The Grind

It's strange, when you think about it. The vast majority of most people's time is spent at their work. It is how they define themselves. "What do you do?" is a question about your career, not what type of person you are. But it is the rare work of fiction which describes the dramas and emotions of a normal day at work. Why?

"The workday proves dull," says the Guardian. People in the Western world simply don't have interesting jobs any more. We are not Hemingway's soldiers or Melville's sailors. Members of the Western middle class are increasingly paper pushers. We work in offices, tap away on computers, and produce increasingly intangible products. We do it, but have no illusions that it is worthy of high art. You're not going to find many passages in The Great Gatsby where Nick Carraway ducks out for a bathroom break, either.

But let's talk about Gatsby. As the article notes, the fact of work plays a major role in many great pieces of fiction. Nick Carraway meets Gatsby because he has moved East to try his hand in the bond business. Gatsby as a hard-working, driven man is a vital contrast to the independently wealthy Tom, who "drift[s] on forever...seeking the dramatic turbulence of some irrecoverable football game." The fact that the characters work, or do not work, is important. Their actual work, however, is kept from the page. Much better to focus on the exception to the everyday routine -- the grand parties, the romances, the murders.

Is there a way around this dilemma? Can a writer portray the hours between 9am and 5pm without straying into monotony and boredom? The Guardian article offers one possibility -- a return to the fantastic, such as in Kafka's The Fly. When all else fails, a story is always enlivened by turning the protagonist into a bug.

But Kafka's Gregor Samsa doesn't just experience the problems of a man turned into an insect; more importantly, he has the problems of an insect trying to turn into a man. He buzzes about frantically, full of worries and insecurities. What to do? How will he provide for his family? The problems are the same that people experience every day, as is the just-south-of-panic emotional state.

Kafka successfully explained the fears, desires, and perspective of the working man in Gregor -- but without describing hours of compiling Excel spreadsheets. He distilled the essence of a situation in such a way that allows the reader to understand its drama. And, in the end, that is what fiction is all about.

"Mogadishu"

That's what the Gaza Strip is compared to, in this article.

"According to data released by the Ramallah Center for Human Rights, since the start of 2007, 63 Palestinians have been killed and some 400 injured in clashes because of the chaos in the security situation. Most of the casualties were in the Gaza Strip, which is beginning to resemble the Somalian capital of Mogadishu. Tens of thousands of men armed with light weapons and RPGs do whatever they think fit; the Palestinian police are not effective and the courts are not functioning. In armed feuds between clans, the Palestinian security forces do not get involved at all."[Emphasis mine]

The outside world's image of Gaza is a battleground between Hamas and Fatah, where violence and disorder come from the struggle between the two forces. But, as this article makes clear, that point of view does not accurately explain the situation. The majority of forces aren't controlled by either party -- they're loyal only to their clan. And that doesn't bode well for the establishment of a autonomous Palestinian state.

Want to know how bad things are? The tribal clashes, honor killings, and uncontrollable crime have grown so bad that one journalist said, "[many] people in the Strip hope that Israel will reoccupy it because these phenomena were not prevalent during the Israeli occupation." Read the whole article; it's the best report on Gaza I've read so far.

They Are Not Martyrs

"Lebanon mourns the innocent martyrs amidst calls for calm," reads the headline. The "martyrs" are 12 year-old Ziad Ghandour and 25 year-old Ziad Qabalan.

Here is the applicable definition of "martyr": "a person who is put to death or endures great suffering on behalf of any belief, principle, or cause." But what cause do you think the 12 year-old died on behalf of? I remember when I was twelve. I was interested in hoarding baseball cards, not preparing for my imminent "martyrdom" for some political cause.

The two Ziads were the victims of sectarian divisions and deep-rooted tribal loyalties. They died because of a sickness within Lebanese society, and for precisely nothing. They did not sacrifice their lives for some grand principle. They are not "martyrs," they are simply dead.

These are hard truths. But they are important ones. Every faction in the Middle East has their martyrs. Each uses the dead as a reason to press on with the struggle, to never forget who are their friends and who are their enemies. It focuses attention towards those who are dead, away from those who are living. They are a conversation-stopper. "Should we forget old grievances?" "No, we can never dishonor the memory of our martyrs!" The bloody shirt is waved early and often in the Middle East.

Someday, I will write a full article on the cult of martyrdom. Let me just say that there is a healthier way to think of political murders. When President John F. Kennedy was killed, Americans did not speak of his "martyrdom." His death remains a national tragedy, but there are precious few lessons we take away from it. It was awful and that was all; it is still the duty of the living to move forward in the way they believe is best. And the same is true now, after the death of the two Ziads.

No Results

How have Syria's actions changed since Pelosi's visit? The Washington Post notes that there has not even been the slightest expression of goodwill.

The political prisoners who Pelosi mentioned remain in prison. We were recently treated to a sham election. Hamas, whose headquarters are in Damascus, launched rockets into Gaza. Nothing has been done about the suicide bombers who make their way across the Syrian border into Iraq.

There's a Mastercard commercial in there, somewhere. Making nice to Syria, in spite of all previous evidence: regional instability. Bolstering your foreign policy bona fides and sticking a finger in Bush's eye: priceless.

