Atlas Shrugs

Who is going to pay Israel?

Who pays Israel for the tens of thousands of rockets that have been fired into Israel. Who Pays Israel for all the blood and treasure required to defend herself from Islamic jihad. Who pays Israel for the tens of thousamds murdered in the insayiable quest of Islamic worldwide domination?

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moonbat will demand that Israel pay Lebanon $1 billion in compensation over damages caused during the Jewish state's 2006 war against Hizbullah, Lebanese media reported Saturday.

Report: UN to demand Israel pay Lebanon $1 billion

War declared on Israel. Israel foots bill.

 

Jumblatt Submits to Hezb'Allah: Lebanon Turns to the Enemy

Jumblatt has jumped into bed with Islamic jihad. Another death blow to democracy in the Middle East. Devastating. Who was more pro- democracy, pro-West than Jumblatt? This is what happens when American abandons her friends. Georgia, are you listening? Condi is an .... idiot. Was not it just a couple of years ago when we had turned the corner on the evil and despotic Syrian choke hold in Lebanon. Bolton remarked here in March 2006, "finally extracting Lebanon from the grip of Syria." This phenomenon we've witnessed for decades to the point where basically we've all gotten used to it." "Not to date myself or anything but my first recollection of Lebanon was Eisenhower sending troops in in 1958."

Gone with the wind. Pfffffffffffffffffffffft.

And the Mehlis investigation -- the results of which led Syria to abandon its decades long  occupation of Lebanon and struck fear in the of Assad was for nothing.

Rafik Hariri, Pierre Gemayel, Antoine Ghanem , Bachir Gemayel, all murdered, all assassinated - died for nothing.

Bush decried in 2007 Bush said, "the United States opposes any attempts to intimidate the Lebanese people as they seek to exercise their democratic right to select a president without foreign interference. We will continue to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Lebanese people as they resist attempts by the Syrian and Iranian regimes and their allies to destabilize Lebanon and undermine its sovereignty." His word is meaningless.

Olmert could have eradicated the Hezbos in the summer of 2006. What an abject failure, And in the last days of his corrupt and devastating reign of appesement, Prime minister  he is rushing to establish a terror state whose objective is to annihilate Israel. Hezbos north of Israel,  Hamas west in Gazastan, and Judea and Sumeria?

What war was won by appeasement?

Jumblatt deserts Lebanon’s pro-Western camp, signs pact with pro-Iranian Hizballah

The fervently pro-US, pro-Israeli Druze leader, Walid Jumblatt, has decided to hold out no longer. He has thrown in his lot with the most extreme pro-Syrian, pro-Iranian, anti-Israel force in Lebanon, the Shiite Hizballah, which has gained veto power over the government in Beirut unopposed.

DEBKAfile’s Middle East sources disclose that over last weekend, Jumblatt quietly signed a “defense cooperation pact” with Hassan Nasrallah, affording Hizballah a strong foothold in the Lebanese Druze bastion of Mt. Chouf.

Drawing the hostile noose around northern Israel ever tighter, Lebanese president Michel Sleiman was due in Damascus Wednesday, Aug. 13, to celebrate the thaw in relations between the two countries.

Neither Israeli ministers, sunk in an acrimonious contest over the succession to Ehud Olmert, nor the United States in the dying days of the Bush presidency, have lifted a finger to arrest Lebanon’s swift slide into the Iranian-Syrian orbit.

Jumblatt, after watching pro-Western strategic positions crumble in his country, decided to join forces with Hizballah to shield his ancestral mountain domain from Syrian domination.

Read it all.

UPDATE: Conflicting reports on "new alliances:

Aoun invites Hariri, Jumblatt to join his alliance with Hizbullah Daily Star (Lebanon)

Aoun defended his alliance with Hizbullah and called on March 14 leaders MPs Saad Hariri and Walid Jumblatt to subscribe to the memorandum of understanding which was signed by the retired general and Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah in February 2006.

