Our Prime Minister spoke up today. It does not happen often and Hasan Nasrallah and company can be intimidating, but Siniora in his speech today displayed statesmanship, prudence and honour. Siniora managed to strike that elusive balance between restraint and conviction.
Here are some excerpts:
"What we've seen yesterday was an unnecessary fit of anger and rudeness that we don't accept..."
"We won't dig trenches in Beirut streets, we will build bridges of love among the Lebanese, Christian and Muslim..."
"[Nasrallah] told us, 'We want a blocking minority share, or else we will take to the streets and we will not leave the streets until we get what we want.' This style does not lead to results. Threats do not lead anywhere."
"Who has given you the authority to say someone is clean or not clean, his money is clean or not clean? This decision rests with the Creator and not with you. Is your party God?"
No. Hasan Nasrallah is not God, and neither is his party. Our Prime Minister today gave us a voice and revived some lost hope. We may be avoiding the streets to avoid bloodshed, but we are part of this country too and played our role in freeing it from both Israeli and Syrian occupation. By telling Hizbullah that the rest of us will not be bullied around, he has restored some of our honour and dignity - which Hizbullah has been trampling on for weeks, taking advantage of our restraint and our civility. Restraint and civility will be preserved and will remain our guiding principles. But if Hizbullah and company want to make a change in this country, they either do it with us, in a spirit of cooperation and with respect for our institutions, or they had better make themselves very comfortable in those tents.
Friday, December 08, 2006
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
62 comments:
Faysal-
Why did the bastard leave out the bridges to the 100 Jews?
Because he would have been labeled as a traitor and an agent. Uh oh! Maybe we should lay low too!
Is this for real? If there was one Lebanese most responsible for the UNSC 1701 negotiations that ensured Hezbollah wouldn't have to be forcibly disarmed, and afterwards that Hezbollah could be clandestinely re-supplied without U.N. interference, isn't that person Fouad Siniora?
Could Nasty's accusations and Siniora's response be something contrived between the two in advance? If so, I cannot quite fathom their purpose.
Solomon, as an Arab, I am in awe of you. Your capacity for conspiracy theories puts me to shame. I'd better get back to my Elders of Zion now.
To give you a serious answer now, no, there's no massive conspiracy afoot.
More importantly, and that was the reason for my response above, Siniora's Siniora's pursuit of the current form of 1701 was not to allow Hezbollah to rearm, but to prevent further bloodshed in Lebanon and the Iraqisation of Lebanon.
Look at it this way, would you want to be an American in Sadr City? No? Then you wouldn't want to be a soldier trying to disarm Hezbollah in Nabatiyeh. And more importantly, you wouldn't want to be a civilian caught between the two. Hence 1701.
Firas, I offerred the speculation as a possibility. I rank it low. I believe this discord between S&N is real.
However, you guys boast that you are the THINKING Lebanese. So I wanted to know your thoughts on the matter. Khalas.
Howie, you had to ruin it you cynical bastard :-)
Solomon,
The 'thinking' part is applied selectively and within the limits of reasonable analysis.
I'll happily give you my thoughts on why Nasrallah is attacking Siniora and the relationship between that and UNSC1701.
UNSC1701 came as part of a package. That package involved Hezbollah recognising that the only legitimate arms held on Lebanese soil are those held by the Lebanese Army, i.e., admitting that they should drop their guns after having refused to do that in the National Dialogue sessions.
Another component was the Lebanese government's commitment to sending 15,000 Lebanese troops to South Lebanon. The last factor was the new and improved UNIFIL: better armed, better equipped, bigger numbers, and from countries with a lot more clout on the international scene.
This seriously limited Hezbollah's ability to attack Israel and move freely, and to rearm fully. Some significant rearming has been happening, and this is due to the presence of pro-Syria and pro-Hizbollah forces in the security services. But never before has the Lebanese Army been allowed to confiscate Hezbollah's guns if and when it finds them. And it has been doing that.
This has irked Hezbollah, and for good reason. Siniora, while refusing to allow some mad scheme to disarm Hezbollah by force, is narrowing their room for maneuvering. There is no place for Hezbollah in Siniora's Lebanon, and they know it. So they want to get rid of him, and soon. Their empty claims of victory against Israel need to be built upon, and paired with some tangible results aside from crushed homes. Hence the drive for more power and more access to the state and its services. And more importantly, hence the push for a veto-wielding third of cabinet seats, to ensure that the idea of strengthening the Army and putting it in charge in South Lebanon does not take hold.