A "Misguided and Rash" War

Israel's Winograd Commission says that Ehud Olmert exhibited "misguided and rash judgment" in waging last summer's war with Lebanon, which isn't exactly a conclusion that we needed to wait the better part of a year for.

Articles are suggesting that the commission's report will take some pressure off Olmert, because it does not call for his immediate resignation. I guess the bar was set pretty low. While it would have been nice to see Olmert forced out as a direct result of the Lebanon war, it is still only a matter of time before he's forced into an early retirement. Olmert's popularity rests at something like 2%, which tests the limits of statistical possibility. When the poll has a margin of error of +/- 5%, does that mean there is a chance Olmert's popularity is actually a negative number?

The Waiting Game

Beirut is in wait-and-see mode today, in light of ">the discovery of the bodies of the two PSP boys. It's not nearly as bad as the riots in January, where people largely stayed in their homes. There are plenty of people out and about, but everyone is waiting to see if the other shoe is going to drop -- if there is going to be retaliation for the murders. The universities are closed, and there are new checkpoints around the city.

Defense Minister Elias Murr said that he knows who did it, and that, "[w]e are chasing them and we hope to arrest them." Well, I'm not sure that they really know who did it -- but odds are that they'll arrest someone soon, regardless. The pressure to do something and defuse the situation is going to outweigh the need for 100% certainty.

US Softening Towards the Brotherhood

Does a five-minute conversation at a cocktail party signal the beginning of a change in US policy towards Mubarak's Egypt? When House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer visited Cairo last week, he was introduced to Mohammed Saad el-Katatni, who is a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and an MP who leads an independent bloc within Parliament. This wasn't just a chance meeting -- inviting Katatni was "cleared by the State Department," and represents US "concern" over the recent Egyptian crackdown on Muslim Brotherhood leaders.

Dead

The two PSP members were found -- tragically but not unexpectedly -- dead today. Nahar is reporting that Saniora referred to the murder as a "national disaster," and Jumblatt called for "maximum restraint." Universities are closed tomorrow, and we're back to the ghost-town phenomenon on the streets of Hamra -- similar to, though not yet as bad, the period during the strike and riots.

Just came back from Starbucks, where I was drilling Arabic vocabulary. I asked the barista if they would be open to their normal time, given the situation. "Eleven-thirty," he said confidently, then paused. "Eleven-thirty -- unless something bad happens. That should be the motto of Starbucks Lebanon: 'Open until eleven-thirty! Unless something bad happens.'"

Simply Wait

Economist Steven Levitt went to Poland, and was upset about the rampant line-cutting. Waiting your turn is definitely one of those virtues of the Western world that has not quite translated anywhere else. Levitt looks for the reason by examining different incentives for line-cutting in the East. While that may be true at, for example, a crowded manqouche stand in the early morning, it seems to me that the habit has made a leap into the culture of the region. People have leap-frogged over me when we were the only two people in line, and they saved themselves no more than thirty seconds.

There might be a nationwide, socio-political answer to this phenomenon as well. After all, Lebanon is sort of a lawless, laissez-faire country. "If the government can't convene Parliament or establish control over its southern territories," our theoretical line-cutter may say to himself, "why should I be a stickler for the rules?" OK, probably not.

The Mystery of Ziad and Ziad

As Beirut Spring points out, reading the comments to Naharnet's article on the disappearance of two men affiliated with the Druze Progressive Socialist Party does not exactly fill one with a sense of confidence and goodwill towards man. These people do not seem to be enamored of Hizbullah, or of proper spelling and grammar. "Hezbala are known for their histoey of kidnaping," reminds one commenter. "Return them or else!!!" (there were actually far more exclamation marks), writes Sam from Texas.

But, in all seriousness, it's just this sort of seemingly isolated violence which can become the spark which ignites serious fighting. The Ayn Rummaneh bus attack is the event which is commonly argued to have started the Lebanese Civil war in 1970.

From Beirut to the Beltway sketches out the possible reason for the kidnapping, and the probable murder, of the two Ziads. Both were tied to a gruesome murder of a Hizbullah-affiliated man on January 25, during the political riots. After a runaround with the judicial system, and a possible faked "confession" by a Syrian national, it's possible the man's family simply resorted to tribal justice.

Twisted Logic

Some Americans are all in a tizzy about the opening of an Arabic-language public secondary school in Brooklyn. As for this column -- it appears that it was written by two different people, who then decided to combine their work and sign the new creation, "Daniel Pipes."

First, Pipes proclaims that the school is "a marvelous idea, for New York and the country need native-born Arabic speakers. They have a role in the military, diplomacy, intelligence, the courts, the press, the academy, and many other institutions...I am enthusiastic in principle about the idea of this school, one of the first of its kind in the United States." Well, great. And they all live happily ever after, right?

No, actually. Because in the next paragraph, Mr. Pipes announces that he opposes the school, "because Arabic-language instruction is inevitably laden with pan-Arabist and Islamist baggage." Excuse me? "Inevitably?" Does the Alef have some hypnotic power, which will turn me into a mindless lackey of Nasser and Sayyid Qutb?