Lebanese Party Leaders Discuss Ties with Syria  Asharq Alawsat

US LEFT BLAMES U.S. FOR LEBANON JIHAD

AMY GOODMAN! WHY NOT HAVE THIS WOMAN ON YOUR SHOW, TOOL!?! How sick is the leftist/islamic alliance?

 

Video hat tip shy guy via Carl

Leftist Amy Goodman, notorious jihad tool, gives jihadist  University professor the platform to spew Islamic  murderous madness here at Democracy Now. (how ironic is that name, Demcoracy Now? they propagandize for the just opposite, total fascism). These people disgust me. Goodman should be sent packing to live in a Druze village in Lebanon. Dhimmi tool. Here she gives As'ad AbuKhalil, professor of political science at the California State University, Stansilaus and the creator of the Angry Arab News Service blog at angryarab.blogspot.com the soapbox. This, fellow Americans, is who is teaching children. YOUR TAXPAYER DOLLARS AT WORK!

AMY GOODMAN: In Lebanon, armed clashes since last Wednesday between Hezbollah-led opposition groups and US-backed pro-government forces have left at least eighty-one people dead, many more wounded. Opposition forces overpowered pro-government militias and took over large parts of the capital city of Beirut late last week before handing over control to the Lebanese army.

The fighting shifted to the north and east of the country over the weekend, and fresh clashes were reported in Beirut this morning. Meanwhile, the Arab League has agreed to send a high-level political delegation to Lebanon to dialogue with leaders from all sides.

The violence, which has been described as the worst since the civil war, erupted last week during a general strike called by the General Federation of Labor Unions to protest the high cost of living.

On Thursday, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah held a news conference in Beirut to mark what he called the beginning of a "new era" in Lebanese politics. He condemned a decision by the Lebanese cabinet to outlaw Hezbollah's telecommunications network and dismiss the head of airport security for his alleged ties to the party. Nasrallah said their private communication network was a vital tool in combat and critical to their success during the July 2006 war with Israel. He described the government crackdown as "tantamount to a declaration of war."

HASSAN NASRALLAH: [translated] If we want to get off of this crisis, to get out of this standoff, of this confrontation, they need to revoke the decisions of the illegitimate government, and they need to go to the dialogue. That's all. If they want to be stubborn, they will go elsewhere. The game is very dangerous. If they are truly keen about preserving the country, they have only these two solutions.

AMY GOODMAN: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice criticized Hezbollah and declared US support for the Lebanese government led by Prime Minister Fouad Siniora. But after four days of fighting, Siniora capitulated and announced Saturday the decision regarding Hezbollah's demands now lay in the hands of the Lebanese army. The army commander, General Michel Suleiman, is slated to be the new president of the country.

For analysis of the situation in Lebanon, I'm now joined on the phone from California by As'ad AbuKhalil, professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus, and the creator of the Angry Arab News Service blog at angryarab.blogspot.com. We welcome you to Democracy Now!

AS'AD ABUKHALIL: Thank you very much, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you explain what's happening in Lebanon right now?

AS'AD ABUKHALIL: Well, yes. I think that people may remember, back in the 1980s, the United States government, for two years in the administration of Ronald Reagan, deployed troops from '82 to '84. And there was a civil war, and the United States was supporting the rightwing militias of Israel in Lebanon, and they used the discourse of supporting the central government of Lebanon.

Something similar is taking place right now in Lebanon, and this is very much similar to what's happening in Sudan, in Palestine, in Iraq, in Afghanistan and Somalia. The United States is basically instigating, funding and arming civil wars in all those places. We hear a lot about this inability of the international community to tolerate armed militias. Of course, Hezbollah is an armed militia, but so are the pro-militias of the government. There's a Los Angeles Times article today detailing the efforts by the United States and allies to create militias throughout the country. And the Washington Post indicated that this government of the United States spent $1.4 billion to prop up the administration of Siniora in Lebanon.

