarisation among society’s components. Rubinstein holds that Israel has failed to counter Arab threats, in particular failing to extinguish the desire of Palestinians to obtain their rights in struggle against Israel.’ The article also offers a rare insight into the internal racism of western (ashkenazim) jews directed at their eastern (sephardim and mizrahim) and African (falasha) co-religionists, as well as about the large community of Russian immigrants refusing to integrate, and the tensions between the religious and secular segments of Israeli society. Incidentally, it also quotes a few excellent examples of the well-known jewish variety of black humour.

With all the talk (and it is real) about jihadis flooding into the country to open up the next al-Qaeda front (anyone but Israelis are seemingly justified victims for them, with a marked preference for fellow muslims), the biggest hazard facing UNIFIL troops in Lebanon remains the traffic, it seems. Meanwhile, firefights and worse regularly keep erupting in and around Palestinian refugee camps, the preferred hideout in Lebanon for jihadis and assorted criminals of all kinds. The various Palestinian factions in Ain al-Hilweh seem to have – wisely albeit belatedly -agreed to cooperate on expulsing foreign (read: international jihadi with an emphasis on Saudi) ‘elements’ from their midst.

Analyses and articles: Franklin Lamb is an unusually optimistic – if not naive – observer of all things Lebanese, but he is well-informed on the Hizbullah-front and often comes up with interesting information from sources neglected by most journalists and analysts. In this interview at least he makes a lot of sense: ‘Franklin Lamb: Contrary to Israeli reports, those (Hizbullah and allied fighters) who moved into Beirut did not come from the South of Lebanon, from the Bekaa nor were they necessarily the ‘first team.’ Most were reserves with regular full time jobs in Beirut and the surrounding area. Most came in cars and vans just three miles south of Hamra from the Jnah, Ouzai, Ghoberi, Dahiyeh area. They moved along the seafront past the Coral Beach Hotel, along the only free public beach in Beirut, Ramlet al Baida, along Corniche Mazra and fanned out up the inclines to the right into West Beirut streets. It did not require much more than 20 minutes to reach their forward positions. Others, including Amal and the National Syrian Socialist Party came from the new airport road and from the southeast and east.
Potentially the ‘Hezbollah model’ has application in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan, if oppositions there can replicate the Hezbollah model of study, analysis, caution, patience and determined, disciplined execution. Hezbollah is not essentially a Shia phenomenon, it is a rapidly expanding resistance and justice movement and that it what makes it so lethal to colonialism and occupation enterprises such as Zionist Israel and hegemonistic America during the current period.’

Karim Makdisi offers this economic analysis on Electronic Intifada: ‘Lebanon is facing several critical issues. First, there is a tremendous social and economic crisis in this country, there is a 45 billion dollar debt, one of the largest debts per capita in the world, resulting from over a decade of neo-liberal economic policies that simply didn’t work throughout the 1990s. In truth there is little opposition towards the economic policies that the government is putting forward, that is to say that the opposition in Lebanon is more or less in agreement with the government in regards to social and economic policy. Both the opposition and the government have attempted to sweep the main social and economic issues facing Lebanon under the carpet. (…) Over the past couple years unemployment rates have gone up between 15-20 percent, as Lebanon’s economy is suffering due to major internal political crisis or military conflict in this country. Also there is a tremendous emigration happening, especially young people or youth who are leaving in droves, in search for jobs, a better life, a bit more stability than is possible to find in Lebanon today. Poverty has risen dramatically in Lebanon in recent years, especially in areas outside of Beirut, in northern Lebanon, in southern Lebanon, in the Bekka valley and also in certain Beirut suburbs. (…) State services from electricity, to phones, to water have all suffered also. Today there are many electricity cuts, also many water shortages and the summer season hasn’t yet began where traditionally there has always been regular water shortages and electricity cuts, so in this regard many are expecting a severe summer. Also Lebanon is experiencing an environmental catastrophe today, both resulting from the Israeli attack in 2006 but also more generally an environmental disaster brought upon Lebanon over the past years. Lebanon’s coastline has been almost entirely privatized or destroyed due to pollution. Lebanon’s mountains are also being privatized. Many forests in Lebanon have been cut up. Air pollution is very, very high, while multiple important international environmental agreements have not been implemented in Lebanon. (…I)t’s clear that today in Lebanon many social, environmental and economic indicators have simply been plunging in the past several years. This is not simply due to the political crisis over the past couple years, which has clearly made things much worse, but also due to very bad policies created during the 1990s within the supposed boom period for Lebanon. All these major issues haven’t been addressed by either side. Even the opposition, including Hizballah, except on the margins doesn’t really mention or talk about the economic crisis.’