Pipes then lists ways in which other Arabic instruction has had "pan-Arabist and Islamist baggage." Well, fine. I'm sure it has happened. But that's no reason to oppose this school. In fact, that's all the more reason to support its creation -- and make sure that it acts as a counterweight to the current situation. If pan-Arabists control Arabic language instruction, their grip needs to be broken somewhere. And, because Pipes praises the theoretical creation of an Arabic language school, surely he thinks that Islamic culture has more to offer the world than Islamist ideology and tired pan-Arabist slogans.

Not Over

If you're a Lebanese student learning about your country's history, you might wonder where the last six decades have gone. That's because your history textbook ends with the withdrawal of French troops in 1946, so as not to have to explain the divisions which ultimately resulted in the 1975-1990 civil war. Without a common consensus on why the war occurred, it has been impossible to produce a history book including the civil war.

As a result, students are either ignorant about the war -- or, more likely, they get their information from second-hand gossip from their relatives and friends. "I have only a vague idea about what happened...All I know about it I got from my parents and the news on television," said one student. So each young Lebanese person gets their view of history from the previous generation, who embody the very divisions which began the war in the first place.

There's also the risk that the next generation doesn't draw parallels between the current situation, and the situation during the civil war. Many of the same military chiefs in power during the civil war are still in positions of leadership. Long-running political tensions may still lead to sustained violence because of one horrific attack. Sectarian divisions then are similar to divisions now. But why would they know that?

Further Adventures In Arabic

David Adesnik wants to know how to say "Israel" in Arabic. Turns out that the two best-known introductory Arabic textbooks published in America fail to mention the name of the country that separates the Meditteranean from the Jordan River. If these Arabic books were published in Syria, for example, I wouldn't be surprised. But there's no reason for American publishers and academics to go along with the Arab world's juvenile habit of playing dumb to Israel's existence.

Nevertheless, this reminds me of one of my many faux pas in learning Arabic. We were learning country's capitals, and how to say one place was "in" another place. "Parees bi Faransa," "New York bi Amerka." It was boring at the time, too.

Finally, the teacher asked, "Wayn Quds?" (Where's Jerusalem?) Without thinking, I answer, "Quds bi Israel!" That was not the right answer. "Quds bi Falasteen," she snapped back, glaring.

What If You Held Elections, And Nobody Showed Up?

Syrian Elector has been the clearing house for all Syria-election related news. They updated throughout the weekend, using "watchers" in the major cities. Some of the people gathering data were arrested temporarily by Bashar's watchers. With turnout so low, the police didn't have much else to do.

Bomb, Bomb Iran

McCain sings his new ditty, "Bomb, bomb Iran" in front of a town hall in South Carolina. A liberal group gets hold of the video and runs an attack ad -- and McCain's campaign receives a boost. Ah, politics.

Syria's Elections

I'm kicking myself for not going to Syria this weekend, to observe their elections. Most newspaper articles stress the country's general disinterest in the process, and their lack of hope for real change. And sure, voter turnout of 4 - 10 percent does not indicate a scintillating election season. I would have liked to write about the more mundane problems of running an election in Syria. For example:

In previous electoral rounds there have been cases where celebrations for successful NPF candidates were made before the electoral results were even announced.

A Really (Really) Bad Idea

Look, I have no love for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. To the extent I believe in such things, I'm sure that he will receive an icy reception at the Pearly Gates (or the Muslim equivalent) upon his ultimate demise. But this paragraph, from the Israeli magazine Ynet, articulates one of the worst ideas I've come across:

"Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has to be killed. Really be killed, I mean, physically. He should be eliminated, put to death, assassinated, and all those words that serve to say the same thing."

The article justifies Ahmadinejad's assassination by referring to his threat to Israeli civilians. That's true, no doubt. But it dodges the issue of whether killing him would lessen the risk to Israelis, or increase it. Ahmadinejad isn't some dictator who took power by force, and who has radically different beliefs from the people he governs. He has a social base, and is a product of his country's current political mood. Kill him, and Iranians are just going to elect another President just like him -- except more determined to take Israeli lives. Even threatening to kill him is bad. So, just...shhh...

They Hate Our Adorable Bear Cubs

From Foreign Policy, "Knut: Ball of fuzz defiant after receiving death threat, rolls around in adorable fashion."

Invisible People

If you're interested in the issue of Iraqi refugees in Lebanon and the broader Middle East, read this article by Serene Assir. For my money, it's the best and most comprehensive reporting on their plight yet. In short: they risk death back in Iraq, the NGOs are overwhelmed and have no funds to support them, and they are treated as illegal immigrants in Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon. To avoid security forces, most refugees spend most of their time indoors -- where they cannot make money to provide for their families. Oh, and there's the growth of sectarian divisions where none used to exist:

For now, and so long as the situation in Iraq does not improve or the West does not open its doors to more refugees, Iraqis in Lebanon are forced to live invisibly. Perhaps in a bid to find safety in an organisationally sectarian country, Iraqis are for the most part choosing to live in areas corresponding to their own religious affiliation. In other words, the Shias are seeking shelter in the southern suburbs of Beirut and south Lebanon, and the Christians in east Beirut and beyond, into the mountains."[Emphasis mine]

Assir has far different ideas of what can and should have been done to solve this problem. Very well. No matter our different political persuasions, we both have to come to terms with the problem, before solving it. These are the facts.

