Violence in Beirut
Violence in Lebanon
Courtesy al-Hayat
Update: CNN is reporting that the Lebanese military is reluctant to intervene in street fighting between pro-Hizbullah forces and supporters of the Seniora government. Aljazeera is also reporting that the Lebanese military has drawn back from flashpoints. It showed one clip of troops facing crowds of young men throwing stones, who were dispersed by tear gas. The overnight street fighting, which the Aljazeera correspondent said does not involve barricades but is rather fluid, was the worst seen in Beirut since the Civil War ended in 1989.
Hizbullah leader Nasrallah has just announced that he feels the Seniora government has declared war on his movement by denying them access to a network of electronic monitoring and surveillance based at the airport. (Apparently Hizbullah uses it for its struggle against Israel, but the government became concerned that they were also using it to track pro-government individuals).
A member of Saad Hariri's government on Aljazeera just said that Hizbullah had the opportunity to help elect a president (Gen. Michel Suleiman) who could have participated in the decision-making and would have been more sympathetic to Hizbullah, but they instead played the role of spoiler. The Lebanese parliament has been unable to elect a president, who by the unwritten national pact has to be a Maronite Catholic, for the past few months.
The Bush administration has been arming the Seniora government and encouraging it to take on the Hizbullah militia, which it sees as a major site of Iranian influence in the region.
From several hours ago:
First, the General Confederation of Labour Unions (CGTL) in Lebanon called a strike to protest the failure of the government to agree to a substantial rise in the minimum monthly wage. Then the strike turned violent, as the Hizbullah joined in. People closed off roads and set out burning tires. The airport was badly affected, stranding 200 passengers. Aljazeera says that the airport is closed on Thursday Arab satellite channels were showing streets crowded with Lebanese army and police, with staccatto machine gun bursts in the background. About 10 people were lightly wounded.
It isn't really clear what the relationship is between the labor unions and their strike for better wages, and the military confrontations with the strikers. [On Thursday pro-government forces said that Hizbullah had taken advantage of the strike to press its own agenda.]
I do know that on the other side, the Bush administration has worked hard to polarize Lebanese society and security, rather than working for a national unity government.
posted by Juan Cole @ 5/08/2008 07:52:00 AM
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9 Comments:
as far as i've understood, the hunger riot is just one part of the picture (and the siniora governement adressed it by raising minimum wages by 50 %, if that decision solves the problem is another matter).
but there are other more significants aspects : a fight is going on to clear the airport administration of hezbollah influence by sacking its security director and even more a decision to suppress the hezbollah network of underground communications.
it is very likely that for hezbollah its network (which proved so usefull for them in the 2006 war) is an absolut red line. it would strip them of the ability to direct (command and control) operations in a new fight against israel.
I do know that on the other side, the Bush administration has worked hard to polarize Lebanese society and security...
Could you provide some references for this? I've seen a few allegations, but nothing more substantial. Also, what does the Bush administration have to gain from a violent, polarized Lebanon, as opposed to a relatively peaceful one?
This seems off the Beirut topic except for the similarity of widespread violence and the apparent continuing intention of Bush to further destabilize the mid East. From 7 May BBC, the report that two Baghdad sports stadiums are being readied for an influx of Sadr City residents.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7387960.stm
From AP 8 May at:
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gkx-3oYeFwuWKCusr2jrojs98w8wD90HB6MG0
“Local residents say Iraqi soldiers are warning people to leave their homes in Sadr City for security reasons....They say the warning is the first time residents are being told to flee the embattled Baghdad district.”
Flee? Where? One should think a moment about the practicality of living with your family in a sports stadium for a while. Say a year or so. Katrina’s dome experience comes to mind. Then one should recall the population of Fallujah at about a quarter million, and compare it to Sadr City’s 1.5 or so million people. If US/Iraqi government attacks on Sadr City continue, what we have coming up is the single most massive, concentrated humanitarian crisis of the entire war, precipitated by Bush policy of viewing Sadr as an enemy rather than a popular spokesman (proto-democracy). And not a word--not a single word--about humanitarian aid which, of course, is impossible. The house that Bush built, as it were. What better motivation might one need to join the anti-occupation insurgency than to be forced into refugee status.
Sorry, this is just way too close to Beirut's history, way too close to photos of the Warsaw Ghetto.
What is truly amazing is that Bush is still standing after having shot himself in the feet so many times.
Amal Saad Ghorayab published something about this recently, noting that the US is arming Hariri's internal security forces and that the CIA has been green-lit to conduct covert ops against Hizbullah in Lebanon. Also, look for work by Faten Ghosn (a joint article will be published in the near future on just this topic), and Gary Gambill.
Following the Lebanese media accounts of the conflict actually makes it quite clear that the US has taken an active role in trying to subvert the opposition - because the US meddlers are open in their comments to this effect. David Welch has been particularly forthcoming about the US role, as has now former Ambassador Feltman, and Secretary Rice.
However, chaos and violence is obviously not the US's goal here, just a product of it and Syria's uncompromising stands. The US is seeking to undercut Hizbullah and its political influence in the country, and more notably its ability to strike against Israel in the next war. The US has been pushing Lebanese governments to try to disarm or weaken Hizbullah for some time now (starting with Hariri), but as this is for the most part not feasible and a recipe for war - as we see today - the Lebanese just accepted Hizbullah as a liability that had to be grudgingly tolerated. Prior to and after the War in 2006 the US made a much more concerted effort to influence things, according to several sources indicating that it would prop up the Saniora government both militarily and economically if it opposed the Opposition.
