Archive for middle east
March 9, 2007 at · Filed under books, middle east, politics
last time i was in israel i picked up a few books in hebrew. mostly centered around israel's recent history.
the first one i read was "good arabs" by hillel cohen. it is based on documents from the israeli police and shin-bet services that were only recently declassified.
the picture the book paints is not one that will be easy to read for many israelis. while i personally give little credit to government agencies and don't buy the israeli myths around our superior moral standards, it was still surprising to learn how corrupt and immoral the israeli government was at the time.
one of the most disturbing revelations as far as i am concerned was the involvement of the israeli security services in trying to control the arab vote and direct it to the party in power (map"ai).
but more than anything it made me realize how inadequate are the history lessons that i got in school. now it looks to me as if i was subjected to propaganda. what you learn in school in israel is very one sided, trying to present the heroic efforts of the jews versus the heartless and barbaric arabs.
i think it will go a long way in making peace process and peace itself feasible if the history taught in schools was more objective, spending as much time on the way things looked to the arab population and the systematic mistreatment from the government.
the arabs are no saints, far from it. and even today their governments, religious leaders, media and general public are operating based on a moral code that is lagging several generations behind the west (yes, i do think there is such thing as moral and less moral cultures. don't buy the relativism approach).
this book is narrowly focused. i wish the school programs will teach some of its findings, but more importantly provide the true history of the early years of israel, the good and the bad.
December 27, 2006 at · Filed under middle east, politics
i read tony blair's piece in foreign affairs titled "a battle for global values", and was really disappointed. tony blair always seemed to me to be very intelligent and eloquent (maybe it is i usually see him talking in press conferences next to bush.. or just his british accent).
it is supposed to lay out his view for what he believes is the real battle of the 21st century (i.e. a battle for the values we stand for), and that is much more than a "war on terror", but it reads more like an attempt to justify his decision regarding iraq.
in his defense of the iraq situation he sounds very much like bush, blaming the naive-peace-protesting-tree-huggers in the west for buying into the propaganda that is coming from the terrorists, calling for a "broader" perspective, and more common excuses…
he is probably right about the values issue. the west should stand for human-rights, environmental protection, individual freedoms, democracy, equal opportunities and economic development. the problem is that the west is not acting consistently according to these values (not domestically and not in foreign policy), and specifically neither bush nor blair can lead the west in such a charge. they are both tainted by the decision to invade iraq, their execution of the occupation and their stubbornness to stay the course.
blair would have done a much better service to humanity if he would have not been bush's puppy on the "war on terror". for him to now write this piece is a bit pathetic and way too late. he should just go home quietly and spare us his dogma.
December 13, 2006 at · Filed under books, middle east, politics
i got the iraq study group report yesterday and stayed up late to finish reading it.
i find the approach of co-chaired, bi-partisan, old-men groups that are supposed to come up with conclusions and recommendations a bit weird. 5 republicans and 5 democrats, all greatly honored for serving with each other on the committee, quickly establish a group-think and reach consensus.
it is a system than guarantees that not the best solution will be offered, but rather the lowest common denominator.
so i was surprised that the report actually did a reasonably fair job in describing how dire is the situation in iraq, and hopefully put an end to the "we're making progress", "the media is only covering the bad news out of iraq..", mantra from bush and his aides.
with regard to the specific recommendations:
- the general approach - i think what they are trying to suggest with regard to a graceful exit from iraq is a scenario in which the US will be able to say "we did all we could to help the iraqis govern themselves, the iraqi government is unable/not willing to make the progress required from a sovereign body and we no longer feel it is our responsibility to support them". which will allow the US to pull out most of its troops and not call it a defeat.
they are offering real measures to improve things on the ground, but at this stage the situation is so hopeless, that it will not account for much. i don't think they really believe their operational recommendations to better the situation in iraq have a real chance of succeeding.
- the diplomatic offensive - i believe the US can get everyone to cooperate beside iran. the path to syria probably lies with getting israel to return the golan heights (one of the recommendations), which i believe israel will have to do, but this is not going to happen quickly enough to have an impact on the situation in iraq.
the US will not be able to create strong enough incentives or disincentives to move iran. iran is just having too much fun watching the US bleed in iraq, and the international community will not side with the US as long as this administration is in power.
actually i doubt that the current administration can not lead any "diplomatic offensive". it's not just that they are not competent to do it, bush is too stubborn and too you're-either-with-us-or-against-us kind of guy. as he is so proudly admits he lacks this type of nuance.