Choose A Leader

"We, who are willing to support this new strategy, and give General Petraeus the time and support he needs, have chosen a hard road. But it is the right road. It is necessary and just. Democrats, who deny our soldiers the means to prevent an American defeat, have chosen another road. It may appear to be the easier course of action, but it is a much more reckless one, and it does them no credit even if it gives them an advantage in the next election. This is an historic choice, with ramifications for Americans not even born yet. Let's put aside for a moment the small politics of the day. The judgment of history should be the approval we seek, not the temporary favor of the latest public opinion poll." --Sen. John McCain (R-AZ)

"We're going to pick up Senate seats as a result of this war. Senator Schumer has shown me numbers that are compelling and astounding." --Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.)

Back To the Future

What did people in 1900 think the world would look like a century later? Some of these predictions -- no mosquitoes (someday, inshallah), strawberries the size of apples, and a giant network of pneumatic tubes -- didn't quite come to fruition. Other predictions, like the military dominance of air power, hit the nail on the head.

But what I'm struck most by is the belief in the imminent creation of an ordered, plentiful society. Universities would be free to every living person. There would be no more bothersome insects, or wild animals. The alphabet will rid itself of the pointless C, X, and Q.

On the one hand, predictions like these make it easier to understand a world that produced A Brave New World, and centralizing governments such as Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. On the other hand, it's hard to escape the fact that people were far more optimistic than they are today. If you asked the public today how the world is going to be different in 2107, do you think that their predictions would paint a world substantially better than the one we live in today?

Pyjamahideen

The Economist -- that mainstream, establishment, glossy magazine -- celebrates Egyptian bloggers' success at embarassing Hosni Mubarak during the latest "constitutional referendum" process.

"By simply posting embarrassing video footage, small-time bloggers have blown open scandals over such issues as torture and women's harassment on the streets of Cairo. No comment was needed to air widespread disillusionment with last month's referendum to approve constitutional changes, after numerous Egyptian websites broadcast scanned images of a letter from one provincial governor to junior bureaucrats, ordering them to vote yes."[Emphasis mine]

There are some well-written, funny, and courageous Egyptian blogs out there. I read 9arabawy, The Arabist, and Rantings of a Sandmonkey with some degree of frequency. As the Mubarak regime has shown, criticizing Egyptian politics from inside the country is not a risk to be taken lightly. These guys deserve your support, so check them out!

Round Two

From Defense Update magazine:

[Israeli] [o]fficials warned that Hezbollah has regained most of its strength since the last summer with Israel and that the rate of weapons smuggling has nearly doubled over the past few weeks.

Here is what will probably happen, at some point. Israel will bomb South Lebanon and dahiyeh, citing Hizbullah's rearming as a violation of sundry UN resolutions. They will be right. Hizbullah will cite Israeli flyovers of Lebanon and sundry other violations of UN resolutions. They will also be right, though neither party's sense of moral rectitude is going to prevent less people from dying.

Inside Kirkuk

First, apologies for the thinness of updates this week. For some as-yet undiscovered reason, the Internet has died a sudden and unexpected death in my apartment. I'm typing this from one of Hamra's many cafes.

Moving on. If you have a half-hour to kill, check out Michael Totten's latest report from Kirkuk. He covers a lot of ground, so make sure you're comfortable before starting in. Let me cherry-pick one point, and respectfully take issue with Michael:

"The vast majority of the violence, according to my Kurdish sources, is committed by Baathists and old Baathists under new names. Failure to identify Iraq’s principal terrorist organizations and treat them accordingly is the number one reason why Iraq is such a catastrophe. At least this is what I have been told. Kurdish officials I’ve met who try to explain this to the Americans are dismissed out of hand and ignored utterly."[Emphasis Mine]

I'm not an expert on Iraq, so my opinion should be taken with a grain of salt. However, this comment seems to miss the point. Ba'athists in Iraq are the same as die-hard loyalists to Saddam Hussein -- any ideology that the Ba'athists used to stand for has been a dead letter for ages. With Hussein dead, being a Ba'athist means fighting for a return to the days where the Sunni majority maintained supremacy, by force, over the other ethnicities in Iraq.

Iraq can't be explained as a battle between the Ba'athists vs. everyone else, but as a power struggle between the various religions and ethnicities. Simply put -- the groups have radically different opinions on how to organize society, and do not believe the other groups should have an equal vote in the course of the country. Totten simplifies and trivializes Iraq's problems by blaming the entire war on Ba'athist "dead-enders."

Master of the Universe

If you liked Bonfire of the Vanities, check out Tom Wolfe's look at New York's hedge fund managers, twenty years after.

"What's happened? What's happened is, I just spent $200,000 on a state-of-the-art positive-pressure HVAC system in our apartment, and I've gotta put in new windows to make it work right, and I gotta put four vents, four lousy little vents, through the walls of this building, which nobody's ever gonna notice--and I've gotta do it now--AND THE BOARD IN ALL ITS AUGUST WISDOM IS BREAKING MY--OBSTRUCTING ME EVERY INCH OF THE WAY!"

And to think, these are the people Wolfe chooses to live amongst. As a side note, Wolfe lives every American writer's dream. Bash the rich Wall St. people's, bash the racial demagogues and the politicians -- all the while living in midtown Manhattan and making truckloads of money.