So by accusing the Army of intercepting weapons during the war, Nasty hopes to compel the Army from seizing his weapons now. Thus he justifies today's weapons smuggling as activity to make up for what the Army "prevented" reaching Hezbollah during the war.
Nasty isn't really trying to convince anybody, I think. Instead he is telling his people how to justify their activities, to themselves and to others. It seems like quite a stretch, for he is asking his followers to choose, in their deeds today, between loyalty to Hezbollah and loyalty to the elected government of Lebanon.
The division has never been so sharp before, has it? No wonder Siniora felt emboldened to speak out. And now I understand why the Lebanese Army responded promptly and directly to Nasrallah's charges.
'But if Hizbullah and company want to make a change in this country, they either do it with us, in a spirit of cooperation and with respect for our institutions, or they had better make themselves very comfortable in those tents.'
:D :D :D :D :D
You should be quoted :D
Firas said...
Solomon, as an Arab, I am in awe of you. Your capacity for conspiracy theories puts me to shame. I'd better get back to my Elders of Zion now.
-----------
LOL
by the way Firas
I am a bit confused about Arab part .. because the Israeli Druze took it as a sort of offence if you call them Arabs ...
the only thing of this kind in the region that I know are some Lebanese Christians who took it as a personal insult .. i was repeatedly bashed in private emails and on forums by Lebanese Christians until I started using 'Arab speakers' and 'Arab speaking' when talking about Lebanon and its Christians
Faysal,
It was very freshing to hear Siniora take the stand that he did.
AM,
Please feel free to quote me at length :-)
Nobody,
This stems from a Lebanese Christian myth that became popular in the 50s and the next couple of decades about Lebanon not being an Arab country, the Lebanese being descendants of the Phoenicians and other stuff like that. I was supposedly resolved in the Taif accords, but like other things in Taif, that doesn't seem to have worked. Anyway, the Lebanese have been conquered by a million peoples and those conquerers have been assimilated. So it's safe to say that no one knows the true ethnic 'origins' of the Lebanese since there is no such thing as Lebanese ethnicity.
Anyway, it's all a bunch of BS. Ignore your Christian Lebanese friends. Or correct them.
actually , faysal, i see nationality as a personal choice and language, culture and genetics only as motives that can or not be enough to influence the personal choice ...
i came to this conclusion after meeting several 'jews' in russia who neither according to judaism nor according to the soviet definition of nationality were jewish .. yet the physical appearance of these people influenced by some remote jewish connections made this people subject to the most intense anti semitism ( russians are quite xenophobic) .. these people later repatriated to israel and did not care even to make Giur since they considered their national issue closed ...
the lebanese christians may or not be ethnically arabs ..it matters little .. it is their choice to not see themselves as part of the arab world ... the phoenician thing is only a pretext but the main reason is probably that the arab world in its present form is not very inspiring place to belong to ...
I would offer people to see nationality as a personal choice to save themselves all kinds of embarassments as, for example, when people refuse to accept the nationality one is claiming for them or ,the opposite case, claim to themselves a nationality they objectively speaking cannot have...
Nobody,
You're right about the subjective nature of nationalistic feeling. However the genetic anthropology (I actually wanted to enter this field of study at one point) applied to Lebanese would reinforce Faysal's statement that ALL Lebanese contain "mixed blood" . The Phoenician-Canaanite, Syro-Aramaic, tribal Arab (pre-Islamic), Syro-Persian, Islamic Arab (I make this distinction to differentiate between early settlements and the greater effect of the Arab expansion in the 7th century), Anatolian (pre-Turkic, but I don't know if Byzantine is the right term), Kurdish, Turkic, Greek, and modern Persian elements are all present in our society. There is legitimacy in claiming a Phoenician heritage, but there are two qualifications that should be made:
1. This heritage does not equate to a Phoenician nation as Christians (mostly 19th century Maronites) originally propogated the notion of - there was a political need to diverge from the congruent Islamic-Arab identities. Indeed, Lebanese Christians always phrased nationalities to diverge in that way - when the Ottomans ruled, the Christians of Lebanon in fact catalyzed Arab nationalism. When it became clear that this nationalism was in fact, a component of a broader Islamic identification, the Lebanese Christians began to propound Syrian and Lebanese nationalisms, with the latter dominating their communal thought process.
