William wrote a good article in today’s Financial Times on the Arab regimes’ impotence, the Sunni-Shiite divide in the region, and how the (Sunni) Islamists’ solidarity with the Lebanese Shiite group is boosting their influence.
Letting Lebanon burn
Excerpts from a new MERIP editorial on the war.
On the US media:
The American broadcast media nevertheless labor to fashion symmetry where there is none. There is balanced treatment of the casualties on both sides. The Israelis forced into bomb shelters are juxtaposed with the Lebanese politely warned to flee their homes. For competing renditions of the day’s bloodletting, CNN’s avuncular Larry King turns first to nonchalantly windblown Israeli spokeswoman Miri Eisen and then to a program director from Hizballah’s al-Manar satellite channel, Ibrahim al-Musawi, who always seems to have one eye on the sky. The rock-star reporters who parachuted in to cover the story dispense dollops of confusion. CNN’s Anderson Cooper in Cyprus explained that, since Hamas members are Sunni and Hizballah members Shi‘i, they are “historic rivals.” MSNBC’s Tucker Carlson, sans bowtie to convey the seriousness of the occasion, wondered if Hizballah had rocketed Nazareth because its residents are all Christian, ignoring the images on the screen behind him from the attack victims’ funeral at a mosque.
On Hizbullah’s motivations:
No evidence, beyond leaked Israeli intelligence of secret meetings between Nasrallah and his alleged Syrian and Iranian puppeteers, has been presented for the thesis of broader conspiracy, let alone for the core proposition that Hizballah snatched the Israeli soldiers on orders from Bashar al-Asad and/or Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. (Who else sees the hand of Iran, by the way? Saddam Hussein, admonishing Syria from his Baghdad jail cell not to “deepen its coalition with Iran, because Iranians have bad intentions toward all Arabs and they hope to do away with them.”) The fact that Hizballah’s arsenal includes missiles of Iranian and Syrian provenance is also adduced as proof. By this same logic, of course, Washington must be ordering every sortie of Israeli F-16s over Beirut and every demolition of Palestinian homes by Caterpillar bulldozers.
Hizballah is not shy about acknowledging its external patrons, who presumably assented to its operation. But the timing of the militia’s cross-border raid, as Israel was punishing all of Gaza for the capture of one soldier, suggests another motivation rooted in regional politics — namely, that Hizballah aimed to impress the Arab public as capable champions of the Palestinians, in contrast to the impotent grumbling of the US-allied Arab regimes. Surely, as well, Saudi and Egyptian criticisms of Hizballah stem more from the popularity of Nasrallah among their own (all or mostly Sunni) populations than from a genuine fear of a “Shiite crescent.”
This Shia crescent nonsense has been way overblow, in my opinion. The Saudis have been warming to the Iranians for years, and the Egyptians have tried but have been probably blocked by the Americans. What does Hosni Mubarak have to fear from Shias? He barely has any in Egypt. The only thing he fears is being upstaged as a regional VIP.
Here’s the conclusion, but read the whole thing:
On July 19, a reporter asked White House Press Secretary Tony Snow if Bush’s insistence that Rice not undertake shuttle diplomacy until Israel “defangs” Hizballah made the conflagration in Lebanon a US war as well as an Israeli one. Snow dissembled: “Why would it be our war? I mean, it’s not on our territory. This is a war in which the United States — it’s not even a war. What you have are hostilities, at this point, between Israel and Hizballah. I would not characterize it as a war.”
It is a war, an unjustified war. Israel’s legal justifications — protecting the sanctity of its borders and enforcing UN resolutions — are disingenuous to the point of being dishonest, after Israel’s own years of ignoring the will of the international community and crossing and erasing boundaries with impunity. The US is the only international actor with the power to stop this war, and instead has chosen to encourage the fighting. So the US, too, will be held accountable by history.
Israeli lawyers sue Lebanon for damages
Israeli lawyers want to sue Lebanon for the damage done to northern Israel. You know that among Israel’s sick society (86% of them support what’s being done in Lebanon, remember) you’re still going to find lawyers that are even sicker. I guess lawyers are lawyers everywhere.
Perhaps a settlement can be arranged, each side pays for the damage done to the other?
Actually this brings up a good point: Lebanon is bound to get aid money for reconstruction. And who will be paying for Israel’s war (and already is paysing for it)? The American taxpayer, that’s who.
See also here.