Hizbullah Likes It Like This

"Nasrallah Aide Scoffs At Border 'Supervision'" is the subtitle of this Daily Star piece. It's a perfect example of an argument that I've been trying to make for some time: people see the current situation in Lebanon as a stalemate, where neither side has achieved their objectives. In reality, Hizbullah is winning a considerable victory by merely keeping the Lebanese political system deadlocked.

The Daily Star articles quotes Hussein Khalil, a top Hizbullah aide, saying that while Hizbullah opposes an international monitoring of the Syrian-Lebanese border, in any case "Hizbullah has enough weapons to defend Lebanon against Israeli aggression, even if borders with Syria are completely closed." The absence of a central government helped Hizbullah rearm without difficulty. Hizbullah's primary goals are protecting its weapons and retaining its autonomy over South Lebanon -- goals that are easier to achieve when the state isn't functioning.

From its current position, Hizbullah has very little incentive to compromise with the majority. The same is not true of the FPM and the other parties aligned with Hizbullah, but they've already chosen their side and now are forced to live with their decision. There's plenty of other interesting points in that article -- including Nasrallah's interesting willingness to hold a "national referendum" over everything from Hizbullah's weapons to what he should have for breakfast -- but I'll leave that for another day.

I can't resist, however, posting this passage: "Khalil added that his group will 'never' make use of its weapons in a civil war in Lebanon 'simply because Hizbullah firmly opposes it.'" Oh, phew. I guess we don't have to worry any more.

American News Round-Up

Sure, Barack Obama is the rock star candidate in the 2008 Presidential election. If national elections were primarily (instead of just partially) high school popularity contests, he would win in a landslide. But Segolene Royal is about to prove, by losing the French presidential campaign, that there's a little more to it than that. Royal road a wave of positive media coverage into the campaign -- the first woman President of France! However, it turned out that was the first and last reason to vote for her.

Most Americans would appreciate the symbolism of electing a black President. But, by itself, that's not a good enough reason to vote for him. And there's some evidence that Obama is starting to fall victim to the cheesy, easily-digested language of people who are subjected to too much fawning media coverage. Take a look at these comments, where he compares the violence at VA Tech with the "verbal violence" of Imus and "the violence of children whose voices are not heard in communities that are ignored." Gag.

As for the horrible shooting at VA Tech, I don't have a great deal to say other than it's awful. Politically, one side is going to use the event as an opportunity to argue that we need more gun laws, while the other will suggest that it proves we need fewer. Policy will be probably depend on who can muster up more outrage, which really seems like a great way to make laws.

"Israeli Melons Have AIDS"

Sometimes, these headlines just write themselves. A text message is causing a furor in Saudi Arabia, claiming that the Saudi Interior Ministry is warning people against a load of Israeli melons infected with AIDS entering the country.

The government has tried to contain the rumor with several statements so far, to no avail. "The HIV virus cannot survive in any temperature other than that of the human body, which cannot be reached in fruits," said one official.

Listen to Limbaugh, Become Smarter

Those who listen to Rush Limbaugh are equally well-informed on current affairs as those who listen to NPR. Somewhere in Cambridge, MA certain right-thinking individuals glanced down at their latte and felt like a small part of themselves had flitted away, without knowing why. For the record, I've never listened to either -- they both annoy me, for different reasons.

93% of Americans know who Arnold Schwarzenegger is ("movie star," or "governor of California" were counted), 64% of people know Beyonce Knowles...and 36% knew who the President of Russia is. Can we convince Putin to appear in the middle of Jay-Z and Beyonce's next video, please?

Sarkozy's France

The writing style in this New York Times article on Nicolas Sarkozy annoys me -- but it is, nevertheless, the best overview of the current political climate in France that I have read.

Foreign journalists who cover France, especially from such heights as the Times, face the unique danger of coming across as unbelievably pretentious with just the slightest slip of the pen. They become sucked in by la romanticisme de la culture francaise, l'histoire, la Tour Eiffel... In any event, David Reiff inexplicably slips into French once or twice, and has a penchant for drawing broad conclusions from his assessment of the "mood" of a location. Oh, if journalists only had that ability.

Anyway, read the article. Merci.

Internet, We Hardly Knew Ye

The men in white labcoats are thinking about scrapping the Internet. Turns out a "'clean slate' approach is the only way to truly address security, mobility and other challenges that have cropped up."

Well -- t's been fun, guys. I'll see you on the other side.

How To Fight A Regional Hegemon

Hizbullah's flag transforms the Alef into a hand clutching a rifle. If accuracy was paramount, the hand would be clutching a microphone in the manner of a press podium. Their true skill, after all, is in media relations. Noah Pollak visited the town of primarily Christian town of Ain Ebel, in South Lebanon, after last summer's war. During the war, Hizbullah placed its rockets next to inhabited houses. If Israel wanted to destroy the rockets, they would have to kill civilians who were sympathetic to their cause, and risk international condemnation.

