Condi Rice, in three separate recent interviews, describes the situation in Lebanon as very fragile. She warns of possible murder attempts on the Politicians of the March 14 movement in Lebanon, Sanyura, Hariri, Jumblatt and co...and at the same time she predicts that this movement will become stronger. She also recycles the view that Israel was in war against Hezbollah and not against Lebanon.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has said the situation in Lebanon was still "very fragile" following the Israeli offensive on Lebanon, and warned of possible assassination attempts of figures associated with the March 14 group and the moderate consensus.Rice also said that "what really is going on in the Middle East, the kind of sharpening between extremist forces and moderate forces," adding that "what will be interesting and important is how that plays out over the next, now, probably several years."
I think these are very disturbing declarations from a secretary of state. Are secretary of states supposed to give predictions when they speak with the press as if they were sports or weather commentators or are they supposed to give sharp analyses of the political situation and explain their diplomacy efforts ?
By the way, look who are the 'moderates' in the Arab world according to Rice ! Actually she agrees with one of the zionist commentators on this blog on the definition of a 'moderate'.
And as it appears, she has not learned a thing from the recent war in lebanon, let alone not learning from Iraq. According to my own definition of a radical and an extremist, which states that a radical will pursue its agenda whatever the consequences and the circumstances and the suffering, Rice corresponds very well to this definition. So much for Diplomacy !
''My people decide the truth in sixty countries every morning. And in every one it's different.''
Since March 29th 2006
8 comments:
For the Americans,"moderate" is a code word for one of our S.O.B.s.
Bush and Condi will try to quiet things down in the ME before the Nov. elections because Bush and the Republicans are down a lot in the polls as a result of their disastrous ME policies. They are even being criticized by their generals in public.
I expect that after the Nov. elections, all hell will break loose as this administration will try to saddle the next administration with a situation ,from which , they cannot easily retreat. A Neo-Con legacy.
Ms. Rice has been the worst Sec. of State in the postwar era, if we are to judge her from the rise of Anti-Americanism in the world, particularly the ME. See http://pewglobal.org/reports/display.php?ReportID=252
She makes me yearn for the days of Kissinger and his protégés.
Issam
Issam,
Thank you. You are adding so much to this blog that you can have your own. Please feel free if you want to post an article on this blog. I will be happy to host it !
Bad omen, that is what Rice and her employer are. Why doesn't she get a boyfriend. Bush should hook her up with sensitive Sanyoura or if she doesn't like then I advice that she accept macho Wi-Am Wahab, but she really need to get laid...
Moussa,
All over the web there is talk that there is a romance between Rice and Canadian foreign minister Peter MacKay. She visited on september 11th to thanl the epople of his riding for having hosted most American passengers and flights on that day. On the pictires yaken by the press Mac Kay who is 10 yeras younger and handsome by other people's sta ndards was loooking at her like a school boy.
Well I am not happy about the fact that in Canada we will be inheriting Rice ! God forbid !
Hi Sophia first of all "badger" has made a very interesting find. Secondly Declan has asked me to say he hasn't forgotten your questions and is doing some asking around.
Hello Mark,
Please tell Declan this can wait and when he feels that he can send me his answers he can mail them to me. My mail is at the top of my Link list.
As for Badger, I read his article. It is always interesting to read the Arab press but most of it is Koweiti and Saudi owned, which means that they are the official organs of these monarchies. I can trust Al-Safir, the new Al-Akhbar but not other Arab newspapers and this tells you about the state of the information in the Arab world. However we have Al-Jazeera and nobody gives a damn about what Al-Siyassa says. People now know their biases. They write for themselves.
Al Siyassa ia probably the worst because they don't even try to appear as neutral and they are specialised in rumours ad wishful thinking. This rumour may be significant of one thing in my opinion, the state of political despair the March 14 movement is finding itself in. They are not credible anymore in the eyes of the public. They are trying to get out from this and the best way they think they can do it is to appeal to the foreign power who fed their movement and initiated it. Don't forget that these Politician were all clients of Syria before becoming clients of the US.
The March 14 movement is on the path of the orange revolution, they amused us and they filled our screens for a while with colors and then they vanished. Neo-con designed policies for the entire world with a short expiry date.
Of course they will ty to do things to get out from this situation but they are in a deadlock. Unless they resort to a military coup, and I think the July war was a kind of military coup, they cannot get out from this situation. But what are they going to harvest with a coup de force ? More support for Hezbollah and a step further along the dangerous path set for us in the ME by Bush and co.
I don't like to be cynical but the only option left to them right now to raise popular support is to realize the predictions of Ms Rice, more assassinations, but even this will not have the effect expected because Lebanese are now very suspicious of these assassinations.
My brother, who is Aounist, came by yesterday and we chatted about the situation. He is quite optimistic that the march 14 movement have their hands tied in Lebanon and their only way out is more violence but this wil not happen. They don't have the high ground.
Thanks for the comment and for pointing Badger's post. I think these rumours are interesting in that they tell you about the magic thinking and the maneuvres in which the March 14 movement had fell and the state of dependance of a part of the Arab world, those whom Rice calls 'moderates', on the US.
LOL no argument from me about Al-Siyassa Sophia - No argument on your analysis either.
You know I've always thought that a similarity between the Lebanese and the Irish is that both peoples will put up with and forgive a lot - but God help you if you act in bad faith towards them.
I rather think the 14ists are about to find that out.
Wouldn't it great if meddling outsiders finally got taught that using Lebanon as their proxy battleground was way to expensive to be worth it.
A friend can hope can't he?
Mark,
You are right on the point when you write:
''You know I've always thought that a similarity between the Lebanese and the Irish is that both peoples will put up with and forgive a lot - but God help you if you act in bad faith towards them.''
You know, once I saw a movie 'Titanic Town' and it was about the Irish civil war, its beginning. You might find this movie, which is delightful because it has a lot of funny situations also despite being tragic. This was the day I understood that Lebanese and irish are all the same and that the movie could have been about Beyrouth during the civil war because the characters reminded me of my family in Lebanon.
Lets hope together that these people will learn the lesson of the last war. And a friend of Lebanon, you and Declan certainly are.
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