2. This heritage is shared by most, if not all Lebanese, and is part of a historical process of assimilation and mixture - the Lebanese community cannot be simply reduced to one identification. Indeed, most "Arab" nations/societies differ from one another because the communities that preceded the Arab expansion, or joined the mix after this expansion, are different. Berbers differ from the Syriac peoples, and Kurds differ from the pre-Arab Egyptians. The semitic peoples of historical Syria differ from the bedouin tribes of central Arabia, but there can be no denial of centuries of intermixing - the Lebanese are Lebanese, whatever that may be!
i understand what you say, silent .. but as i said i see nationality as a personal decision .. in a sense its about making alliances or deciding whom you join .. its not about your origin , language and other objective stuff ...
the lebanese christians coould have simply said something in a sense that we got hooked on french classics and we dont like this shit going on around us .. the fact that they resorted to dubious ethnic research to substantiate their claims, i attribute to this, incomprehensible to me, habit of the lebanese to extract themselves from one mess by messing their way out into another one ...
compare this to what one russian dissident once bluntly said about his russian nationality (i hope my memory is right) .. he said - the fact that a person may happen to be born in a pig farm does not mean that he is a pig...
i should say that i find a considerable part of social sciences standing on their head ... it is very clear to me that in terms of nationality science should be descriptive and not prescriptive ... you cannnot decide for a person what nationality he has ...science should instead try to explain how and why people make their decisions ... then it may quickly discover that the subjective is not so subjective as it appears and the same goes about the so called objective
Solomon,
Keep in mind a couple of things. This man's security handlers refuse to tell their boss where he is or where is he going next. Everything he knows he knows through handlers and secretaries. Given the influence of the Iranians and Syrians over those, it is not difficult to perceive a scenario where he actually thinks that what he says is the truth.
Whether or not he believes this to be the truth, such statements serve a dual purpose. First, they galvanise Hezbollah's supporters, second, they are an attempt to distance Siniora from the more Islamic of his Sunni supporters.
Sorry,
I should clarify... the "scientific" aspect is only useful in alleviating curiousity as to the origins of civilizations and communities, and can help sometimes in supplementing gaps in historical knowledge concerning the movement of people.
Concerning the subjectivity of nationality...
While it is true that nationalism forms nations, and that it is all contingent upon a subjective political will to join together, there are some objective criteria that must be met in order to sustain the national community - subjective notions of identity ultimately fail unless there are objective ties to support the community that forms. The idea of a Jewish nation for example, was propogated in full, during the late 19th century - the objective aspects needed to allow for the elimination of what Zionist writers called an "abnormal state of existence" included the collective experience of the Jewish Exile/Diapsora, a concentration of Central and Eastern European thinkers who gave the movement a vanguard with collective experiences (even as their differing conclusions caused some to become Socialists and others to become Revisionists), and the need for objective criteria was demonstrated by the modernization of Hebrew and the implementation of that language at the expense of Yiddish, or even German, which some Zionists wanted. The common political experience of Jews in Israel, as opposed to Jews in the rest of the world also serves as an objective criteria in supplementing subjective notions of Israeli nationalism as opposed to a broader Jewish identification. In Lebanon, the subjective and objective aspects of nationalism are gradually overlapping, as the acceptance of the state of Lebanon as legitimate has eliminated the need to cling to a purely Phoenician or purely Arab identification - the nation is forming, if nothing else, because of our common language and evolving political experience as a society vis-a-vis the state and each other.
Nobody,
The Druze in Lebanon are quite different, and are mostly very keen on confirming their Arab identity. Some go further and insist that they are proper Muslims (with a twist).
In my opinion, I am born both an Lebanese Arab and a Unitarian Muslim (the proper name of the Druze), though I identify more strongly with the Lebanese, Druze and Arab identities -in that order- than with the Muslim one.
Do you know why the Israeli Druze are offended by the Arab label?
