Tuesday, April 26, 2005

The Youth of the Lebanese right-wing Opposition: Spare me. The right-wing and sectarian LBC-TV assembled a group of Lebanese young people (all males except for one "independent" female). All but one were Christians, and one could be either--I could not tell. One guy with a Che Guevara t-shirt kept appearing in the background of the program behind the guests, and LBC people kept pushing him away. Che is big among young Lebanese, and especially among the rich brats of LAU and AUB, who do not even know who he was, and what he represented. They just like him because he is good-looking and chic. They do not know how Che fled his middle class life to learn about the poor of South America. Che in Lebanon? This is like saying "the Marxist Bush." And those interviewed were supposed to represent the future Lebanon. What future? The young representative of the Ahrar Party was from the Sham`un family (direct descendant of the family of the founder), and the representative of the Phalanges' Base was a Gemayyel (a direct descendant of the family of the founder). Those sectarian dynasties represent hope for Lebanon? How could they? Walid Jumblat was on; he was back to the old Arab nationalist Jumblat, but I will let you know what he will stand for next week. He was very awkward in explaining his positions over the last few months; he attributed his one-time praise for the US war in Iraq to "the turmoil" and "anxiety" that followed Hariri's assassination. New TV has aired copies of withdrawn checks by the departing head of Syrian mukhabarat in Lebanon, the notorious Rustum Ghazalah, along with his brothers, relatives, etc. The amount is in the millions of dollars. Owner of New TV, Tahsin Khayyat, had these incriminating documents about Ghazalah for years, and Ghazalah knew about it, so he last year ordered the Lebanese military intelligence to arrest Khayyat on trumped up charges of espionage for Israel. Ghazalah then searched Khayyat's house for those documents. I read that Cheney, according to Saudi Foreign Minister, approved of the appointment of Sa`d Al-Hariri as successor to his father. Am I supposed to be impressed now? Does that make me feel more positively inclined toward the Hariri, Inc?