And basically, what happened in Lebanon in the last few days is a partial coup d'etat that was in response to a full coup d'etat that was engineered by the United States and Saudi Arabia and Israel from behind the scene back in 2005, capitalizing on the assassination of Rafik Hariri.

And things have gotten to this point because America basically is responsible, more than their clients in Lebanon. I mean, there were ideas of dialogue in Lebanon, and things were moving in that direction, and then, suddenly, lo and behold, the Assistant Secretary of State of the United States for the Near East, David Welch, shows up in Lebanon, and he basically wanted to stiffen the resolve of the clients and to basically prevent the possibility of dialogue. And then, Walid Jumblatt, one of the clients of the United States and Saudi Arabia and Lebanon today, escalated by deciding on taking the issue of disarming Hezbollah, which is supported at least by half of the Lebanese, and Lebanese parties, including clients of the United States, agreed that the issues of disarming Hezbollah should be left for internal dialogue of the Lebanese themselves.

But it seems the Bush administration, while it's sailing into the sunset, wanted to achieve a victory that has long eluded it in Iraq and elsewhere. They were getting too excited about Lebanese affairs in the Washington Post, who were celebrating the so-called Cedar Revolution. Well, they tried to push them further, and look what happened. This is something that experts have warned the United Nations about. If you push things to that point, the other side is going to lash out, and they did lash out, even if one, like me, does not like the scenes of these militias and armed thugs running into the streets of Beirut and so on. But basically, we have to say that this is the doing of US foreign policy, and this is the true face of the Bush Doctrine in the Middle East.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk overall about the United States—what you feel the US role should be right now?

AS'AD ABUKHALIL: Well, I mean, just to get out, just to not be as heavily involved. We have to see that US policy is not only in funding and arming the militias in the Anbar province in Iraq or places in Iraq—I mean, Afghanistan, the warlords, or in Lebanon, the various militias. But we have to say that this level of intense tensions and conflict and animosity is the product of a deliberate American-Saudi policy of instigating a Sunni-Shiite conflict, the likes of which Lebanon has never seen. I mean, even somebody like myself who come from a split background—my mother is Sunni, and my father is Shiite—I mean, we've never seen anything like this. Saudi media, with the full cooperation of the United States, have been for three years mobilizing the Lebanese opposition, because that's the only thing they have. I mean, if patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel, sectarianism in Lebanon is the last refuge of scoundrels of the United States and Israel. They have been for serious propagandizing to splitting Sunnis from Shiites in order that they create a militia that can stand up to Hezbollah.

Well, this militia of Hariri's, as supported by the United States, trained in Jordan, funded by Saudi Arabia, basically didn't last. It's very much like the Dahlan gangs in Palestine in Gaza. They do not have a cause. The United States can provide them with weapons and with money; it cannot provide them with a doctrine or an ideology. And that's why, when push comes to shove, they flee. They flee for their life, just as militias of Israel fled across the border when Israel attacked and left, humiliatingly, South Lebanon in 2000.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor AbuKhalil, we have thirty seconds. What's next? What do you make of Hassan Nasrallah's comment that this is a new era in Lebanese politics?

AS'AD ABUKHALIL: Basically, he is saying that they will no more allow this heavy-handed role by the Saudis in Lebanon, and they want to change the balance of forces on the ground. Now, that in itself does not bode well for the future in Lebanon. I fear that Hezbollah may get too intoxicated with their so-called victories on the streets of Lebanon, and they may assert a sectarian agenda that is going to provoke the other side. I worry about a [inaudible] syndrome among the Sunnis of Lebanon.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you very much for being with us. Professor As'ad AbuKhalil teaches political science at California State University at Stanislaus, visiting professor at UC Berkeley.

Meanwhile, the Druze are pleading for US help.

ATLAS EXCLUSIVE: NIDRA POLLERJihad putsch in Lebanon

Nidra Poller is back and pens a searing indictment how a jihad complicit  France helped secure a Hezbo victory in Lebanon. She  saw the Lebanon  photos on Atlas, and rightly laments, "just imagine if the bloodshed could be blamed on Israel? We don't have to imagine, we saw it, the bloody photos of the Palestinian civilians recently killed (by their father's shahid bomb or some such explosives) and fraudulently blamed on Israel".