Here's the relevant passage:

"In Ain Ebel and elsewhere, Hezbollah was in effect aiming Israeli firepower, directing its missiles and artillery onto Hezbollah's preferred targets--houses, hospitals, apartment buildings, anywhere civilians could be found--knowing that Israel would be punished by the ensuing international outrage...Many people refer to Hezbollah's tactic as the use of 'human shields,' but this gets it exactly backward: It implies that Hezbollah was trying to protect its assets by using civilians to deter an Israeli attack. In fact, Hezbollah was trying to provoke Israeli bombardment so that both human lives and infrastructure would be destroyed, and the Party of God could enjoy the resulting moral absolution."[Emphasis mine]

The facts on the ground are clear, though the lesson taken away depends on one's political prejudices. Israelis like Pollak justifiably feel a sense on helplessness when faced with an enemy willing to resort to such inhumane tactics. But, as for me, I think it highlights the fact that the Lebanese cannot hope for someone else to solve the problem of Hizbullah. They simply can't. It will be a problem solved by an internal agreement among the Lebanese, or not at all.

P.S.: As a commenter pointed out, Noah Pollak is an American living in Israel. Mea culpa.

Kurt Vonnegut, RIP

The irony of Kurt Vonnegut's death is that he would have been the person the least concerned over it. Vonnegut had many virtues; optimism was not one of them. His poem Requiem, I think, is more than appropriate for the moment.

When the last living thing

has died on account of us,

how poetical it would be

if Earth could say,

in a voice floating up

perhaps

from the floor

of the Grand Canyon,

"It is done."

People did not like it here.

McCain Resurrected

Maybe in a more normal world, it would be bad news for John McCain to learn that the mainstream media has turned on your presidential campaign. But, in Washington today, nothing could be better for his chances to come out victorious in the Republican primary. Conservatives have always been suspicious of McCain's star status among the supposedly liberal mainstream press. Now, he's one of them again.

Check out this positively swooning editorial over at The National Review:

We have had many differences with Senator McCain over the years, but can only brim with admiration for the clarion voice he has sounded at this critical juncture in the war. The media are almost ready to pronounce his presidential candidacy dead. It has indeed been sagging...but there is an element of malice in the media's predictions..."

As the editorial is kind enough to point out, NR hasn't always been the kindest friend to McCain. To only increase the surreality, there are plenty of NR bigwigs -- including the founder, William F. Buckley -- who long ago turned against the Iraq War that McCain championed. But past and present disagreements are papered over by a shared enemy. Oh, it's enough to make a boy miss Washington D.C.

Gilad Shalit: Political Football

So 19 year-old conscript Gilad Shalit gets captured in Southern Gaza in June 2006, and there he sits. When I was nineteen, I was playing football video games in my freshman year dormitory, but let's abandon that angle for now. First, the Israelis tried tearing Gaza apart to find Shalit. They even imprisoned "nearly 100 Hamas cabinet ministers, officials and lawmakers," including the speaker of Parliament -- but no dice.

Allowing an Israeli soldier to languish in the prison of their enemies makes Israel look weak and vulnerable. So what does an Israeli Prime Minister -- whose low polling numbers test the bounds of mathematical possibility -- do? Certainly nothing that risks alienating even more people (though immediate family might be all that is left). You don't want your party's right wing to run back to Likud, so you can't acquiesce to the demands of Hamas.

Oh, and while we're on the subject, what are those demands? Hamas wants a prisoner swap, and it wants a 1,400 : 1 ratio in their favor. Many of the 1,400 people they want released come from the top tier of the leadership of the militant organizations, including Fatah's Marwan Barghouti. Now, I'm not particularly in awe of Olmert's military aptitude, but I trust that he understands some basic facts. For example: it's obvious that Israel will be in a weaker position vis-a-vis the Palestinian resistance if hundreds or thousands of Palestinian militants are back on the streets, and the Israelis only get Shalit.

What can nations expect from their soldiers, and what do they owe them? Israel conscripts its young men and women into the army, and expects them to fight and die for the state. This is uncontroversial. But, when a soldier is captured, there is the sense that other lives should be risked to retrieve him -- the question goes beyond a simple mathematical calculation of risk and reward. Israel and Hamas are the current parties debating the limits of this altruism, though chances are they won't be the last.

Google Earth: Weapon Against Genocide

Hat tip: Beirut Spring

Check out this effort, by Google Earth and the US Holocaust Museum, to publicize ongoing genocides. When people scan the satellite imagery of the globe on Google Earth, they will see flames over the regions where there are current humanitarian disasters. Zooming in on the icon will let them see, for example, a village destroyed by the Sudanese government in Darfur.

"We need President Bashir [the Sudanese leader] and other perpetrators to know they are being watched," said Daowd Salih, a former Red Cross worker.

The Routinization of Crisis

This Anthony Shadid article is a must-read for anyone living outside Lebanon, looking to understand what is going on in the country. Shadid captures the bizarre normality of a city supposedly undergoing a political crisis: the nightclubs are full, the protesters relax and organize soccer games, and MPs from opposite sides of the political divide hug and exchange jokes. It doesn't seem, on a daily basis, like a country on the brink of civil war.

But, I think, the initial perception misses the point. Lebanese have become very good at ignoring the political crises gathering around them. They have become habituated to the cycle of one apocalyptic confrontation after another; they have even become blase about it. This doesn't mean that they don't care. It just means that they can bifurcate their lives between politics on one side, and everyday life on the other.

Still, the longer this crisis goes on, the harder it will be to mend the growing division between the two factions. The two sides are learning to live without each other. It might not seem that way, on the surface. But that's only because it's a matter of routine by now.