Israel’s psychological warfare
Sick fucks:
Late night calls from Israel spook jittery Lebanese
Reuters 21.07.06 | 21h23BEIRUT, July 21 (Reuters) – At first, Bushra Khayyat tried to ignore the incessant ringing of the phone at her house in Lebanon’s southern port city of Sidon. It was 4 a.m., but she finally got out of bed.
“I said hello and got a recorded message from Israel,” she told Reuters.
In clear Arabic, the strong voice on the phone said: “Oh Lebanese people, we tell you not to follow Hizbollah. We will continue to strike and no one will bring your prisoners back from Israel except the Lebanese government.”
Other residents of the south have received similar calls.
“My grandmother got two calls at 5 and 6 in the morning saying the Israeli state would not stop the attacks and asking everyone to leave the area south of the Litani,” said one woman who is stranded in Sidon.
“She slammed the phone down.”
Israel has dropped flyers on Lebanon during its 10-day-old conflict with Hizbollah guerrillas, warning people to stay away from the group’s strongholds, warning them to evacuate their villages in the south or caricaturing the chief of Hizbollah.
But there was something eerie about the phone calls.
“It was a shock to get a call from Israel,” said Khayyat, who has since fled the bombardment to Syria and then France.
“I have caller ID on my landline and when I checked it came up as ‘out of area’. It’s not that I was scared, I just wished I could talk back to the voice but it was a recorded message.”
Khayyat got a similar call two nights later, this time answered by her maid, who, panicking when she heard a voice announce “this is Israel”, immediately put down the phone.
I doubt this kind of psychological warfare will get them far. I also wonder, out of curiosity, how they are doing this — how they got control of the Lebanese phone system. And how long they’ve had the ability to control it.
Update: It gets even sicker, now they want snitches:
Israel offers rewards to Lebanese for tips on Hizbollah
Reuters 21.07.06 | 21h56JERUSALEM, July 21 (Reuters) – Israel dropped leaflets across Lebanon on Friday offering “attractive material rewards” to people who give information about Hizbollah that helps the Jewish state’s offensive against the guerrillas.
An army spokeswoman said the rewards could be a range of things, such as cash or a house. It was not clear how such items would be delivered or exactly what information Israel wanted.The leaflets, worded in Arabic, call on people to “remove the sore known as Hizbollah from the heart of Lebanon”, gave a phone number and Web site where information could be passed on.
Confidentiality was assured, said the leaflet, entitled “All 4 Lebanon”.
Israeli aircraft dropped 23 tonnes of bombs on a Hizbollah bunker earlier this week in southern Beirut after intelligence indicated senior leaders of the group were there. Hizbollah said none were killed.
The Jewish state launched the offensive last week after Hizbollah seized two Israeli soldiers and killed eight others in a cross-border raid.
Ground invasion to come soon?
Many Israeli analysts and sources are expecting an imminent ground invasion as the govt. there has called up more reservists and massed troops at the border. The Israeli army has also told people to leave South Lebanon. It looks like at least a partial repeat of 1982 will happen.
The Angry Arab, whose mother is in hospital in Beirut, doesn’t think so because the Israelis have destroyed the roads and bridges. He sees this as posturing to put pressure on Hizbullah.
I’m not sot sure how this squares up with the Israeli statements that they want this to be over within two weeks. Perhaps they intend to stay in a part of Lebanon until an international peacekeeping force can come in. Another interesting development is that Hizbullah refuses to negotiate directly, while Israel only wants to negotiate directly.
The Lebanese defense minister said the Lebanese army would fight in the case of a ground invasion:
Lebanon’s army, which so far has sat on the sidelines of the violence raging in the country, will fight an Israeli ground invasion, Defense Minister Elias Murr said on Al-Jazeera television Thursday.
“The Lebanese army – and I stress – the Lebanese army will resist and defend and will prove that it is an army that deserves respect,” he said.
Although obviously the Lebanese army is no match as a conventional army, I wonder that — if this is more than posturing — what they would do. What would make sense is to adopt the guerrilla tactics of Hizbullah against an occupation army. But if this didn’t happen in 1982, I don’t see why it would happen now. If it did, it would certainly complicate matters…
Latest developments
From Reuters (latest civilian toll in Lebanon is 345):
July 21 (Reuters) – Here are developments in the Middle East.