F,
"Unitarian?" As in muwa77adeen? Doesn't that mean Wahabbi? :D
silent
i think that if you have a significant portion of christians who refuse to see themselves as arabs you can be sure that there is something objective behind it and this something is stronger than language, culture and ethnic origins ...my point is that what we see as objective comes from a sort of mental laziness .. we are just searching for something easy to identify and classify ... it may make life easy for scientists and anthroplogists but it does not get them closer to the reality ...
by the way i have a post of sorts about israeli nationality, if you are interested in this subject
who is a jew? who is israeli?
I love how we went from Fouad Siniora's speech to moral epistemology.
firas ...
i have no idea why they are offended ... i think they probably have a very bad record of mutual relationships with them ... because as far as i can see the arabs pay them back with a similar dislike ...
also israeli druze are a sort of our rambos .. they like to serve in the army and have higher percentage of army officers than any other community in israel .. actually their unit performed so well during the last war that there were talks to declare them a special unit .. ( we have an all Druze batallion apart from Druz who serve in regular army units together with other israelis)
by the way i heard that the Lebanese Druze excelled during Lebanon's civil war so i assume that you are in general a very peace loving comminity
How come so many Druze are in the Israeli army? And what ranks do they reach? Could the Chief of Staff be Druze?
Yeah, Druze are quite keen on guns, fighting, warfare and that sort of thing. They started out in Egypt and spread from there. Those that were not high up in the mountains and/or could fight died or were converted. So, survival and holding on to the high ground are built in values by now. That's one reason why no Druze ran in 1948.
actually i remember talking to israeli druz in the army ... and what they told me was very strange .. they told me that by their religion they believe that they are descendents of one guy who is called itro in our bible ...
this guy was a friend of moses ... there was more to this story but i know very little about judaism to go into more details ... but it was confirmed to me by our orthodox i talked to in jerusalem ... so they saw it like a sort of alliance from the times of moses
if i remember it right yom tav samia is a druz .. but i may be wrong ... he was responsible for the south including gaza a few years ago ... yes .. we have druz as generals ... we did not have a druz as a chief of stuff .. probably it can happen theoretically ... but this is a relatively small community though wildly overrepresented in the IDF ... i dont know where their passion for military service comes from ... i hope that by providing this information i am not creating for you problems with non Druz members of this blog
in general Israelis have a very positive view of the Israeli Druze .. and i can confirm from my experience that Israeli Druze see themselves as part of Israel ... they are quite Israeli ..,
it is very different from bedoins i met who also serve in the army (some bedoin tribes historically cooperate with the army and serve as scouts or in border police) ... but the bedoins are met were arabs by mentality and self identification .. in fact i was wondering at times how the army is not afraid to give them weapons at all ...
ah
actually now i recall what the orthodox told me in jerusalem and what i found so amazing .. it apparently appears in talmud or elsewhere ... that the jews would encounter sons of itro and that they should treat them well because this is an alliance going from the time of moses ... i dont know if itro the israeli druz were talking about is the same one mentioned in our tora
So, survival and holding on to the high ground are built in values by now. That's one reason why no Druze ran in 1948.
---------
i think we should check the history .. because i think there was some understanding between israelis and druz ... they were not enemies in 1948
well firas
i dont want to upset you .. but after checking the net it appears that indeed in 1948 israeli druze were fighting on the israeli side
ha ha ha
well this is what i found here http://www.jcpa.org/jl/vp464.htm
THE DRUZE IN ISRAEL AND THE QUESTION OF COMPULSORY MILITARY SERVICE
by Zeidan Atashi
... As a result of these struggles, the Druze community was divided in the contest for Mandatory Palestine. Some were politically active in the Arab national movement and others joined the armed struggle, but the majority remained passive. Until 1948 most of the Druze villages were open to the Arab nationalist movement. However, the leaders of local Arab militias related to the Druze with scorn, acting with violence and extortion within their villages. Other Druze were kidnapped and murdered by Arab nationalists, sowing threats and fear. At a time when many Druze sought a solution to their plight, the Jewish leadership in the country, who realized what was occurring, capitalized on the anger in the Druze villages and began to develop relations with the Druze, primarily in Ussifiya, Daliat al-Carmel, and Shfaram. Thus, some Druze began to help and defend the Jews, while others continued to identify with the Arab nationalist leaders.
...
