The Arab Cesspool in Damascus and US policy on Lebanon
Dr. Joseph Hitti
March 26, 2008
After much heart-wrenching soul-searching by Lebanese Prime Minister Siniora and his March 14 mastodont supporters, he finally decided not to attend the periodic Arab cesspool (a.k.a. summit) to be held this weekend in Damascus. While his indecision for some weeks now about whether to attend or not was incomprehensible, his decision not to go is understandable, since he would be jeopardizing his own life and the lives of the Lebanese delegation members. In the three years since its humiliating withdrawal from Lebanon, the Syrian regime - out of spite and revenge, but also to scuttle the International Tribunal slated to try the regime itself for the assassination of Siniora´s former boss, the infamous political fence-rider Rafik Hariri - has killed up to about 20 (no one knows the real number anymore) of Siniora's own allies and fellow politicians in the March 14 dung heap.
Arabs like Siniora abide by the irrational primal instinct of less developed cultures to stand by one´s brother even if he is the greatest threat against you. Kinship altruism taken to an extreme. Genes in the Arab world are by far the supreme, and often exclusive, criterion by which people are judged. The majority of Arab regimes today are either hereditary monarchies (kings, emirs, sultans etc.) or hereditary dictatorships. No rational, independent, objective criteria such as merit, potential, capability, qualifications or previous criminal record are used to bring people to power. You could be a cruel despot like Saddam Hussein who wantonly killed 500,000 of his own people, and your Arab brothers will still prefer you to an American invasion that prompted the killing of 100,000 Iraqis by other Arabs masquerading as renegades, insurgents, terrorists and such of Al-Qaeda, former Baathists and the Shiite militias.
Same thing with Saad Hariri, Walid Jumblatt, Amine Gemayel or Bashar Assad. They can be the last idiots on earth or the vilest criminals with blood on their hands, but their chromosomes override any other consideration and they are automatically enthroned in positions of power to replace their fathers. In the battle between nurture and nature, backward peoples don´t believe in nurture. It´s all about genes, especially the male ones.
Same thing with Siniora. The Syrians are, to date, his worse – and very real – enemies: They have killed 20 of his fellow supporter politicians. They hold hundreds, if not thousands, of Lebanese prisoners, less for political reasons and more for the vulgar Syrian practice of blackmailing the prisoners´ families out of bribe money. They terrorized Lebanon for 30 years and still occupy large chunks of Lebanese territory along the Syrian border. They refuse to officially cede back sovereignty of the Shebaa Farms to Lebanon, and help bring an end to the torment of this small country. They continue to smuggle weapons and terrorists across the border. Yet, Siniora still defends Syria against Israeli air incursions and, as of yesterday, was still having moral doubts about whether to go to Damascus, a Cornelian problem between love (to his Syrian Arab brothers) and duty (to his country).
Mind you, he is quick to denounce Israel – the theoretical Zionist enemy who is not an Arab brother – when it flies jets over Lebanon hunting for Siniora's own sworn enemies, the Hezbollah bomber-hijacker-suicide killers, or when it bombs nuclear/chemical weapons targets in Syria. He makes grand declarations that he – the prime minister of Lebanon – will be the last one to negotiate peace with Israel, long after all the Arabs do. Mind you too, however, that the Arab brothers he so yearns to see in Damascus have, for the most part, made peace with Israel one way or another: Syria has adhered religiously to a ceasefire on the Golan since 1974, never allowing anyone to fire a bullet across the ceasefire line; Egypt and Jordan have full-fledged peace treaties with Israel and embassies in Tel-Aviv; the hypocrites of the Emirates, Tunisia, Morocco and other Arab countries bark loudly against Israel but open Israeli trade offices and hold cultural, commercial and scientific relations with Israel.
Prime Minister Siniora – like Hezbollah´s Prime Turban, Hassan Nasrallah – is an unflinching enemy of Israel. Together, he and Hassan will burn Lebanon to the ground to "score" any quixotic victories against Israel. For 30 years, they kept – and are willing to keep for the foreseeable future – Lebanon and its people hostage to a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict. They insist that Lebanon will never know peace as long as Israel is not destroyed and eliminated.
Note that the Americans too insist on Lebanon remaining on the burner and never know peace, but for a different set of reasons: An eternally burning Lebanon is a prime candidate for the displacement of the Christian population by massacres and emigration (which has already happened), for the permanent settlement of the half million Sunni Palestinian refugees currently living "temporarily" in camps in the country (which is happening as we speak), and to relieve Israel from the "Right of Return" imperative standing in the way of a final peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians (which is the ultimate goal of the United States).