Pix to a story

Some time ago, during the ‘events’ of May, I posted a story about graffiti painting in the streets of Beirut. These are the accompanying pictures. (The faces of the police officers have been ‘pinked out’ at their own request, since they are not allowed to have their photographs taken while on duty…)

And this was the story: ‘Circulating between the three or four bars still operating in Gemmayzeh on saturday night (both Hamra and Monnot being out of the circulation for obvious reasons). Contrary to the previous few days, the lone open bars are packed to the brim with people tentatively celebrating the lull in the fighting (in Beirut at least) and the slightly promising understanding between HA and the government that had just been announced. At some point, I team up with some youths going out onto the street to spray graffiti representing, or meant to represent, a peace message. It consists of the slogan ‘Power of the Underground’, positioned above three stylized men with bandanas on their faces, each holding up a peace sign in a circle in one hand stretched above their head. Only, when not sprayed very carefully, they can easily be mistaken for three bearded man throwing bombs… Everybody is tipsy and the whole operation is carried out without much care for discretion, so predictably, after three or four spraying sessions, two of the police that are always stationed on Gemmayzeh arrive and want to know what the fuzz is all about. The girl who’s doing the actual spraying puts on her sweetest smile and explains it is an action for peace in Lebanon. ‘Peace in Lebanon? What the f*** are you talking about, are you nuts? Can’t you see what’s going on?’ ‘Yeah, we know, but what can we do? Stay in our homes, watching sectarian scare-mongering channels on TV and be brainwashed and afraid, like everybody else? At least we go out and try to do something constructive, you know, it’s not like we’re shooting RPG’s at each other…’ By this time the cops are broadly smiling, touched by the innocent naiveté and presumably happy there is still some left in the country, and it ends up with them posing for a picture in front of the police van, in uniform carrying their guns, on either side of the girl who is holding the spraycan, with the template in front… Well, they couldn’t very well arrest some kids for spraying graffiti while standing by idly while militiamen kill each other, destroy houses and take over entire town quarters, I suppose…‘

Articles & analyses

Alain Gresh writes in Le Monde Diplomatique: ‘The authority of the Future Movement among Sunnis has been questioned since “Saad Hariri was incapable of organising the Sunni community or defending it, let alone building the institutions of state,” according to Mohamed Baydoun, a former Amal minister who is now with the government. There are fears that Sunnis, especially those in the north and in Tripoli, will turn to Salafist groups, or even to al-Qaida, which has been extending its reach in Lebanon in the past two years. It was after all, Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaida’s second in command, who recently proclaimed that Lebanon would be pivotal in the struggle against “the Crusaders and the Jews.”’
The Christians stayed on the sidelines of the recent fighting. Alain Aoun, an adviser to General Aoun, believes their reaction to the recent events has been ambivalent: “On one hand, they were worried about the use of force, but on the other they were pleased about the alliance between the FPM and Hezbollah, which guaranteed peace in the Christian districts of Beirut and in the mountains.”

Hussein Agha and Robert Malley in the New York Times: ‘The Gaza deal is being brokered by Egypt. Qatar mediated the Lebanese accord. Turkey is shepherding the Israeli-Syrian contacts. All three countries are close allies of the United States. Under normal circumstances, they would be loath to act on vital regional matters without America’s consent. Yet in these cases they seem to have ignored Washington’s preferences. The negotiations either involved parties with whom the United States refuses to talk, initiated a process the United States opposes or produced an outcome harmful to its preferred local allies. The region is in a mess, and Washington’s allies know it. They privately blame the United States and have given up waiting for the Bush administration to offer them a way out. By acting as they did, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey gave the true measure of America’s dwindling credibility and leverage after American debacles in Iraq, the Palestinian territories and Lebanon. They are willing to take matters into their own hands and overlook American ambivalence about their doing so. Intent on isolating its foes, the United States has instead ended up marginalizing itself. In one case after another, the Bush administration has wagered on the losing party or on a lost cause.”’

