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This just about says it all about prospects for Lebanon:

BEIRUT — A potential kingmaker in Lebanese politics threw his support Friday behind Hizbullah, a major boost to the Shi’ite militant group that brought down the country’s Western-backed government last week.

Walid Jumblatt, the influential leader of the Druse sect, refused to say exactly how many lawmakers are with him, but his support is key for any candidate trying to form a government…

“The party will stand firm in support of Syria and the resistance,” Jumblatt told reporters, referring to Hizbullah by the popular term.

On Thursday, Jumblatt said he was under great pressure not to name Hariri as the government’s next premier despite earlier statements throwing his support behind him, Lebanese paper an-Nahar reported.

He told members of his party that insisting on Hariri as the country’s new prime minister would lead to “catastrophic consequences” for the security of the Druse party, himself, and the Druse population in Hizbullah-controlled areas. He added that things “have become greater than him and his ability to maintain the middle ground in a harsh battle in which Hariri’s regional and international backers only resort to statements, while his opponents (Hizbullah) turn to all manners of military and popular pressure,” according to the report. — Jerusalem Post [my emphasis]

This reminds me of the possibly apocryphal story that when Churchill asked Stalin to consider the position of the Vatican about Polish autonomy, Stalin replied by asking “How many divisions does the Pope of Rome have?”

The West isn’t short on ‘divisions’ or other means of persuasion, but as Jumblatt suggests, is not prepared to take any real action to oppose Hizballah.

Earlier this week, Hizballah operatives fanned out to strategic locations throughout Beirut, unarmed, but uniformed and carrying radios. The idea seems to have been to demonstrate that a coup was not beyond their capabilities.

In the recent past Hizballah has been content to exercise control over the government without actually taking over. They’ve avoided overt actions that might trigger another bloody civil war, and have maintained the fiction that Lebanon is independent and democratic.

Now they have apparently decided that it is absolutely necessary to prevent the independent tribunal investigating the 2005 murder of former PM Rafik Hariri from announcing indictments of Hizballah members.

One wonders why this is sufficiently important to justify threats of a takeover, which could easily become violent. After all, indictments would not diminish Hizballah’s reputation among its supporters, nor could it get worse among its enemies.

One possibility is that they think such an announcement by the tribunal would spark a confrontation, and they don’t want one. I doubt this, since Hizballah is regarded by all parties as the most powerful military force in Lebanon — as Jumblatt’s surrender illustrates. Christian elements do not have the capability to oppose Hizballah alone. If the tribunal announces its indictments, very little is likely to occur.

Another possibility is that it is a pretext — that they have now decided that they want to take full control of the country. The focus on the tribunal is just indirection.  But I doubt this, too, because an ‘official’ takeover would certainly make waves in the West and Israel — imagine if they declared Lebanon an Islamic republic! — and they don’t need this to achieve their main objective, which is to project Iran’s military power and threaten Israel.

Or — and I think this is most likely — perhaps they simply want to force the West to back down on the tribunal, and believe they can do it just by making threats. At the same time, when the government is reconstituted, Hizballah will end up with even more power and opponents will be weakened. They get what they want without firing a shot.

This is another so-far successful gambit in the chess game being played by Iran in which, little by little, Western influence in the Middle East is being squeezed out.

Or to use another metaphor, they are turning up the heat on the pot in which the West’s frog is being cooked, and the frog hasn’t noticed yet.

Technorati Tags: Lebanon, Hizballah, Jumblatt

News item:

GENEVA — Representatives of Israel’s Olympic committee are ready to help Palestinian athletes train for the London 2012 Games, the International Olympic Committee said on Thursday.

The offer came during a “constructive and cooperative” first meeting of Israeli and Palestinian Olympic officials in the Swiss city of Lausanne hosted by IOC President Jacques Rogge, the Olympic body said in a statement.

The meeting at IOC headquarters was a first attempt to broker an agreement over obstacles Palestinian athletes and players say they face, hampering training and travel to compete in sports events…

“In the short run, priority will be given to assisting Palestinian athletes to move towards their dream of taking part in the Olympic Games in London next year,” [the IOC] added. — AFP

I shouldn’t dwell too much on the irony that the same folks that used the Olympics to raise the profile of their ’cause’ in 1972 by mass murder are now using them again, this time to blame Israel for ‘obstacles’ their athletes face.

There’s really no need for me to point out that the ‘obstacles’ are security measures which exist because Munich in 1972 was neither the first nor the last time Palestinian Arabs turned to terrorism. Or that their objective is not self-determination or a state but the denial of those things to the Jews.

Abu Daoud (Mohammad Daoud Oudeh), the leader of the 1972 Palestinian 'Olympic team', died of natural causes in Syria in July 2010.

So why bring this up?

Because I think that if the Palestinian Arabs want to have a real Olympic team made up of athletes instead of murderers, if they want to give up barbarism and join the civilized world, they really ought to apologize. They ought to say that what happened at Munich in 1972 does not reflect their ideals and values any more, and that they sincerely regret the bloody murders that were done in their name.

You know what’s coming, right?

