Qifa Nabki
Hezbollah
More Cheeky Aounist Posters
I promise to lay off March 14th at some point this week and go back to bashing Napole-aoun, but credit should be given where credit is due. The silly flag billboards all around Lebanon have been replaced by Future Movement electoral campaign billboards (coincidence?), and as Bech explains over at Remarkz, the results are often … Continue reading
Deals, deals, deals…
Deal 1: The General’s Return I’ve been reading Karim Pakradouni’s recently published history of the Lahoud presidency (Sadma wa Sumud: ‘Ahd Imil Lahhud, 1998-2007), and I recommend it to anyone interested in a behind-the-scenes peek at Lebanese politics from the perspective of a consummate insider. I’ll mention one anecdote by way of an endorsement. Toward … Continue reading
Hizbullah Announces Candidate Lists
Update: (Spoke too soon, see below for revised conclusions.) Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah appeared on al-Manar this evening to announce Hizbullah’s candidates for the 2009 parliamentary elections. Here is the list and some quick reactions: Nabatiyeh: MP Muhammad Raad; Sour: MP Muhammad Fneish, Nawwaf al-Moussawi; Bint Jbeil: MP Hassan Fadlallah; Marjayoun: Ali Fayyad; Baalbek-Hermel: Husayn Moussawi, … Continue reading
Hizbullah Rebuilds South Beirut
I remember hearing Thomas Friedman on NPR after the cease-fire that ended the July War in 2006. He was speaking to Terry Gross if I’m not mistaken, and he said something along the lines of: “Nasrallah is yet another Arab leader who repeats the same formulas as many before him. He’s just another leader who … Continue reading
Love Song for Paul Krugman
Nobel Prize, Shnobel Prize. Getting a YouTube hit song named after you means that you have arrived… Okay, back to sobriety (or maybe not): Here’s a piece on Hizbullah’s “narco-Islamism” from the Middle East Strategy at Harvard blog. (What is narco-Islamism, by the way?) I believe that Jeffrey Goldberg had a two-piece article for The … Continue reading
Qifa Nabki 
And the people say…