I wonder why turncoat George Bush does not urge Siniora – the head of the "pro-Western" Lebanese government – to negotiate with Israel and settle the Shebaa Farms issue peacefully, thus short-circuiting Hezbollah's claims to resistance and Syria's holding Lebanon hostage to a resolution on the Golan. This would be a quick and no more painful a solution to Lebanon´s eternal crisis. Why doesn´t Bush urge Siniora to seal the Lebanese-Syrian borders? This would stop the flow of weapons and murderers and would send a clear message to the Syrian regime. Shouldn't there be a convergence between American interests and Lebanese interests, beyond a defeat of Hezbollah? What are those common interests, once Hezbollah is dismantled and eradicated? Are they to genuinely pacify Lebanon and allow the country to evolve its democracy beyond the pestilence of Islamo-Arab brands of democracies? Are they to finally shield Lebanon from the stench of the Islamic-Jewish conflict in Palestine-Israel? Are they to allow the Lebanese people to clean their house from the shackles of antiquated religious and feudal governance by supporting authentic democracy advocates, reformists, human rights activists and other agencies of real change? Or are they to allow the criminals and the corrupt of the ruling establishment - the March 14 mastodonts - to reassert their hold on the country, after they contributed to its demise? In sum, does America really want to let Lebanon become a normal country again? Or is America's plan to keep Lebanon in the crucible until it becomes the permanent dump for all the trash of the Arab-Israeli conflict? Will Lebanon finally foot the bill of the Kissinger Plan, namely to become the sacrificial lamb over whose cadaver the Israeli-Arab conflict will one day be resolved for good?
Why is the US not pushing Siniora to negotiate a final settlement between Lebanon and Israel, and thus extricate Lebanon from the Arab-Israeli conflict? Instead, it lets Siniora bash Israel every which way he goes and whenever he opens his mouth.
Shouldn´t the US be arming the Lebanese army so that one day it can defeat Hezbollah and assert the State´s authority over every inch of Lebanese soil? It isn´t. It lets Hezbollah continue to arm itself, smuggling and installing longer and longer range missiles 20 miles from the Israeli border, while begging Syria for a more positive role (even after 30 years of colluding with the Syrian regime led US policy nowhere). What is so different about Lebanon that it has to be treated like the whore of the neighborhood and the village idiot? The only answer to these questions that have haunted the Lebanese people for close to 40 years is that the US indeed plans to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the Arab-Israeli conflict over the remains of Lebanon.
Arabs like Siniora abide by the irrational primal instinct of less developed cultures to stand by one´s brother even if he is the greatest threat against you. Kinship altruism taken to an extreme. Genes in the Arab world are by far the supreme, and often exclusive, criterion by which people are judged. The majority of Arab regimes today are either hereditary monarchies (kings, emirs, sultans etc.) or hereditary dictatorships. No rational, independent, objective criteria such as merit, potential, capability, qualifications or previous criminal record are used to bring people to power. You could be a cruel despot like Saddam Hussein who wantonly killed 500,000 of his own people, and your Arab brothers will still prefer you to an American invasion that prompted the killing of 100,000 Iraqis by other Arabs masquerading as renegades, insurgents, terrorists and such of Al-Qaeda, former Baathists and the Shiite militias.
Same thing with Saad Hariri, Walid Jumblatt, Amine Gemayel or Bashar Assad. They can be the last idiots on earth or the vilest criminals with blood on their hands, but their chromosomes override any other consideration and they are automatically enthroned in positions of power to replace their fathers. In the battle between nurture and nature, backward peoples don´t believe in nurture. It´s all about genes, especially the male ones.
Same thing with Siniora. The Syrians are, to date, his worse – and very real – enemies: They have killed 20 of his fellow supporter politicians. They hold hundreds, if not thousands, of Lebanese prisoners, less for political reasons and more for the vulgar Syrian practice of blackmailing the prisoners´ families out of bribe money. They terrorized Lebanon for 30 years and still occupy large chunks of Lebanese territory along the Syrian border. They refuse to officially cede back sovereignty of the Shebaa Farms to Lebanon, and help bring an end to the torment of this small country. They continue to smuggle weapons and terrorists across the border. Yet, Siniora still defends Syria against Israeli air incursions and, as of yesterday, was still having moral doubts about whether to go to Damascus, a Cornelian problem between love (to his Syrian Arab brothers) and duty (to his country).