Jihad putsch in Lebanon

Paris 10 May 2008

Nidra Poller

The 2006 Hizbullah war against Israel was packaged in France as a (Lebanese) humanitarian crisis. Public opinion was worked to a frenzy by images of suffering civilians while on the diplomatic level the French foreign minister gradually imposed terms and conditions dictated by Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah and trickled down through Fouad Siniora to his French ally. UN Resolution 1701 “saved” Lebanon from Israel and delivered the country into the hands of Hizbullah. (I reported on the story for TCS Daily here and Atlas Shrugs Continue reading "ATLAS SHRUGS EXCLUSIVE: NIDRA POLLER .... BAKED ON THE PREMISES" »)

UNIFIL troops looked the other way as Hizbullah rearmed. The besieged Siniora government was reduced to impotence. French opinion makers followed with lazy distraction as the Iranian-backed movement pursued its jihad style takeover.  By contrast, the current jihad putsch with its massive attack against civil liberties has been underplayed. And the fate of French UNIFIL troops has not even been mentioned. Citizens of the free world should be transfixed in horror at the sight of jihad in action. Instead they are fed outdated analyses of the specter of civil war.

A Lebanese woman in hijab beat her breast and screamed in fury: “Hizbullah promised they’d never turn their weapons on us… they’d only use them on the Jews.” The translator changed Yahoud to Israelis. As if that could protect them from a similar fate in a not too distant future. Prematurely aged, her teeth botched with dark lead caps, the woman spoke more sense than any of the news reports coming from the region since Hizbullah pulled its latest operation in an ongoing jihad putsch.

Her words should be posted at the head of every dispatch from Lebanon. Europeans, take heed. You thought their weapons would only be used against the Jews…Israel, that is. Ultimately they will be aimed at You!

In 2006, two days after Goldwasser and Regev were kidnapped in a cross-border attack from Lebanon then president Jacques Chirac delivered his traditional 14 Juillet (Independence Day) speech. Sharply rebuking Israel for a disproportionate response aimed at destroying Lebanon, he called for an immediate humanitarian cease fire.

French diplomacy was already at work at the UN. French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy led Condoleeza Rice in a dance to the tune of Hizbullah, gradually inserting Nasrallah’s demands filtered through Siniora into the initial ceasefire resolution. They came up with Resolution 1701 that was supposed to be heartened by a beefed-up UNIFIL. Chirac promised to send 3000 troops, reduced to 800 as soon as the resolution was signed.

On the home front we were treated to an endless flow of primetime humanitarian crisis. French media visited frantic Franco-Lebanese families whose youngsters, vacationing in the homeland, were trapped in the wrath of Israel’s disproportionate response. Whole newscasts were shot on the docks as tearful refugees of varied nationalities—most of them hyphenated Lebanese—were evacuated. Microphones lapped up their indignation at Israel’s disproportionate response.

Today French media detect no humanitarian crisis. No refugees. The airport is closed, the port is closed, and no one seems to have the courage to open an escape route. Or even to admit what is happening. A ridiculous vocabulary imposed by Hizbullah is picked up and mindlessly repeated. It started with food riots. A few days later it was “civil disobedience.” And now it is “calm restored,” as the army moves in and holds the positions established by the putschistes.

Though the Sarkozy government is striving to break with three decades of twisted Mideast policy, no strong statements have yet been heard. FM Kouchner is still trying to figure out how to get humanitarian aid workers into Burma against the will of the junta and the refusal of the UN to take a stand. France is in easy living mode as the long Mayday weekend melded into the long Pentecost weekend. And no one has thought of soliciting a comment from Jacques Chirac, who is living in a luxury apartment that belongs to Saad Hariri. His generous benefactor--whose media have been torched, whose government is surrounded, whose soldiers are disloyal, who can be eliminated at will--might appreciate a kind word from his late father’s best friend. 