Last year Abu Daoud, the leader of the 1972 Palestinian ‘Olympic team’ that murdered 11 Israeli athletes and a German policeman, died of natural causes in Syria. This is how Palestinian Arab leadership reacted:

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas sent his condolences to Daoud’s family, WAFA reported.  “He wrote in his letter to his family, ‘He is missed. He was one of the leading figures of Fatah and spent his life in resistance [against the occupation] and sincere work as well as physical sacrifice for his people’s just causes,’ ” the news agency quoted Abbas as saying. — CNN

You can read more tributes to Abu Daoud here. Even before his death, he was honored, winning the Palestine Prize for Culture in 1999 for his book “Palestine: From Jerusalem to Munich”. In the book, he describes how he planned the Munich operation. After it was published, the German police issued an arrest warrant.

Now explain to me again how we can have peace with these people.

Technorati Tags: Olympics, Palestinian Arabs, Munich Massacre, Abu Daoud

Atropine

The IDF has completed its investigation of the death of Jawaher Abu Rahma, the woman that was alleged to have been killed by IDF tear gas used against demonstrators at Bili’in on December 31, 2010. The Jerusalem Post report almost makes sense:

Jawaher Abu Rahma, the woman who Palestinians claimed was killed in late December from IDF-fired tear gas during an anti-security barrier demonstration near Bilin, died as a result of the medical treatment she received at a Ramallah hospital, the IDF probe into the incident has concluded.

Abu Rahma, IDF sources said on Saturday, did not actively participate in the demonstration but was inside a house about 500 meters away from the site of the demonstration. She was however evacuated to a hospital in Ramallah sometime later in the day and after the demonstration where she was treated for an unclear ailment.

“According to our findings Abu Rahma died as a result of the medical treatment,” an source in the Central Command said on Wednesday.

Medical documents obtained by the IDF show that Abu Rahma received unusually high doses of Atropine, a medicine that is commonly used as an antidote to nerve agents such as nerve gas. Israeli gas mask kits used to be distributed to the public with shots of atropine inside.

According to the IDF’s findings Abu Rahma died of medical complications due to the medical treatment she received that was not connected to tear gas. The IDF has also uncovered documentation which hints to the possibility that Abu Rahma was sick with cancer and had been hospitalized several weeks before her death. — Jerusalem Post

This is strange indeed. Atropine? Nerve gas? Why would they treat her for exposure to nerve gas? Israel does not even use nerve gas against enemy troops, not to mention demonstrators. And Atropine isn’t a treatment for cancer.

The Ha’aretz report is both more confused and more damaging to Israel, leaving a lingering doubt that the tear gas was nevertheless somehow involved:

Military investigation finds that Jawaher Abu Rahma was misdiagnosed and given the wrong treatment at the hospital after inhaling tear gas at a demonstration in Bil’in last month. …

The IDF findings, which were presented to GOC Central Command Avi Mizrachi, were based on hospital documents, some which showed that doctors believed Abu Rahma was sickened by phosphorous fertilizer and nerve gas. She was therefore treated with atropine and fluids, without Palestinian doctors realizing that she had in fact inhaled tear gas. — Ha’aretz

Keep in mind that she was more than a quarter mile away from the site of the demonstration, and it’s highly unlikely that there would be a high enough concentration of tear gas at that distance to require hospitalization in the first place. And I doubt that the doctors thought Israel had used nerve gas against the demonstrators!

No, I think there is a better explanation.

Atropine is an antidote for aldicarb pesticides, such as temik. Aldicarb is highly toxic. When I lived in Israel in the 1980’s it was commonly used, although there were very strict rules about how it is applied, protective gear, etc. It would not surprise me in the least if Arab farmers also use it, and perhaps are somewhat less careful.

Atropine also might be given as an antidote to organophosphate pesticides like parathion, also highly toxic. This would explain ridiculous initial statements that Israeli soldiers or police had used ‘phosphorous’ on the demonstrators, and the mentions of nerve gas. Most military nerve agents are based on organophosphates.

Accidental pesticide poisoning (and the use of pesticides for suicide) is a big problem in the developing world, according to the World Health Organization.

The Palestinian doctors probably were quite familiar with pesticide poisoning. My guess is that Abu Rahma was somehow exposed to a pesticide like temik or malathion. Unlike tear gas, they are deadly, so relatives rushed her to the hospital — where someone accidentally gave her more than a safe dose of atropine.

Now, those of you who went to the demonstration in front of the Defense Ministry on January 1, to protest “Israeli war crimes,” including Palestinian Authority PM Salam Fayyad — don’t you feel stupid?

Technorati Tags: Jawaher Abu Rahma, IDF, tear gas, atropine, pesticide poisoning

MK Orit Zuaretz, who called the Labor party "naked spineless, invertebrate mollusks".

One thing about Israeli politics is that its practitioners don’t hold back. They let you know what they think. For example, a member of the Knesset for the Kadima party, Orit Zuaretz, is reported to have said

The prime minister is stirring in the dark and the Labor movement is revealed as naked spineless, invertebrate mollusks… — Jerusalem Post

Whew. Can you imagine what she says to her kids when they are slow in doing their homework?