Mind you, he is quick to denounce Israel – the theoretical Zionist enemy who is not an Arab brother – when it flies jets over Lebanon hunting for Siniora's own sworn enemies, the Hezbollah bomber-hijacker-suicide killers, or when it bombs nuclear/chemical weapons targets in Syria. He makes grand declarations that he – the prime minister of Lebanon – will be the last one to negotiate peace with Israel, long after all the Arabs do. Mind you too, however, that the Arab brothers he so yearns to see in Damascus have, for the most part, made peace with Israel one way or another: Syria has adhered religiously to a ceasefire on the Golan since 1974, never allowing anyone to fire a bullet across the ceasefire line; Egypt and Jordan have full-fledged peace treaties with Israel and embassies in Tel-Aviv; the hypocrites of the Emirates, Tunisia, Morocco and other Arab countries bark loudly against Israel but open Israeli trade offices and hold cultural, commercial and scientific relations with Israel.
Prime Minister Siniora – like Hezbollah´s Prime Turban, Hassan Nasrallah – is an unflinching enemy of Israel. Together, he and Hassan will burn Lebanon to the ground to "score" any quixotic victories against Israel. For 30 years, they kept – and are willing to keep for the foreseeable future – Lebanon and its people hostage to a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict. They insist that Lebanon will never know peace as long as Israel is not destroyed and eliminated.
Note that the Americans too insist on Lebanon remaining on the burner and never know peace, but for a different set of reasons: An eternally burning Lebanon is a prime candidate for the displacement of the Christian population by massacres and emigration (which has already happened), for the permanent settlement of the half million Sunni Palestinian refugees currently living "temporarily" in camps in the country (which is happening as we speak), and to relieve Israel from the "Right of Return" imperative standing in the way of a final peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians (which is the ultimate goal of the United States).
I wonder why turncoat George Bush does not urge Siniora – the head of the "pro-Western" Lebanese government – to negotiate with Israel and settle the Shebaa Farms issue peacefully, thus short-circuiting Hezbollah's claims to resistance and Syria's holding Lebanon hostage to a resolution on the Golan. This would be a quick and no more painful a solution to Lebanon´s eternal crisis. Why doesn´t Bush urge Siniora to seal the Lebanese-Syrian borders? This would stop the flow of weapons and murderers and would send a clear message to the Syrian regime. Shouldn't there be a convergence between American interests and Lebanese interests, beyond a defeat of Hezbollah? What are those common interests, once Hezbollah is dismantled and eradicated? Are they to genuinely pacify Lebanon and allow the country to evolve its democracy beyond the pestilence of Islamo-Arab brands of democracies? Are they to finally shield Lebanon from the stench of the Islamic-Jewish conflict in Palestine-Israel? Are they to allow the Lebanese people to clean their house from the shackles of antiquated religious and feudal governance by supporting authentic democracy advocates, reformists, human rights activists and other agencies of real change? Or are they to allow the criminals and the corrupt of the ruling establishment - the March 14 mastodonts - to reassert their hold on the country, after they contributed to its demise? In sum, does America really want to let Lebanon become a normal country again? Or is America's plan to keep Lebanon in the crucible until it becomes the permanent dump for all the trash of the Arab-Israeli conflict? Will Lebanon finally foot the bill of the Kissinger Plan, namely to become the sacrificial lamb over whose cadaver the Israeli-Arab conflict will one day be resolved for good?
Why is the US not pushing Siniora to negotiate a final settlement between Lebanon and Israel, and thus extricate Lebanon from the Arab-Israeli conflict? Instead, it lets Siniora bash Israel every which way he goes and whenever he opens his mouth.
Shouldn´t the US be arming the Lebanese army so that one day it can defeat Hezbollah and assert the State´s authority over every inch of Lebanese soil? It isn´t. It lets Hezbollah continue to arm itself, smuggling and installing longer and longer range missiles 20 miles from the Israeli border, while begging Syria for a more positive role (even after 30 years of colluding with the Syrian regime led US policy nowhere). What is so different about Lebanon that it has to be treated like the whore of the neighborhood and the village idiot? The only answer to these questions that have haunted the Lebanese people for close to 40 years is that the US indeed plans to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the Arab-Israeli conflict over the remains of Lebanon.
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