- the milestones to the iraqi government - great milestones. no chance what so ever they are going to meet (or even try to meet) these milestones.
- the military recommendations - sounds good. i am not sure why it took these wise old men to come up with this list, and why these issues are only being addressed 3.5 years into the war, but i guess it is better later than never.
changing the main military mission to training is a very clear path for the US to reduce the number of troops and gradually pull-out.
considering the fact that the ISG was not supposed to look on the past, but rather focus on where do we go from here there are a few interesting comments in the report
- strong criticism of the administration handling of the funding to the war outside of the main budget
- calling for the administration to be more open and honest with the public
- pointing out inaccurate reporting of violence level
- criticizing the number of arabic speaking officials in the embassy (6 out of 1000)
now i understand why bush looked like a ghost when he received the report last week (i'll be interested to know whether he actually read it, or did someone just summarize it for him in a few bulletpoints in powerpoint).
i think he'll wait a few more weeks till the pentagon finish its own review, and while he speaks with "advisors" and members of congress. he will then have a prime-time TV address where he will say "over the past few weeks i have conducted an intensive review of the situation in iraq. i would like to thank the iraq study group, the pentagon analysts, and all those who dedicated their time and efforts to think about this challenge…. blah, blah, blah. i believe there is a path for victory in iraq… there were some great ideas offered by the different groups that looked into the situation… i am planning to adopt some of these ideas into a new comprehensive plan that will clear the path to a successful conclusion of the mission in iraq… blah blah blah"
bush will embrace some of the operational recommendations in the report, he will set milestones (but will not link them to troop levels), he will send a special envoy to the middle-east, he will call for a "stakeholders" conference of all the countries that have an interest to see iraq come out of its crisis.
the bottom line will be that troop levels will not come down significantly and there will be no end in sight for the current US approach in iraq as long as bush is president.
john mccain will not win the 2008 elections (and maybe not even the republican primaries) because of his position on iraq. a democrat will win 2008, and will pledge to be out of iraq by any meaningful measure by Jan 2010.
too many predictions for one post.. 
September 11, 2006 at · Filed under middle east, politics
i wanted to subscribe to Foreign Affairs for a long time, and i finally did so today.
the first essay i read was by Niall Ferguson titled The Next War of the World. I read his essay with the bias of knowing he is an historian who is favored by neo-cons, for his strong support for american foreign intervention, realpolitik, and US acting as the empire that it is without a troubled conscious.
in his essay niall is trying to explain why the 20th century was the bloodiest, and later on he predicts that most likely the 21st century will be the same. just that this time it would be the middle-east and not the balkans that will incubate the global conflicts. considering the current state of things this is not a very creative line of thinking. it is harder to find someone that holds an optimistic view for the region.
niall attributes the time and location of the violence to ethnic disintegration, economic volatility, and empires in decline. today the "empires in decline" is not very relevant, though the US may be regarded as such. the other two factors are very much in play in the middle east.
his remedy for the middle-easy situation is more intervention by the US, and economic progress. i am not sure about either.
August 11, 2006 at · Filed under middle east, politics
in israel there is a lot of talk about hezbollah winning the conflict.
nassrallah is reading the israeli press (he said so himself in one his interviews on al manar teleivision) and is enjoying every minute of it. but this is beside the point. the real question is the hezbollah really winning?
in the eyes of the hezbollah they already won this conflict based on the following:
- there is still a battle going-on after a month
- there are still rockets landing in israel in similar numbers to the start of the conflict
- israelis as far as hadera are not feeling safe
- northern israel is in shelters and not able to sustain a normal life
- nassrallah is still alive
- israelis believe they are losing
these arguments may be enough for the hezbollah to claim victory, but assuming there will be a cease-fire in the next few days, and the dust settles here is the reality:
- lebanon has suffered a major blow to its civilian infrastructure and economy, it will take years for lebanon to rebuild the country to its pre-July 12 state. israel on the other hand will go back to normal rather quicly, repairing the local damages
- the shiites in lebanon have been the target of probably 90% of the israeli attacks. hunderds of thousands fled their homes, and many of them will go back to find that their villages are completely destroyed, their businesses gone.
