Email from Beirut
A friend writes from the American University in Beirut:
' The university has fuel (and power) for only 12 days; after that we will have a real crisis at the hospital which is already stressed with many wounded people. Refugees from the southern suburbs are now visible in Ras Beirut.
I spoke to X in Saida [Sidon]. The city is almost completely cut off, and it is flooded with refugees from the south. X is volunteering to help distribute food and clothing to these people who are now in schools and shelters. Food seems to be running low.
Last night there were many loud explosions in Beirut and the air was thick with smoke. Beirut is rife with rumors, conspiracy stories, and panic. But so far, there is absolutely no sign of Lebanese people turning on each other. While many are disturbed that Hezbollah's actions seem to have triggered this war, the brutality of the Israeli attack has united the country. People are speculating on what the endgame will be. '
- Patrick McGreevy
posted by Juan Cole @ 7/18/2006 01:02:00 PM
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12 Comments:
The best we can do?
> Monday, July 17. 2006
> Letter from Ralph Nader to President George W. Bush
>
> July 17, 2006
>
> Dear President Bush:
>
> 2. You have been so docile and permissive to Israeli demands that any modest deviation from this posture will make your next move credible. Announce that you are sending two prominent negotiators—perhaps James Baker (Republican) and former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell (Democrat) to Israel and Lebanon to arrange for a cease fire between the combatants.
>
Didn't we send Jim Baker to tell ('negotiate with') Saddam Hussein what was going to happen because he wasn't fulfilling US foreign polcy expectations just before we invaded Iraq?
Isn't George Mitchell on the board of Bechtel or Parsons, or some corporation that does "Infrastructure-building"?
So... So much for "The Cedar Revolution"..
Wasn't the US State department praising the glory of Lebanon's newfound "democracy" just a short year ago?
As Robert Fisk implied... I'm sorry, he stated it directly:
.
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article14016.htm
> But where are the other supposed political titans of Lebanon? What is Saad Hariri, son of the assassinated ex-prime minister Rafiq Hariri - who rebuilt the Lebanon which Israel is now destroying - doing in Kuwait, chatting to the Kuwaitis about his country’s predicament?
The Kuwaiti army is scarcely going to come to defend Lebanon.
Why isn’t Hariri the son on his private jet to the G8 summit in St Petersburg to demand of President Bush that he protect the democratically-elected government and the nation he praised for its “cedar revolution” last year? Or doesn’t democracy matter when Israel is smashing Lebanon?
Answer: no, it doesn’t
>
...all those Lebanese who have been looting their country under the pretense of "Rebuilding" it, shiny new buildings and a purposely-left-wasted government infrastructure that allows the 'robber barons' of the middle east to operate un-impeded, with the help of the west and it's financial machine... Harriri's son... where are they now?
Waiting to reap the benefits of construction contracts to rebuild Lebanon again?
That was, and is, the model for Iraq/Iran as well. Westernized Iraqis/Iranians rebuilding their country and pledging allegiance to western business interests that, in the final analysis, don't give a rat's A-- about them, OR their 'pissant little country'.
Now EVERYONE in the Middle East knows it.
On the evacuation of U.S citizens via 'cruise ships'... There are multiple historical precedents of terrorist raids and attempted destruction of ships.
Combined with a confused and tumultuous situation, verifying identity of people who may have lost or left documentation behind, or verifying that the documentation is representative of the person actually boarding... thousands of people!
The security risk is off the scale, between the warring parties, extra-governmental actors, and, perhaps even our own government's covert intentions... everyone should re-acquaint themselves with Operation Northwood.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwood
I am also in Beirut, and weighing evacuation or not.
What does the future hold? How can the actions of bullies and tyrants be predicted? Follow the self-serving answers, I suppose.
For personal comments on the situation, read:
http://toughtimesbeirut.blogspot.com/
Same person Juan??
Ben Ryan Blogging from AU-Beruit
what, ~25,000 Americans are being bombed by ISRAEL, and the American Democrats are falling all over themselves in an attempt to show their support for the Fundamentalist Theocracy doing it!