This has to do with Ehud Barak, former leader of the Labor party, who is Defense Minister in the present coalition government. On Monday he left the Labor Party and started his own party, to be called ‘atzmaut‘ (independence). Of course he gets to remain in the Knesset, the government and his ministerial position even though nobody voted for Ehud Barak — they voted for ‘Labor’ and he was at the top of its list. As you can imagine, the Naked Spineless Invertebrate Mollusk — er, Labor — Party is irritated.

Barak took four other Labor MKs with him, and the remaining 8 will leave the government. But Netanyahu’s coalition will still have a majority of 66 seats (out of 120) and will continue in power.

Apparently the move was precipitated by demands from some Labor members that the party should vote to leave the government because Netanyahu wasn’t moving fast enough (that is, wasn’t making the concessions demanded by the Obama administration) in negotiations with the Palestinian Authority. Barak wanted to keep his position, the second most important post in the government.

This further marginalizes the increasingly marginal Labor Party. But given that they apparently still believe that the path to peace runs through concessions — they learned nothing from the Intifada and the Gaza withdrawal — they deserve to be marginalized. Now it’s possible that the party will splinter further, with some Labor MKs joining Kadima on its right or Meretz on its Left.

Barak, not a very attractive character in some respects, at least has the military experience needed for his job, unlike the last Labor Defense Minister, the unbelievable Amir Peretz — who gave birth to a whole genre of jokes about x-ray vision when he pretended to see out of a pair of binoculars without removing the lens caps.

Zuaretz and other Kadima members would have liked to see Labor bring down the government, or at least reduce its margin to a paper-thin one seat by quitting en masse. Then Kadima would be the logical replacement for Labor in the coalition. Kadima’s leader, Tzipi Livni, could even share the PM job with Netanyahu. Barak’s clever if cynical maneuver, probably in cooperation with his old Army buddy Netanyahu — hence the ‘stirring in the dark’ comment –  prevented this.

And you thought American politics was complicated!

Incidentally, the ‘other’ Barack — Obama — is thought to want to bring about a change in the coalition with Kadima taking the leading role, because he thinks it will be more pliant about making concessions to the Arabs than the present Likud-led government. But that isn’t in the cards today.

Technorati Tags: Israel, Ehud Barak, Orit Zuaretz, Israeli Labor Party, Kadima, Netanyahu

News item:

DOHA, Qatar — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton delivered a scalding critique of Arab leaders here on Thursday, saying their countries risked “sinking into the sand” of unrest and extremism unless they liberalized their political systems and cleaned up their economies.

Speaking at a conference in this gleaming Persian Gulf emirate, Mrs. Clinton recited a familiar litany of ills: corruption, repression and a lack of rights for women and religious minorities. But her remarks were striking for their vehemence, and they suggested a frustration that the Obama administration’s message to the Arab world had not gotten through.

“In too many places, in too many ways, the region’s foundations are sinking into the sand,” she said to a stone-faced audience of foreign ministers, businesspeople and rights groups. “The new and dynamic Middle East that I have seen needs firmer ground if it is to take root and grow everywhere.” — NY Times

Clinton can get as “vehement” as she likes, but if she and her partners in the Obama administration honestly believe the problems facing the Middle East stem from economic corruption and lack of political freedom, I despair.

Where are the ‘I’ words — ‘Islam’ and ‘Ideology’ — which correctly name the reasons for the degree of conflict swirling around the region, both internally and between it and the West?

Maybe she is afraid to speak these words and risk alienating her already “stone-faced” audience, so instead she says things like this:

Those who cling to the status quo may be able to hold back the full impact of their countries’ problems for a little while, but not forever … If leaders don’t offer a positive vision and give young people meaningful ways to contribute, others will fill the vacuum.

Extremist elements, terrorist groups and others who would prey on desperation and poverty are already out there, appealing for allegiance and competing for influence. — (the Times article continues)

Yes, they are out there, but it isn’t because leaders don’t offer a “positive vision.” It’s because Islamist groups offer a powerful and attractive ideology which promises to sweep away everything that’s wrong with their society in their view, everything that has been corrupted by its contact with the poisonous West.

Mrs. Clinton’s Western concepts, like “equality for women and religious minorities” are the last things that could win over young people influenced by Islamist ideology, who see them as blurring essential distinctions that are part of the proper structure of the world, and part of the reason for the evil and spiritual corruption that characterize the West.

Imagine trying to tempt, for example, a dedicated revolutionary to betray his ideals by offering him a high-paying job and a house in suburbia. It’s hard enough. Now imagine that he has a religious motivation, and imagine that it is strong enough under some circumstances that he is willing to blow himself up to advance it.

The article mentions the crisis in Lebanon, a country where — at least in some places — women are ‘liberated’ and the economy, in between periodic wars brought about by ideology, booms. This week, its government was brought down by Hizballah, a movement representing the revolutionary Shia Islamist ideology of Iran.

Until our leaders begin to understand the actual forces acting in the Middle East, they will continue to look stupid and to be irrelevant.

Technorati Tags: Middle East, Hillary Clinton, ideology, Islamism