Aside from reasons of security for Israel, the US is keen on the Majority bloc because it is mostly composed of the old Zuama that are economically dependent upon the US and international economies and want to end the conflict with Israel to rebuild the country. The US pushed for immediate elections in spite of the fact that the election laws were gerrymandered by the Syrians in 2000 to put their supporters in office because these erstwhie Syria supporters were now fiercely anti-Syrians in the Majority bloc (a tribute to the fluidity of Lebanese politics). At stake is also the naturalization of the Palestinians living in Lebanon, which the Palestinians and Opposition reject, the latter both in support of the Palestinian territorial aims and because this would decrease the proportion of both Shi'a and Maronites, pushing the Maronites further to the margins. The US has reportedly (see Naharnet.com) offered to forgive 30% of Lebanon's crippling 40 plus billion dollars in debt if they do this.
As someone who's followed the situation for some time now in my own scholarship, I'm worried about the portent of these last few days. Apparently the Hizbullah camera was aimed at runway 1-7, which opens to the sea (and is terrifying to land on), which was rumored to be the landing zone for an Israeli invasion of the Dahiyeh suburb scheduled for May 28, then scrapped. While I think this may just be the typical Lebanese rumor mongering that happens on a daily basis, it's certainly not outside of the realm of possibility that Israel would use the discord between Hariri's forces and the Shi'a as an opportunity to make a strike of their own while Hizbullah is otherwise occupied. The airport scandal and the immediate attack on the telecommunications network (echoed by the US today) seem far too conveniently placed and have mimicked certain other casus belli that we've seen in other US backed conflicts as of late.
I'm still skeptical about this, however, since an Israeli attack would likely lead to either outright civil war if the Sunnis are seen as party to Israel's invasion (some Sunnis and Christians I talked to are actually in favor of this) or the Majority once again siding with Hizbullah against the Israeli aggression to prevent the aforementioned civil war. We'll just have to see how this plays out in the end I suppose.
- Tylor Brand
"Hizbullah leader Nasrallah has just announced that he feels the Seniora government has declared war on his movement by denying them access to a network of electronic monitoring and surveillance based at the airport. "
Juan, you have a mistake here and you should make a correction.
The current row started when the government accused Hezbollah of setting up video surveillance of planes landing at Beirut airport in order to plot against government officials. Hezbollah had dismissed these accusations.
After this story came to light, the government threatened to close down Hezbollah's extensive fixed-line telecommunications network. Nasrallah stated that the government would be declaring war on the resistance if they dismantled the communications network since it was integral to the successful resistance of Israel's 2006 invasion.
The video surveillance and the fixed-line network are two different things. Hezbollah denies any video surveillance at the airport.
Al Jazeera had this article on Beriut which says:
"At the top of the agenda at the Security Council today is the issue of armed militias in the streets of Beirut and elsewhere," Roed-Larsen said, speaking to Al Jazeera after the briefing.
I wonder if they discuss the private armed militias (e.g. Blackwater) that US military hires.
It would be comical to argue that US/Britain has right to lunch preemptive wars, then hire mercenaries for their own protection yet argue that local population must rely on the local military for their own protection.
Helena Cobban at:
http://justworldnews.org/
in her May 8 posting "Humanitarian access, R2P, Burma/Myanmar, and Sadr City" addresses and expands on the crisis in Sadr City, as well as pointing out a math error in my previous post. Sadr City has 2.5 million inhabitants, not 1.5 million. But hey, whats another million Iraqis? Like someone said, fifty people killed is a massacre. A thousand dead is just a statistic. I'm waiting for this story to gain some wider traction. But I'm not seeing much.
Yesterday I also tripped over the statistic that under evil Saddam, Iraqis has the highest percentage of Phd's per capita in the mid East, and Iraq's education and health cares sytems were superior to those in the US. Bush says things are better now.
One other scorecard update to remind of all the progress in Iraq: Saddam supposedly killed 300-400 thousand Iraqis during his 23 years in power, though it is hard to know for sure because those figures were suppressed. Bush Neocon intervention has resulted in somewhere between 150,000 and 1.5 million dead in five years, though it is hard to know for sure because those figures are suppressed. But George is definitely ahead.
Actually, Professor, this mess is just another reason why I thought and still think Senator Clinton's "nuclear umbrella" proposal was a good idea.
Yeah, she said, "Obliterate". Didn't Obama say he'd retaliate with nukes if Israel were attacked by Iran?
In an off-hand comment in the Tom Russert interview on Meet the Press...
He did say that. If you think you are voting for a candidate who is not promising to nuke Iran for the sake of Israel, think again.
Her proposal-to extend the US nuclear umbrella BEYOND Israel to the Sunni Arab states, who are nervous about Iran and the Shi'ia in general, gives them the perfect opportunity to raise the question, or make the demand:
"We agree to huddle under the United States 'nuclear umbrella'.
We demand that the USA promise to obliterate ANY state in the region who nukes anybody.
We will not,in consequence, pursue the development of nuclear weapons
IF the one nuclear power in the region, ISRAEL, would do the same...
Or actually shit-can the nukes it already has."
Too nuanced for the low-information
voter to get behind?
Absolutely.
Too nuanced for you, Professor?
I think you totally missed it.
Uh, Juan, let me get this straight...
McCain is consorting/cavorting with these wingnuts, and we are supposed to be worried about Jeremiah Wright?
How is it we only hear about Wright even on PBS, and not these guys?
Griff
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