"The Jewish Problem" is one of the most divisive issues in American politics, n'est-ce pas? i would rank it up there with Abortion / Sexual Rights and Racism / Immigrant Rights, to be sure.
BushCo, Rove et al must be laughing their heads off, in glee: The pathetic Democrats have once again been entirely finessed, "divided and conquered," as it were, and THE CONVERSATION is once more being driven by those shameless enough to do ANYTHING, even BOMB THEIR OWN CITIZENS, to seize and hold POWER.
From the bulletin boards it appears there is a growing sentiment against Israel, even majority sentiment against Israel. Only right-wing conservatives continue to strongly support Israel.
However I would guess the vast majority of Americans unfortunately don't care - a couple of posters even wondered whether Lebanon was in Europe. That is apparently what Israel is counting on, that Americans are so fed up with Israeli-Palestinian violence that they don't care.
What Americans generally do care about is a humanitarian crisis and that is probably what Israel is most concerned about. There should be much more reporting on that aspect.
Here is a new website that is trying to organize aid efforts to lebanon. hopefully they can help..
www.saveleb.org
Should we not instead invade Israel?
Remember Grenada in the 1980's
When 6,000 US Students in the Medical School were "thought to be possibly in some danger".
Reagan did not evacuate the students. He did not send a cruise ship. He sent the Navy, Air Force, and Marines AND invaded Grenada to remove the "problem".
If then why not now?
And did we charge the students the cost of the invasion? After all they were going to be medical doctors. No
In any case I thought Israel was the great ally of the US necessary to protect US interests. And the reason we gave them $10 Billions a year including the F-16 and 1,000 pounds which they are using to threaten US citizens.
Is US citizens’ welfare not part of US interests. Apparently not when it comes to Israel or may be it is because the West Bank and Gaza are not the only Israeli Occupied Territories, which clearly also include the White House and Congress as well as the US Media.
George Orwell, wonder no more. Israel has arrived. It make Peace by engaging in War. It exalts human life by bombing. And it shows its gratitude to the US by threatening US citizens.
Guy
I sent the webmaster @ savelebanon an email with this demonstration info:
National emergency march on Washington
Defend the People of Palestine and Lebanon!
Stop the U.S.-Israeli War!
Saturday, August 12, 12 Noon at the White House
Initiated by the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition, the National Council of Arab Americans (NCA),and the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation.
http://answer.pephost.org/site/News2?abbr=ANS_&page=NewsArticle&id=7869
The AUB was my home for four research trips to Lebanon between 1999 and 2003... It is nice to know that the campus is still at peace and free of the violence that rips through parts of Beirut...
I have not tried to contact any of the faculty at the Pol. Sc. department at AUB as I guess they have their hands full and need not be bothered by someone who has little to offer in the way of help...
Thanks to all from Beirut who have posted here - I shall be following the blogs out of Beirut regularly...
So far, the response of progressive U.S. politicians has been to side with the Olmert government and state the same laissez-faire, conditional approach offered by Bush. A statement from Senator Russell Feingold goes as follows: “The first steps toward establishing peace must begin with the unconditional and immediate return of the kidnapped Israeli soldiers.” Although he uses the word ‘unconditional’, Feingold’s conditional approach, if allowed to persist, guarantees that a full-scale humanitarian crisis will take place in Lebanon.
From a conversation with a representative at Senator Feingold’s DC office this morning, I am aware that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee currently does not even plan to hold hearings on this conflict, and given the disaster-in-the-making, laissez-faire position of Bush, their abdication of responsibility is unconscionable. Progressives should call on The SFRC to convene immediate hearings on the conflict. These hearings should seek to re-direct U.S. foreign policy in order to comprehensively protect unarmed civilians in Lebanon and Israel, and to avert the looming humanitarian crises in Lebanon and Gaza, in keeping with the Geneva Conventions. An immediate and unconditional cease fire would be consistent with these goals. This humble starting point would protect the human rights of non-combatants, and allow for the restoration of vital civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, roads, and power plants. The Lebanese cannot wait for Hezbollah to meet Israel’s conditions, nor can they wait for more insipid statements from another global summit. The time for action on their behalf is now.