 

ISLAMIC JIHAD IN LEBANON

The world community is responsible for murderous gang of Islamic thugs rise to power. And its only just begun and the world will cower, appease, and the kiss the ass of the crocodile up until the day they get eaten as well. If I;ve said it once, I've said it 1000 times, these brutal bloodthirsty savages must be crushed not negotiated with. Obama, take heed, sissy.

And the UN stands there and is paid to watch.

Hizbullah Redrawing Mideast Map - Joshua Mitnick
Hizbullah's dramatic gains in Lebanon are just part of a regional process that began last year in Gaza and will continue in Jordan and Egypt, Sheikh Yazeeb Khader, a Ramallah-based Hamas political activist and editor, said in an interview. "What happened in Gaza in 2007 is an achievement; now it is happening in 2008 in Lebanon. It's going to happen in 2009 in Jordan and it's going to happen in 2010 in Egypt." "We are seeing a redrawing of the map of the Middle East where the forces of resistance and steadfastness are the ones moving the things on the ground."
    His remarks highlight a growing alliance linking Hamas, Iran and Hizbullah. The notion of new countries falling under Islamist influence reflects a goal of Hamas' parent group, the Muslim Brotherhood, of replacing secular Arab regimes with Islamist governments. (Washington Times)

WAR IN LEBANON Ya Libnan hat hip Michael

With practically no weapons, the Druze men took on the menacing rockets of Hezbollah. Druze fighters in Mount Lebanon refused to sit quietly while Hezbollah militiamen ravaged their homes and shops.

Blood stains covers a bullet riddled wall where Druze supporters of Walid Jumblatt were executed in cold blood by Hezbollah militiamen in Choueifat

Hezbollah militiamen stabbed a knife into the head of anti-Syrian leader Walid Jumblatt inside the home of one of his supporters in Choueifat

A Druze sheikh outraged over a murdered supporter of Jumblatt in Choueifat

Hezbollah militiamen try to occupy the Druze territories of Mount Lebanon

Hezbollah militiamen rejoice as they continue to murder Lebanese

Wielding RPG's and machine guns, Hezbollah militiamen fought a cowardly war against the unarmed Druze, and failed to occupy their land

Puppet master Nabih Berri, head of the Amal militia responsible for much of the destruction, gazes angrily at American envoy Michele Sison

Home destroyed

Hezbollah militiamen destroyed the house of the mayor of the town of Choueifat

A Druze Sheikh walks past destroyed shops in Choueifat

Destruction inside the mayor's home in Choueifat

Druze woman Yessra Halawi tries to find her jewelry in her bedroom in her house destroyed by Hezbollah

Druze youths inspect their destroyed shop in Choueifat

Angry Hezbollah supporters mourn one of the 15 militiamen killed by Druze defending their homes in Mount Lebanon on Sunday

Lebanese Army patrols Choueifat after "taking control"

Map Of Conflict In Tripoli

For those who are interested in where the fighting is taking place in Tripoli:

What Lebanon Really Means

Barry Rubin over at the GLORIA center explains what is happening in Lebanon. He correctly predicts an ominous outcome  to the Hezbo violent takeover in Beirut.  Their intention was never to be part of the process, their objective was always violent jihad. The Hezbos have been nothing if not consistent in their  objective of an Islamic Lebanon.
Excerpt:

What Spain was in 1936; Lebanon is today.

Does anyone remember the Spanish Civil War? Briefly, a fascist revolt took place against the democratic government. The rebels were motivated by several factors, including anger that their religion had not been given enough respect and regional grievances, but essentially they sought to put their ideology and themselves into power. Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy backed the rebels with money and guns. The Western democracies stood by and did nothing.

Guess who won? And guess whether that outcome led to peace or world war.

Funny, I thought September 11 changed everything.