- israel was able to take over any village it wanted, and hezbollah stronghold it wanted, and suffered casualties only in occasions when it was concerned for civilian life, and sent troops in rather than completly destroy the target
- hezbollah military strength has been greatly reduced (the extent of which will continue to be debated), israel destroyed much of its ammunition, bunkers and killed a good amount of hezbollah fighters
- hezbollah will likely have to agree to a lebanse army presence in the south together with an international force (something the hezbollah has resisted for the past 6 years). which will make it harder for the hezbollah to launch attacks/provoke/harass israel. it will be harder for hezbollah to rebuild its arsenal as israel and the international community will be watching it closely.
but even so, dancing over lebanon's rubble will be nassrallah, celebrating his great "victory".
the shiites already far behind their sunni and christian fellow citizens will fall even further behind. they'll count hundreds of dead, they will have lost their homes and livelihood.
maybe some of them will start asking questions like "what did we gain by this war?", "did it serve our interests? our childrens interests?". "for what cause did our relatives die?", "who are these iranian friends that send us to do their dirty job?".
maybe they will not ask these questions. maybe they will have pride in their "victory", will be angry with these jews with horns, will look for a flag to torch, and chant "death to israel, death to america" as they stand over the rubble that used to be their life.
indeed an arab victory for the ages. as long as the arabs will continue in their quest to re-gain their pride by fighting israel, they will not move forward, but rather stay behind and complain about the evil west, and how it is to blame for their backwardness.
war is measured by which of the parties was left in a worst shape, will take longer to recover and what are the long-term political impacts. based on all these measures israel will be the clear winner in this conflict. which is why i think the sooner the cease-fire the better. israel should insist on an international force, keep its right to preempt hezbollah's future build-up, and get the US and Europe to put sanctions and pressure on iran and syria.
August 11, 2006 at · Filed under middle east, politics
the "war" (it is definitely a war for lebanon, i still claim it is a military operation for israel) has now been going for a month.
at this stage there is a consensus that israel did not deliver a knock-out punch to the hezbollah (hard to make a counter argument when ~ 200 rockets are hitting northern israel daily), and therefore hezbollah is essentially winning (i have a major problem with that argument, but i'll deal with it in a separate post).
the israeli press is full of opinion columns. more than the usual dose.
those who are on the right (and center) don't want a cease fire, because that would mean that the sacred "israeli deterrence" is lost, and that doom's day is around the corner.
those who are on the left support a cease fire, and spend most of their time explaining how the army consists of incompetent, trigger happy, generals who are guided by an inexperienced, hot-headed government.
in general the israeli press is obsessed with the inability of the army to destroy hezbollah. it seems to me that there is a complete loss of perspective.
August 5, 2006 at · Filed under middle east, politics
Chibli Mallat (a professor of law at Saint-Joseph University in Beirut and former candidate for president of Lebanon) is blogging on the NY Times website.
he published the following post earlier today (requires timeselect, so i copy/pasted):
Three weeks into the war between Israel and Hezbollah, some patterns have emerged. In the first week, Israeli security officials declared that they wanted to bomb Lebanon back 50 years, and indeed destroyed over 40 bridges across the country in the first few days, as well as a large number of factories, over 30 according to the Association of Lebanese Industrialists. Then the targets changed radically.
Clearly prompted by the United States, the Israeli government announced an objective alliance with the Lebanese government on the latter’s exclusive sovereignty over its territory and borders. Israel then acted accordingly in its warfare. On a handful of occasions, which have puzzled the observers, Lebanese army points were targeted, but non-Hezbollah areas were rarely hit. The map of destruction was characteristically Shiite; only few missiles were fired in other areas. In Beirut, destruction was limited to a perimeter of about one and half square kilometer, now known as the security quadrangle, which consists of a small, poorer section in the Shiite suburbs, where Hezbollah’s sway has been historically dominant.
I went on Tuesday to see for myself that area of Beirut where I had been a guest on the Manar TV station a few times before 2004. Some of the neighborhoods have been bombed to Ground-Zero-like lunar places, with ten-story buildings reduced to rubble. It is hard not to feel sad at the sites.
Much destruction can also be found in the south of the country — from Tyre to the Blue Line, and various parts of the western Bekaa, close to the border, and in the historic city of Baalbeck, which lies much further north.