During the 1948 war there were some Druze, largely from the three above-mentioned towns, who cooperated with the Jewish Haganah forces. Based on these contacts and the assistance extended by a few Druze activists, Jewish military commanders and political leaders decided not to attack these towns, in an attempt to win Druze trust and eventual support.
As the war progressed, Druze and Jewish leaders decided to form the Minorities Unit in the IDF and launched a campaign to recruit Druze volunteers to serve in the unit, with most of the volunteers coming from these three towns and from clans whose leaders cooperated with the Jewish leadership.
Also among the first volunteers were several soldiers who had been part of the Syrian Druze battalion that had come to fight against the Haganah as part of the Arab Salvation Army. Following the defeat and withdrawal of their unit after it had sustained serious losses, these soldiers then defected and remained in Israel.
This trend continued and increasing numbers of Druze voluntarily joined the Minorities Unit of the IDF between May 1948 and 1956.
....
The original decision to subject Druze to compulsory military service was made in 1956 at the initiative of Druze leaders seeking to gain influence and support from the country's Jewish leadership, and who expected to be rewarded by government leaders and military officers, which would then strengthen their status in inter-clan rivalries.
The average Druze was never asked whether he or she supported this move. No plebiscite was conducted among the villagers to weigh their attitude. The co-opted Israeli Druze leadership believed that since many Druze had already served voluntarily in the IDF following the declaration of the State of Israel, the new measure would be welcomed by most Druze. Thus, beginning in May 1956, tens of Druze began to be conscripted into military service, in two groups each year, while those who avoided or refused service were very few in number. (The measure applied only to young men; Druze women are totally exempt from military service.)
Nobody,
The Druze probably fought on the Israeli side for the same reason that the Druze in Lebanon accepted the creation of the Lebanese state despite strong reservations about the preeminence given to the Maronite community at the time - namely, to insure a degree of autonomy if not independence, and a realization that it would be preferable to operate in a smaller state rather than a larger one dominated by a mainstream Muslim and/or Arab population... Do you think that's a fair reading Firas? Or is there more to it?
actually firas can you clear this itro thing for me ...
i think in english they say jetro or something .. is it this guy who was Moses' father-in-law ?
The Silent said...
Nobody,
The Druze probably fought on the Israeli side for the same reason that the Druze in Lebanon accepted the creation of the Lebanese state despite strong reservations about the preeminence given to the Maronite community at the time - namely, to insure a degree of autonomy if not independence, and a realization that it would be preferable to operate in a smaller state rather than a larger one dominated by a mainstream Muslim and/or Arab population... Do you think that's a fair reading Firas? Or is there more to it?
-----------
silent
dont try to provide a cover-up for this sneeky zionist
ha ha ha
Nobody,
Thanks for the article and the information. I checked about Jethro/Itro/ Shuaib in Arabic, and the connexion is mostly false, though it seems to be a common enough myth. The Biblical Jethro was indeed Moses' father in law, but he was not the Arab Shuaib that the Druze revere.
On a different note, the Druze think that Moses, Jesus and Mohammad were one and the same essence (not sure if soul as well) reincarnated in different bodies.
Silent,
I think you have to keep in mind that for the Druze land and family come first. Thinking of leaving their land is anathema to them. Nobody mentioned that some were cooperating with the Jews at the time Israel was founded. But even the ones that were not cooperating did not leave their homes.
In the Lebanese War, the Druze that left their villages did so temporarily, and came back a lot faster than Christians in a similar position. This is the sort of mentality they operate in. Land comes first, and guns are necessary if you want to keep the land.
Definitely the Druze feel threatened if surrounded by a massive majority, and prefer to keep to themselves or live among other minorities. This may have played a role in the choice some made to support the Jews in 1948. The Jews would have had to assure them that they would be allowed to live without the state meddling in their affairs.
A Zionist? Me? Never! I just think the Israelis should be left in peace in the 1948 land, is all. :)
OK... cool Firas.
Nobody, stop causing trouble! ;)
Hey...did you guys here the one about the suicide bomber that goes to heaven?
Well he gets there an immediately is set upon by famous Americans like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson and they just start kicking his ass, one after another.
So the guy yell out to God, "hey, what happened to the 70 virgins?"
God calls down, "dummy, I said Virginians".