Why should Lebanese Sunni, Druze, and Christians risk their lives when the West doesn't help them? Every Israeli speaking nonsense about Syria making peace; every American claiming Damascus might split from Tehran; every European preaching appeasement has in fact been engaged in confidence-breaking measures.

Hizballah doesn't need to win a military victory but only to show it can win one, using that position of strength to try to force its demands on the moderate government. . The government has already accepted Michel Suleiman, Syria's candidate for president. But Hizballah and the rest say this is not enough: they want veto power over everything.

The goal of Hizballah, and its Syrian and Iranian backers at present is not the full conquest of Lebanon--something beyond their means--but to control the government so it does nothing they dislike: no strong relations with the West, no ability to stop war against Israel, no disarming Hizballah's militias or countering that group's control over large parts of the country, and certainly no investigation of Syrian involvement in terrorism there.

Why, three years after Damascus ordered the murder of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri do investigators dawdle, having edited out the names of top Syrian officials they blamed for the killing in their initial report?

Israel bombed a nuclear reactor being built in Syria. Rice reportedly opposed the action. The world yawned.

Iran drives for nuclear weapons. There is some effort but too little, too slow. Whether or not the war in Iraq was a mistake, when terrorists murdered Iraqi civilians, much of the West blamed America; all too many Americans agreed.

Far too much Western media, intellectual--sometimes political life--reviles Israel. But Israel is no threat to them; other forces are. And events in Lebanon are one more proof that the Israel-Palestinian conflict is only a portion, say one-fifth, of the wider Middle East crisis.

Many in the West think Israel will pay the price for their follies. But Israel is ready to do what it needs for its self-defense. If anything, the mistakes of the last round in Lebanon reinforced this determination.

Instead, the main victims will be Arabs, mostly Muslims, in Afghanistan, Gaza, Iraq, and Lebanon, killed by the various Jihad groups, or ruled by them where they take power or dominate through intimidation. And second they will be Western interests, which would not fare well in a region dominated by a combination of Islamists and those who feel they have no choice but to appease them.

When Senator and presidential candidate Barack Obama says he will negotiate with Syria and Iran over Iraq's future, he signals every Persian Gulf regime to cut its own deal with Iran. When his stances convince Hamas that he's the guy for them; when Iran and Syria conclude they merely need stand defiant and wait until January 21 for any existing pressure vanishes, the U.S. position in the Middle East is being systematically destroyed.

Note that this does not make Obama the candidate favored by Arabs in general but only by the radicals. Egyptians, Jordanians, Gulf Arabs, and the majorities in Lebanon and Iraq are very worried. This is not just an Israel problem; it is one for all non-extremists in the region.

If the dictators and terrorists are smiling, it means everyone else is crying.

The Syrian and Iranian regimes know that while they may walk through the valley of the shadow of sanctions they need fear nothing because there are all too many who comfort them.

After all, if the UN human rights committee is run by Libya, if UNIFIL forces in Lebanon tread lightly so Hizballah won't be angry with them, if Westerners tremble and repeal freedom of speech lest some Muslims be offended, why should the "bad guys" worry?

Yet the West doesn't have to play it stupid forever. Now is the time for energetic action on Lebanon to wipe that confident sneer off their faces. To contain Iran and Syria, to buck up the Lebanese government side and all those Arabs who, whatever their faults, don't want to live in an Islamist caliphate.

If you want to know what's wrong, consider Obama's May 10 statement on Lebanon. He starts out playing tough, talking about "Hezbollah's power grab in Beirut....This effort to undermine Lebanon's elected government needs to stop, and all those who have influence with Hezbollah must press them to stand down immediately." He calls for supporting the Lebanese government, strengthening the Lebanese army, and to "insist on disarming Hezbollah."

But how to do this? By "working with the international with the international community and the private sector to rebuild Lebanon and get its economy back on its feet."

