Qifa Nabki
Syria
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
Failure to Coordinate Grand Gesture Ends in Embarrassment for Israel, Syria
DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Fresh on the heels of a regional summit in Doha where President Bashar al-Assad had reaffirmed his support for resistance against Israel while expressing reservations about the Arab Peace Initiative, the Syrian president dropped a bombshell by embarking on an epoch-making visit to Tel Aviv, Wednesday morning. “Nobody saw this coming,” … Continue reading
Sy Says Syria’s Serious
Once upon a time there lived a legendary journalist named Sy Hersh, who wrote for The New Yorker, won five George Polk Awards and a Pulitzer Prize. His coverage of Lebanon, particularly in the period 2006-07, uncovered American complicity in Israel’s premeditated war on Hizbullah and American-Saudi-March 14 complicity in the Fatah al-Islam phenomenon. These … Continue reading
A Lebanon Accountability Act?
The following commentary was written by AIG, a reader of this blog. The post originated as a challenge from me to him, in the context of a discussion about the U.S. government’s likely response to a March 8th win in Lebanon’s upcoming elections. I told AIG that if he wanted to write a post arguing … Continue reading
Nasrallah’s Rhetoric Directed East or West?
Update: Joshua Landis responds to this piece; I’ve posted his comments below the article. *** I’ve got an article over at Joshua Landis’s Syria Comment. I reproduce the text below. In a speech Friday evening commemorating the Prophet Muhammad’s birthday, Hizbullah secretary-general Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah rejected the recent American offer of dialogue along with its … Continue reading
Qifa Nabki 
And the people say…