Rami Khoury again: ‘The strength and status of Hizbullah and the weakness of the Lebanese state are symbiotic developments that feed off each other, and can only be resolved together. The coming era of calm political adjustment in Lebanon — including the national unity government and the Spring 2009 parliamentary elections — must address the very difficult core disputed issues. The central one is the Hizbullah-state relationship, which is directly or indirectly linked to other tough issues such as Syrian-Lebanese ties, and the role of external powers such as Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United States. If Lebanon does not make progress on these issues in the coming few years and instead falls back into a pattern of stalemate and street fighting, a second civil war is likely, and no country I know of has survived two civil wars and remained intact. A resumption of fighting on a large scale will see the country slip into a slow and steady pattern of dysfunctional statehood and patchwork sovereignty, somewhere between the Yemen and Somalia models. The challenge remains to construct a state built on equal citizenship rights in which all Lebanese have the opportunity to improve their quality of life in the context of the rule of law, rather than tribal or communal self-defense. The manner in which the parties at Doha haggled over electoral districts in Beirut and other parts of the country suggests that the concepts of the Lebanese state and citizens’ rights remain subsidiary to the more powerful forces of sectarianism and tribalism that define both the affirmation of identity and the exercise of power. This is not unique to Lebanon. Most of the Middle East suffers the same problem, but elsewhere it is camouflaged beneath the stultifying calm of the modern Arab security state.’

Sic semper tyrannis publishes a report of a visit by a group of Harvard political science students to various political leaders in Syria and Lebanon. The entire piece is well worth reading for its matter-of-fact but knowledgeable descriptions of how the personalities come across, but the part about their meeting with Walid Junblatt is especially hilarious (and close to the bone): ‘After our return to Lebanon we met with Walid Jumblatt, who frankly appeared to be somewhat in pieces. In addition to a generally stoned demeanor, he gave answers which ranged from completely inscrutable to impolitically frank to obviously evasive. I tried hard to pin him down on the issue of the impact of US domestic politics on his ‘bets’ in Lebanon. After interrupting him about four times, steering him back to the issue from long lectures about nothing in particular, I asked him “do you think the US will trade Lebanon? [to Iran and Syria]” and got what I think was an honest “I don’t know.” He pushed what I find an implausible conspiracy theory of Syrian involvement in the death of Mughniyeh. His old dog lay loyally -or listlessly- at his feet the whole time. He said that Nasrallah and Hezbollah are fascist organizations and drew tired comparisons to 1930s Germany. His position towards the opposition was uncompromising, though I personally wouldn’t be surprised to see him back as a Hezbollah ally in a few years if the US does not continue its strategy of confrontation in the Middle East. He was very pessimistic overall, though it was not clear if this was due to the broader strategic situation or the very humiliating defeat he had recently been handed by Hezbollah.’
And this is the writer’s impression of a talk with Geagea: ‘Samir Geagea, the head of the Lebanese Forces and a key figure in the March 14th coalition, was the first person we met. The extent to which his discourse mirrored that of the most extreme elements in the Bush administration surprised me. His talk was full of references to the Global War on Terror, Good versus Evil, Light versus Darkness, and such. After about 20 minutes of somewhat unproductive Q&A (we had not yet learned the art of simply interrupting longwinded and off-topic answers) he veered off into a discussion of his spirituality, which seemed genuine if bizarre, talking about how he “lives in the second dimension”. I suppose he did spend 11 years in solitary confinement. None of the LF people were happy about Doha and they seemed to be looking forward to the day it would fail.’

And finally, a rare article focussing on Hizbullah’s deputy leader, Naim Qassim: ‘At the signing ceremony of one of his books, Qasim thanked his wife for her support, something that raised eyebrows within religious establishments as uncommon for a turbaned cleric. Qasim commented on the matter saying that “I support the rights of women” claiming that women’s rights are a must in proper Islam. He adds, “She [in reference to women] is not a slave. She is not only there for delivering children. She is a human being in every sense of the word. She has full rights” (…). In his own words, his wife is “educated and intellectual,” proudly saying that she used to lecture on various matters and was very active in public life but had to limit her public activities in order to raise their children.’