There is contradictory information about this topic on the Web, perhaps someone commenting here can point me to a real source:
how much aid is the US providing to Israel and what are the conditions for this aid ? While we're on the topic, I know we also provide aid to Egypt as well as other countries in the region and I would be interested by the reason for it as well as by the conditions which have to be met.
Thank you.
Some Questions on the Current Israel-Lebanon Crises: Comments Welcome
Here are some questions that have been bouncing around in my head since the start of this back and forth between Israel and Hizbollah last week:
1. Who started it?
Well, the Israelis claim the Hizbollah started it by killing and kidnapping its soldiers on July 12... The Hizbollah claim that Israel started it by invading Lebanon in 1972 and killing and kidnapping Lebanese Shiite... Can Israel go back beyond that point in history to find an Lebanese Shiite offense to prove THEY started it? Perhaps something dating back to the weaponization of Imam Musa Sadr's Amal movement? Amal, after all, disintegrated into Islamic Amal which then fused, among other small groups, to officially form Hizbollah in 1985...
2. Who attacked the civilians first?
The Israelis claim the current cycle of terror was launched due to Hizbollah's killing and kidnapping of Israeli soldiers last week - but under the April Understanding of 1996, that should only have resulted in Israeli strikes on Hizbollah's military targets... Technically speaking, Israel and Lebanon are still at war - the peace treaty put forth by Israeli-installed President Bashir Gemayel in 1982 was never ratified by the Lebanese government under his brother Amin Gemayel... In that case, would not the killing and capturing of soldiers be an act of ongoing war? According to the CNN's timeline of events:
July 2006: Hezbollah militants cross into Israel, kill three Israeli soldiers and kidnap two others in a bid to negotiate a prisoner exchange, a demand rebuffed by Israel. Another five Israeli soldiers are killed after the ambush. Israel responds with a naval blockade and by bombing hundreds of targets in Lebanon, including Beirut's airport and Hezbollah's headquarters in southern Beirut. Hezbollah responds with rocket attacks targeting northern Israeli cities. Fighting leaves dozens of Lebanese civilians dead and coincides with a two-week-old Israeli military campaign in Gaza in response to the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier by Palestinian militants.
By that CNN timeline, it is definitely Israel that first attacked civilian targets, thereby allowing Hizbollah (under the April Understanding) to retaliate by attacking Israeli civilians...
3. What the hell is this April Understanding and why should we bother to even think about it?
The April Understanding was the diplomatic ceasefire agreement to the 1996 Israeli Operation Grapes of Wrath, brokered by the French between Israel, Hizbollah, Syria and the United States, which essentially allowed both parties to carry on their military war, but forbid them from attacking civilians... Under international law, it is legal for an occupied people to attack the troops of the foreign power... However, if one party attacked civilians first, the other would have the right to reply in kind...
After Israel withdrew in May 2000, the question of whether the April Understanding still applied was largely rendered moot as Israel claimed it was no longer an occupying power in Lebanon... However, Hizbollah claimed that many pockets of Lebanese territory, the largest being the Shebaa Farms in the foothills of the Golan Heights, remained under Israeli occupation, and that was seen as justification for continued Hizbollah attacks on Israeli troops...
4. How many Lebanese actually support Hizbollah?
The Shiite are the largest sectarian group in Lebanon, a country of 17 recognized religious sects... Conservative figures would put the population of Lebanese Shiite at about 1 million, of which roughly one-third support Hizbollah - say 300,000, of which roughly 5,000 form Hizbollah's military wing... However, on the question of support for Syria, the secular Shiite group Amal is much closer to Syria than Hizbollah... If Syria enters this war with Israel then the number of Lebanese Shiites facing off, in the political sense, against Israel would jump to more than 600,000, who would almost certainly be joined by thousands of Palestinian militia members living in refugee camps in Lebanon...
OK, I will stop here and await comments from readers on my blog or at juancole.com.
More later.
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