A Failed State

It is impossible to read Hassan Nasrallah's recent remarks without getting the impression that he believes that Lebanon is a failed state, and has no hope of ever exerting serious influence within its borders. Considering that Nasrallah runs a state within a state, this should not be surprising. It is certainly a reality which benefits his interests. But, if a national leader anywhere else in the world complained so persistently about the state's weaknesses, he would be considered hopelessly defeatist. Not Nasrallah. He's the leader of the Resistance.

Will Hizbullah be giving up its weapons any time soon? Nope. For that to happen, "there must be a strong state and a strong army capable of confronting any Israeli aggression on Lebanon." Is Nasrallah burning the midnight oil to strengthen the state's military, so that this is possible? Let's not descend into fantasy.

Nasrallah has a vested interest in a weak state -- in its current form, the state can't challenge Hizbullah's domination of the south or the dahiyeh. He has no incentive to end the current deadlock. If a compromise was reached, the state might get back to doing things that states normally do: convening parliament, aiding economic development, investigating the assassination of a Prime Minister. When the government cannot fulfill its functions, Hizbullah can move in.

Don't believe me? Nasrallah said it himself: "If the stalemate continues for a while until a solution is found or we go to a civil war, then let the stalemate continue."

Al-Jazeera goes on to say "the opposition was willing to bide its time until circumstances become convenient for a solution or regular elections are held in 2009." If this is still going on in 2009, Lebanese will have grown so accustomed to being at each other's throats that they will no longer see themselves as members of the same nation. And chaos like that only benefits the group with all the guns.

The State Department Is Hilarious

It seems the State Department has been hiding its comedic talents from the rest of the world and suddenly decided to best them out all at once, with this report. One should also not discount the possibility that State has been saving up jokes since the Dean Rusk era, and this represents the sum total of their humor over the past half century.

Anyway, it is a report on the dangers one finds abroad. It focuses on the eternal, mundane problems of crime and traffic accidents rather than the headline-catching (but far rarer) dangers of terrorism. Here are my top four favorite warnings, in reverse order (to ensure suspense).

4) "Driving in Qatar is (like) participating in an extreme sport."

3) "The tragedy of Haiti is that Haitians have become great leaders in every profession and in every country, with the exception of Haiti."

2) "Reporting crime is an archaic, exhausting process in Mexico, and is widely perceived to be a waste of time."

1) "Despite Malta's geographic proximity to Italy, organized crime is almost nonexistent."

Torture

What to make of Mark Bowden's epic piece in The Atlantic, on torture? I suppose that it depends on what one wants to get out of it. If you're looking for a big-think piece that explains how to right the wrongs of Iraq, you're going to be disappointed. If you're hoping for a full-throated denunciation or defense of torture, the piece isn't for you. But if you're looking to read a well-written piece of narrative journalism explaining how coercion is used in the real world, you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Bowden is writing to enlighten and inform, rather than to drive home a specific policy message. This isn't like a PG-13 movie, where the audience gets a moral lesson drilled into their heads before leaving the theatre. It's filled with a lot of stories like this one, of a CIA agent interrogating a Lebanese national after the Beirut embassy bombing:

"'I sent him back to his cell, had water poured over him again and again while he sat under a big fan, kept him freezing for about twenty-four hours. He comes back after this, and you can see his mood is changing. He hasn't walked out of jail, and it's beginning to dawn on him that no one is going to spring him.'

Over the next ten days Hall kept up the pressure. During the questioning sessions he again kicked Nimr out of his chair, and both he and the Lebanese captain involved cracked him occasionally across the shins with a wooden bat. Finally Nimr broke. According to Hall, he explained his role in the bombing, and in the assassination of Lebanon's President. He explained that Syrian intelligence agents had been behind the plan. (Not everyone in the CIA agrees with Hall's interpretation.)"[Emphasis mine]

To the extent that Bowden's piece does reach a policy conclusion, it tries to draw the line between "torture" and "coercion." Torture is the medieval styles of inflicting pain -- the rack, and its many descendants -- and it is reprehensible. Coercion relies on psychological pressures to break the victim. Leaving the prisoner standing for long periods of time, denying them food and proper rest, and even giving them mind-altering drugs like heroin or LSD. These, according to Bowden, are proper and necessary measures used to defeat America's enemies.

But I'm not sure if I see the clear red line that Bowden envisions. Both "coercion" and "torture" damage an individual's mind and body. One we reconcile ourselves to "coercion," I don't see how we could still see "torture" as this barbaric, evil practice. If an interrogator believes that a subject has valuable information and his "coercive" techniques fail, will he feel any moral compunction against resorting to direct physical violence? How and why?

Easter Sunday Pictures/Stories

A suspicious baby.

This is in Byblos, a city just north of Beirut. The site has been continuously inhabited since 5000 B.C., making it one of the oldest still-inhabited cities in the world (though most academics agree that this boat has only been here half that long).

The "pigeon" rock, in Beirut. I don't know why it's called that. It graces the cover of many Beirut tourist guides, for obvious reasons.

Retraction

I criticized the captured British soldiers for sucking up to the Iranian government. My assumption was that their statements must have been voluntary, because the Iranian government would not be stupid enough to torture British subjects. It turns out that I was wrong.