Well considering the record George Washington and Thomas Jefferson have with their contribution to slavery in the United States, I'd be surprised if you found them too popular in heaven either. In fact, I'm doubtfull they made it through the front gates. Otherwise I'm sure they got their asses kicked by their old plantation slaves.
I'm a big Jefferson fan - his 'contribution' to slavery nonwithstanding - but I don't fancy him kicking my ass for all eternity. Then again, Im sure this Arab can hold his own against a rich old white guy from Virginia. Still, Ill take the virgins, thank you very much.
God Bless America and all the Native, Black and Latinos that have fallen under its cowboy boots.
Pioneer boots and Spaniard Conquistador boots mostly.
Mohamad-
Most slaves were sold by black African slave traders to white dudes...got to kick their asses too.
Howie,
Thank you, yes them too. The more the merrier. Come to think about it, just about everyone had a hand in the slave trade.
We are a creation long on sin...
Some of us are trying to be uplifting.
Let's keep trying...no matter how differently we see things.
I am a Jew but actually I like a lot of things Jesus said, one being:
"He who is without sin, let him cast the first stone".
We practice that and I guess that would be the end of capital punishment.
Interesting point;
Using Africans as slaves actually occured because a Spanish priest thought that the Native Americans were being abused too much by the Spaniards (this is rue, but they were dying out because of immune deficiency). The priest proposed acquiring Africans because they had proven to be hard workers in Spain... Apparently the message didn't get through and the Africans became slaves treated worse than any Native American was - the priest, writing his memoirs of America, said that he regretted even opening his mouth. Mmmmhh...
Faysal and Mohamed-
Ha ha...you are both racists. Re-read the joke and maybe you can figure out why...
Who can win the test?
Enlighten me :-) Is it because there's no mention of an Arab anywhere?
Howie,
"you are both racists". Thats a hefty claim. You're the one extolling the virtues of Thomas Jefferson and George Washington while equating Islam with terrorism all in one fowl swoop of a "joke". "racist" is a strong word, please be careful how you throw it around in this forum and don't presume you know people well enough to feel comfortable using that word against them. I don't think anyone has gone so far as to be as rude with you.
Yes please enlighten us oh wise and misunderstood one.
Mohamed...did we forget our medication today?
The answer is.......
I never wrote that the suicide bomber was an Arab..or a Muslim for that matter...
Your assumption
Gotcha!
So I was right!
Faysal-
You are one smart dude. My dad was almost killed by a suicide bomber...but the dude was Japanese.
It is a twist on an old riddle about a doctor...they ask all these questions. At least back in the day..nobody thought of the doctor as a female which was the twist to the riddle.
Faysal...very very good.
Mohamed-
By the way "racist" is a word that a lot of people like to throw around, but I bet you few can define it properly.
Best definition I ever heard was that a racist is somebody that "believes race determines behavior". So I think was all make some degree of racists assumptions. VERY hard not to.
But, of course, their are degrees. But there is also prejudious, sterotyping and all kinds of other stuff.
We all have to train our minds to push away our assumptions about what people are based on exterior aspects. But, just try it...just try. It is enormously difficult. I bet most of us have "racist" assumptions about people even from a given city, a certain high school...absurd...but true. In my part of the world...you can be shot at for being from a certain neighborhood, by people of your own race, religion etc.
Howie,
"So the guy yell out to God, "hey, what happened to the 70 virgins?""
I did not say you were insinuating Arabs in the joke. I said the joke was referring Muslims. "virgins in heaven" for suicide bombers is a common stereotype that applies to Muslims, as we all know. So I think you can forgive me for assuming that the Joke was about a Muslim.
As for the definition of 'racist', Howie, you're the one who used the word so from that I can assume you know what it means.
Anyways, moving on to other posts and the subject at hand...
Damn, how come I wasn't aware of this place before?
You all can gang up on Nobody for bringing me here - now I'll steal all the goodies from your garbage cans!
Good to have you with us racoon. And don't worry, there's plenty to go around!
Methinks I shall follow Raccoon into this new realm. ;)
Ahlan wa sahlan my friend, ahlan wa sahlan.
Blast, chose anonymous by mistake. Bah.
By the way, name's Roman. Thanks for the welcome, Faysal. :)
I'm posting this from my mobile, and Blogger is... not overtly agreeable.
Post a Comment