This is a Hezbollah-Israel war, but sociologically it is a Lebanese Shiite-Israeli Jewish war. Probably 90 percent of the people who fled their homes in Lebanon — some 800,000 people by United Nations accounts — are Shiite. This represents nearly a quarter of the Lebanese people. I suspect close to 95 percent of the more than 800 Lebanese killed so far are Shiite. Camp Palestinians also have remained outside the main war zone. So have Syria and Iran.
Consequences of this glaring split on the domestic Lebanese situation are difficult to fathom, and all politicians have rightly endeavored to manifest a patriotic sympathy for the plight of Shiite Lebanese. Politically, such contradictions will in time be more difficult to paper over.
For my part, I do not find it healthy to carry on with a dual language, which is deafening in most Lebanese political circles — wishing wholeheartedly for Hezbollah’s military defeat, while professing in grand speeches a desire for unity. I feel strongly about the suffering of my Lebanese compatriots, as I do about Israelis’ suffering by-and-large. And I take pride in non-Shiites opening their homes and offering hospitality to the refugees. I prefer, however, to voice my open disagreement with Hezbollah over the start of the war and the way it is being prosecuted. I think that candidness in times of violence and death on such a scale is needed, and that the narrowing of the gap between private and public talk in politics will yield a far healthier result in due course, and will help accelerate a workable cease-fire.
On Friday morning, Lebanon awoke to the destruction of one power plant four bridges north of Beirut, all outside the Shiite areas, cutting the capital off from the north. Concern will grow high: is a new pattern emerging?
this is in my opinion a rare candid description of the conflict. it is natural for non-shiite lebanese to fill frustrated, angry at israel, humiliated. but once they let their emotions settle and look at the situation rationally i hope many of them will reach the same conclusions as mallat.
mainly that the conflict is not between israel and lebanon, bur rather between israel and the hezbollah. i also hope israel will remember who the enemy is and will keep its targeted attacks.
August 4, 2006 at · Filed under middle east, politics
i am reading opinion columns from the NY Times, Haaretz, Salon, Slate, Washington Post and much more blogs than i would like to admit. my head is starting to hurt.
i think we are in a classic "fog of war" situation. the lack of knowledge of the public, the contradictory press releases of both sides, the "experts" and monday morning quarterbacks (me included) voicing opposing views, all lead to a situation where i don't think it is clear to anyone what is really going on.
is israel wining? is hezbollah winning? does the israeli campaign makes any strategic sense? were the hezbollah surprised by the israeli response? were the israelis surprised by the hezbollah's response to the response? how much did israel damage hezbollah's infrastructure? is israel/hezbollah achieving its goals? what are these goals?
i guess it is just too early to answer most of these questions, and to distinguish between news and propaganda.
hopefully the mess will be over soon, so historians can start their work and generate their contradictory accounts and analysis..
August 4, 2006 at · Filed under middle east, politics
maskit sent me this link to the NY Times website showing the "destruction in southern beirut" (i believe it is similar to a previous link sent by itai).
it shows the "before" and "after" of a hezbollah neighborhood in beirut. i think this is a good example of the extreme measures israel is taking to pinpoint its bombing on hezbollah targets. israel also provided warnings (by dropping leaflets, radio messages, SMS messages, voicemails) to the people living in this neighborhood to leave. it is an area of 1sq Km. it is also clear to see that israel took extra care not bomb a school and a church.
August 3, 2006 at · Filed under middle east, politics, religion
after a long and thoughtful analysis iran's president, ahmadinejad, came up with a solution to the middle-east crisis.
the solution: destroy israel.
it has a very sound logic behind it. if israel is destroyed it will immediately resolve the the israeli-palestinian conflict, as well as the current conflict with the hezbollah. this is the type of ideas that when you hear it you say "how come i didn't think of it earlier", so simple, so elegant, so obvious.
ahmadinejad acknowledged that his solution can no be applied immediately, so in the meantime he suggested a cease-fire, so iran and its friends (syria, hezbollah, hamas) can have some more time to put together the means to destroy israel.
it is rare these days to see a politician who is both a visionary and a realist.
let me suggest another solution. topple the iranian regime. hezbollah and hamas will lose a major funding source, iraq will have an easier path towards stabilization, syria will remain isolated and weak. and the arab world may come to the realization that the path to regain their lost pride is found through investment in education and industry rather than in nuclear weapons and terrorism.
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