* Israel calls up army reservists for possible major ground assault against Hizbollah in Lebanon
* U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will go to Mideast Sunday while resisting international pressure for immediate cease-fire between Israel, Hizbollah in Lebanon
* Three Hizbollah rockets crash into the northern Israeli city of Haifa, wounding 19 people. Other towns also hit
* Israeli troops launch small-scale raids in Lebanon to try to stop rocket attacks
* Israel’s military chief says the country’s forces have killed nearly 100 Hizbollah fighters in Lebanon during the 10-day offensive
* Four Israeli soldiers are killed in fierce battles with Hizbollah guerrillas inside Lebanon
* Lebanon’s defense minister says the army, which has not fought so far despite losing a score of soldiers in Israeli air strikes, would defend the country against any invasion
WaPo crap on US aid to Egypt
Update: I am a moron, the article this refers to is old. Am keeping this up though, so I didn’t waste my time entirely.
Reporting torturers
I’ve been following for sometime an excellent Arabic website that is keeping an eye on torture in Egypt. The site was an initiative taken by a group of independent activists, who saw that “abusing one citizen = abusing the whole nation.”
The site content is a disturbing crashcourse into the world of “lawenforcement” in our country, with breaking news about torture cases in police stations, horrible stories of minors receiving electric shocks in interrogation rooms, women suspects abused and whipped… As disturbing as it is, I strongly recommend the website for anyone who can read Arabic.
One thing you’ll notice when going thru the cases of abuse on the website is that most of the torture victims are not political activists, but ordinary citizens and “criminals.” Rights lawyers like Ahmad Seif al-Islam have long pointed out to another phenomenon, the “privatization of torture,” where police intervene in personal disputes between neighbors, for example, carrying out torture as a “favor” for their friends and contacts.
Check this story I covered for the Cairo Times back in 2002: Continue reading Reporting torturers
Police crackdown on solidarity demos
I’m getting phone calls saying Egyptian security is cracking down now on thousands of pro-Lebanese and pro-Palestinian demonstrators in Al-Azhar. I still don’t have details. The Mosque, as well as the neighborhood, is under siege by the Central Security Forces, State Security agents, plainclothes policemen and hired thugs, according to a lawyer present in the scene.
Some people are trapped in the mosque. Others are outside, and got scattered into seperate groups by security, who assaulted some of them, confiscated the leaflets and flags they were carrying, according to the lawyer who called me.
Yesterday, the police also banned another rally in solidarity with the Lebanese and Palestinian resistance, in Zagazig, Sharqiyya Province, as Egyptian blogger Asad reports. And in Isma3ilia, ten Muslim Brothers activists were detained by security, and charged for “writing some phrases on the street walls which read ‘Together with the resistance of Palestine and Lebanon,'” according to Ikhwan Web.
UPDATE: I spoke with a blogger who was present in the scene. She said the mosque was packed with worshippers, Kefaya and Labor Party activists, but could not see a sizeable Muslim Brothers’ presence. (CORRECTION: I checked with sources, and it turned out the MB took part in the protest, led by Mahdi Akef the group’s Supreme Guide.) The security, she added, did not restrict access to the mosque, but responded brutally when the demonstrators tried to get out of the mosque. Plainclothes thugs were unleashed on the protestors and worshippers, using sticks and batons, till they pushed them back into the mosque. The blogger said she saw several activists, including Malek whose shirt was stained with the blood of another demonstrator who was injured. The activists continued demonstrating inside the mosque, chanting against Israel, US, and Arab regimes, for around an hour.
Later the security allowed those trapped inside to leave, one by one. Activists are now on their way to the Press Syndicate in 3abdel Khaleq Tharwat Street, to hold a sit in.
UPDATE: It’s 4pm, I got a phone call from the blogger again saying they are marching now in downtown! Around 150 activists managed to re-assemble, after assaults by security and thugs, in Opera Square. They are marching towards the Press Syndicate, chanting slogans against Israel, US, and the Egyptian police. Several activists haven been injured already. Released detainee Rasha 3azzab, according to the blogger, was assaulted by the thugs who slapped her on the face and pushed her to the ground.
UPDATE: 4:20pm, They have reached the Press Syndicate. I could hear on the phone slogans chanted against Gamal Mubarak.
PHOTOS: Photographers Nasser Nouri and 3amr 3abdallah sent me those pix of the earlier protest in Al-Azhar. Check out the SLIDESHOW
UPDATE: Here’s a dpa report by Jano Charbel:
Around 8,000 Egyptians demonstrate against Israel’s escalation of military strikes on Lebanon
Cairo, July 21 (dpa) –Around 8,000 Egyptians demonstrated, in Cairo and Alexandria, following Friday noontime prayers, against Israel’s escalation of military strikes on Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.