The soldiers were apparently subjected to a mock execution, where they were tied to a wall and blindfolded, while soldiers cocked weapons behind them. Here's how Joe Tindell, a marine, described it:

"We had a blindfold and plastic cuffs, hands behind our backs, heads against the wall...there were weapons cocking," Tindell told British Broadcasting Corp. radio. "Someone said, I quote, 'Lads, lads I think we're going to get executed'...someone was sick and as far as I was concerned he had just had his throat cut."

There's a limit to the physical or psychological torture that anyone can take; confessing under such circumstances is no crime. There's also, hopefully, a limit to the West's gullibility about the Iranian government's aims. Hopefully, this will teach our leaders to take what Iran says about valuing "peaceful" nuclear power or "stability" in Lebanon with a grain of salt.

Pakistan On the Brink?

Ideologically, Robert Fisk isn't really my cup of tea. But the fact remains that he produced some of the best journalism from Lebanon's civil war, and that when he comments on Middle East politics, it's worth listening. So, when I read that he thought Pakistan would be the barometer for the future of the Middle East, I kept that idea in the back of my mind.

I can only hope Fisk is wrong, because there has been a steady stream of stories recently about the increasing "Talibanization" of Pakistan. Here's the latest, from Islamabad:

"Shiraz Ahmed was tending his music store in Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan, when a group of 15 bearded young men walked in bearing bamboo poles and a chilling message.

Politely but firmly, they instructed him to take down the colourful array of Bollywood and bhangradance tunes on display and to restrict his business to Islamic music."

The story goes on to describe the growing influence of an "Islamic" opposition to President Musharraf, and Musharraf's unwillingness to act directly against them. Despite acting as a separate police force within the capital city and calling for his assassination, Pakistan's President continues to treat them with kid gloves. That doesn't sound like a leader who is confident of his hold on power.

Name. Rank. Number.

Is there any possible excuse for the colossal suck-up the captured British soldiers gave the Iranian government? I thought acquiescing to Ahmadinejad's little photo opportunity and accepting new suits was enough, but apparently not. One soldier expressed his...gratitude...over being held hostage for two weeks: "We are very grateful for your forgiveness," he told the Iranian president.

Then there's Lt. Carman, who decided to make an address to the "Iranian people," saying, "I can understand why you were insulted by our apparent intrusion into your waters."

Look, they weren't the prisoners of one of the ragtag Iraqi militias who have made a cottage industry out of killing coalition troops. In that situation, a person should be given free license to say whatever they can to save their neck. But they were prisoners of the Iranian government -- a state with a lot to lose by an escalation of tensions with Britain and America. Ahmadinejad couldn't touch a hair on their head -- he had to let them go eventually. If the soldiers had spoken of physical coercion when back in England, the uproar would be deafening.

So, it appears that the British soldiers gave Iran a publicity coup, to avert a nonexistent risk. First Pelosi's visit to Assad, now this -- it seems the West is feeling generous lately. Or maybe, when it comes to its armed forces, Britain just doesn't make them like they used to.

But His Kingdom Is Of This Earth...

Timothy Noah's "Obama Messiah Watch" has discovered the life-sized statue of Barack Obama, that you see above. It was created by David Cordero, it is called Blessing. I think the neon blue halo is a nice touch, though probably one that wasn't present in Bethlehem, the first time around.

Sex Sells

Um, I don't really have anything to say about this New York Magazine story. But come on, the headline is "The Increasing Popularity of Sex In Public Places." If that doesn't raise your interest...well, I hope you enjoy reading the site, Sheikh Naim Qassem.

"Controlling" Lebanon

Woke up this morning that Hizbullah's Sheik Naim Qassem accused the majority of trying to "control" Lebanon. I rubbed my eyes, and looked at the quote again. Yup, that's what he said. It drives home the different rules that are used here, as opposed to Europe and America. In the West, it's taken for granted that a political party will try to "control" the country. It's not an insult; it's just what they do. They want power to implement their policies, which they advertise as helping the country at large, rather than just members of their party.

Here, sometimes, not so much. Qassem not only believes that the majority's policies will harm Lebanon's Shi'as, he believes that they are not designed to help Shi'as. To him, it is self-evident that they are designed to help the cliques in power -- Future, Lebanese Forces, and all the rest. And he doesn't really have a problem with this, except for the fact that Hizbullah isn't the party "controlling" Lebanon.

Are the Maronites Bowing Out?

It is obnoxious that these articles are reporting that "nearly half" of Maronites are considering fleeing Lebanon are being published, before the actual poll. In all likelihood, even the articles were written without looking at the hard data in the poll, or its methodology. So we'll have to wait for a few more weeks to see if the poll can back up its eye-catching conclusion.

The Daily Star shoots holes -- sort of -- through the poll's (alleged) conclusion that Lebanon's "Islamization" is the reason for the (alleged) Maronite departure from Lebanon. My superficial, anecdotal impression tends to agree with the Daily Star's take -- Christians aren't fleeing because they're worried that Lebanon is going to turn into Iran, they're fleeing because there ain't any jobs here. Of course, the Daily Star article reaches its conclusion through assorted "man on the street" interviews. And really, when faced with the choice of believing the leaked conclusion of an unpublished poll or anecdotal evidence gathered from a couple of interviews, there really is no right answer.

More disturbingly, nobody seems to want to argue with