Qifa Nabki
Hezbollah
Lebanese Government Falls, Consultations to Select New PM Begin Monday
I’ll have a fuller discussion of the political situation at Foreign Policy‘s Mideast channel later today. In the meantime, here are some brief updates and links to good pieces of commentary and analysis. President Michel Suleiman has said that he will begin consultations to select a new Prime Minister on Monday. Hizbullah MP Mohammed Raad … Continue reading
No Deal on Lebanon Tribunal: Opposition Set to Bring Down Hariri Government
NOTE: This piece is being updated as the story develops. Updates will be added to the bottom of the post. See below. The Lebanese opposition led by Hizbullah is expected to resign from PM Saad al-Hariri’s cabinet later today. Coupled with the resignation of one additional “neutral” minister, the Hariri government would be brought down … Continue reading
Justice in the Bazaar
The Syrian-Saudi negotiations over the fate of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) are a persistent topic in the Arab press these days. According to an interview with Saad al-Hariri which will appear tomorrow in al-Hayat, an agreement about how to mitigate the STL’s repercussions has already been reached, and is just waiting implementation on … Continue reading
Wikileaks Shocker: Lebanese Defense Minister Reveals Plan to Stay out of Israel’s Way in Next War
If you haven’t yet seen them, be sure to check out the latest Wikileaks cables released to al-Akhbar, at least one of which is tremendously damning and could have major implications for the Lebanese political scene. (See here for the Lebanon-specific ones). In the cable mentioned, the Lebanese Minister of Defense Elias al-Murr discusses with … Continue reading
Hariri Tribunal Reports Tell a Different Story than CBC Account
I spent an hour or so this morning going through previous reports by the United Nations International Independent Investigation Commission (UNIIIC), in order to see how the historical record tallies with Neil Macdonald’s report about the Hariri investigation for CBC. As you’ll recall, Macdonald makes the following basic points in his piece: The UNIIIC did … Continue reading
Qifa Nabki 
And the people say…