Black-clad central security forces sealed in around 5,000 demonstrators within Cairo’s al-Azhar Mosque as they chanted slogans against Israel ‘s targeting of civilian non-combatants and infrastructure in both Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.
The demonstration was organized by the Moslem Brotherhood, and the left-leaning umbrella movement Kifaya/Enough. Other political forces present at the demonstration were members of the Nasserist Party, the Revolutionary Socialists, and the Labor Party. Former Egyptian Prime Minister Aziz Sedqi was also present. Continue reading Police crackdown on solidarity demos
Some people are trapped in the mosque. Others are outside, and got scattered into seperate groups by security, who assaulted some of them, confiscated the leaflets and flags they were carrying, according to the lawyer who called me.
Yesterday, the police also banned another rally in solidarity with the Lebanese and Palestinian resistance, in Zagazig, Sharqiyya Province, as Egyptian blogger Asad reports. And in Isma3ilia, ten Muslim Brothers activists were detained by security, and charged for “writing some phrases on the street walls which read ‘Together with the resistance of Palestine and Lebanon,'” according to Ikhwan Web.
UPDATE: I spoke with a blogger who was present in the scene. She said the mosque was packed with worshippers, Kefaya and Labor Party activists, but could not see a sizeable Muslim Brothers’ presence. (CORRECTION: I checked with sources, and it turned out the MB took part in the protest, led by Mahdi Akef the group’s Supreme Guide.) The security, she added, did not restrict access to the mosque, but responded brutally when the demonstrators tried to get out of the mosque. Plainclothes thugs were unleashed on the protestors and worshippers, using sticks and batons, till they pushed them back into the mosque. The blogger said she saw several activists, including Malek whose shirt was stained with the blood of another demonstrator who was injured. The activists continued demonstrating inside the mosque, chanting against Israel, US, and Arab regimes, for around an hour.
Later the security allowed those trapped inside to leave, one by one. Activists are now on their way to the Press Syndicate in 3abdel Khaleq Tharwat Street, to hold a sit in.
UPDATE: It’s 4pm, I got a phone call from the blogger again saying they are marching now in downtown! Around 150 activists managed to re-assemble, after assaults by security and thugs, in Opera Square. They are marching towards the Press Syndicate, chanting slogans against Israel, US, and the Egyptian police. Several activists haven been injured already. Released detainee Rasha 3azzab, according to the blogger, was assaulted by the thugs who slapped her on the face and pushed her to the ground.
UPDATE: 4:20pm, They have reached the Press Syndicate. I could hear on the phone slogans chanted against Gamal Mubarak.
PHOTOS: Photographers Nasser Nouri and 3amr 3abdallah sent me those pix of the earlier protest in Al-Azhar. Check out the SLIDESHOW
UPDATE: Here’s a dpa report by Jano Charbel:
Around 8,000 Egyptians demonstrate against Israel’s escalation of military strikes on Lebanon
Cairo, July 21 (dpa) –Around 8,000 Egyptians demonstrated, in Cairo and Alexandria, following Friday noontime prayers, against Israel’s escalation of military strikes on Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.
Black-clad central security forces sealed in around 5,000 demonstrators within Cairo’s al-Azhar Mosque as they chanted slogans against Israel ‘s targeting of civilian non-combatants and infrastructure in both Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.
The demonstration was organized by the Moslem Brotherhood, and the left-leaning umbrella movement Kifaya/Enough. Other political forces present at the demonstration were members of the Nasserist Party, the Revolutionary Socialists, and the Labor Party. Former Egyptian Prime Minister Aziz Sedqi was also present. Continue reading Police crackdown on solidarity demos
Gas prices are up
Since last night I’ve been receiving news/rumours about an expected increase in gas prices starting from midnight. I haven’t left home since last night, so I didn’t check out any of the neighboring petrol stations, but Al-Ahram has officially announced it.
While the 80 Octane petrol’s price remained the same, the 90 Octane’s has increased by 30 Piasters per litre, reaching LE 1.3 for the litre. The litre of solar, low quality fuel used for transportation trucks mainly, has reached 75 Piasters, after it was 60 P.
The rise in fuel prices will inevitably lead to a drastic increase in the prices of EVERYTHING else in the coming days. I wonder if another “1977 Bread Intifada” is on the way….