Qifa Nabki
Saad Hariri
FPM: Let’s Avert Disaster in Lebanon Through False Witnesses
The Lebanese political talk show Bi Mawdu`iyya recently hosted an interesting debate between two young political operatives, `Uqab Saqr (a March 14 MP) and Ziad Abs (an official with the Free Patriotic Movement, whom I interviewed in May of 2009). The two-hour discussion covered several topics, but the most interesting bits dealt with the much-anticipated … Continue reading
Who’s Afraid of a False Witness?
The “false witness” issue has gone from being a conspiratorial throw-away line in one of Nasrallah’s early summer speeches, to a full-blown scandal involving several arrest warrants from the Syrian judiciary, and threats by Lebanese opposition parties to boycott cabinet sessions until the issue is resolved. Who is to blame for this fiasco? While it … Continue reading
Israel and the Hariri Assassination: An Equal-Opportunity Scapegoat?
Tha’ir Ghandour has an interesting exclusive interview in today’s Al-Akhbar newspaper with an unnamed “security source close to Saad al-Hariri”. (There’s an English summary of the story here.) The gist of the source’s testimony is the following: In 2006, the Lebanese intelligence services uncovered evidence of the involvement of certain Hizbullah members in the Hariri … Continue reading
In Search of an Endgame
Is Prime Minister Hariri’s government about to be toppled? This is the main question on people’s minds in Lebanese policy circles, to gauge from various conversations I had in Washington DC this week. Certainly, all signs in Beirut point to the brewings of a major clash over the government’s support for the U.N. Special Tribunal … Continue reading
Words and Things
Surveying the Lebanese political landscape today, one can’t help but be struck by the disparity in rhetorical competence between the two major political groupings. If there were a fantasy sports game based on Lebanese politics in which a player’s stock was tied to their charisma and oratorical abilities, how many March 14 figures would you … Continue reading
Qifa Nabki 
And the people say…