In other words, according to the Obama world view, it's a problem of development. If people have more money they won't be terrorists. Of course, that was the policy of Hariri, which was countered by Syria blowing him up. In politics, bombs trump business. And any way you can't have a strong economy with no government and chaos. Part of the mistake here is Obama's assumption that Hizballah (and other radicals) want stability and prosperity. In fact, they want to use instability as blackmail in their pursuit of power. They don't want conciliation. It's a military-strategic problem, not one of community organizing.

The statement continues: "We must support the implementation of UN Security Council Resolutions that reinforce Lebanon's sovereignty, especially resolution 1701 banning the provision of arms to Hezbollah, which is violated by Iran and Syria."

Great. But the UN is no substitute for U.S. power. As David Schenker of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy writes, "It is highly unlikely that the UN -- which failed to even prevent the rearming of Hizballah--would agree to more dangerous deployments in Lebanon." America doesn't need a president whose solution is to turn over crises to the UN.

Nor can Obama pass the buck to Lebanon's army. Its commander is Syria's presidential candidate, its soldiers are mostly pro-Hizballah, and the quarter-billion dollars of U.S. aid given since 2006 may well become additional assets for Tehran.

As President Harry Truman said of the president's desk, the buck stops here. So the president of the United States must take the lead, be tough, and make credible threats. What's needed is not a conciliator but a confronter.

These are the questions Obama isn't even pretending to try to answer: Are you willing to fight on this issue? To defy an "international community" that opposes action? To intimidate and defeat the radicals? Answer: No.

But here's the worst part that few in America but everyone in Lebanon will understand all too well: (there's more, go here)

[...]

Here, at the "From Beirut to Beltway" blog, is a typical, sarcastic, reaction by Lebanese government supporters:

"Oh the time we wasted by fighting Hizballah all those years....If only we had engaged them and their masters in diplomacy...sitting with them around discussion tables, welcoming them into our parliament, and letting them veto cabinet decisions. If only Obama had shared his wisdom with us before, back when he was rallying with some of our former friends at pro-Palestinian rallies in Chicago. How stupid we were when, instead of developing `national consensus' with them, we organized media campaigns against Israel on behalf of the impoverished people who voted for them.

"During that time when we bought into the cause against Israel, treating resistance fighters like our brothers, we really should have been `building consensus' with them. Because what we did...was...unnecessary antagonism, a product of a `corrupt patronage system and unfair distribution of wealth.'"

"We stand today regretting the wasted time that could have been wisely spent talking to them, to the Syrian occupiers who brought them into our system, and the Iranian revolutionary guards who trained them.^[1]

The battle isn't over, which is all the more reason for real--not just verbal--international action. Hizballah has made its point for the moment, that it is the most powerful and to it every knee must bend. Yet without serious political and diplomatic support for Lebanon's government and real costs inflicted on Syria and Iran, the battle will be lost eventually.

For all those in the West who don't like Israel, then at least help the people you pretend to like. Back the Lebanese government with real power and aid, covertly or overtly, those battling the radical forces in Lebanon.

Rick: "Sam, if it's December 1941 in Casablanca, what time is it in New York?"

Sam: "Um, my watch stopped."

Rick: "I bet they're asleep in New York. I'll bet they're asleep all over America."

SILENCING LEBANON!

Watch this now! The frickin jihad is winning! I may not speak the language but I I understand her completely and utterly.

Thank you Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry, Obama's foreign policy advisers and all the other asshats that met with Assad and kissed his ass.

A Clean Sweep: Amal, Hizbullah Take Much of Beirut in Redux of Hamas' Gaza Takeover MEMRI hat tip rut

Please spread the word: The real target of Hezbollah’s vicious campaign is free media in Lebanon.  Beirut Spring Blog hat tip Michael

A little something I designed for those who want to spread the word (details below)

Hidden under the coverage of explosions, smoke and gunmen roaming Beirut is the real story: Hezbollah and its backers in Syria and Iran can’t stand any voice that freely express a different point of view.

The guns were dispatched to silence the voice. All over Lebanon, in Beirut, In Tripoli, in Saida, and in Bekaa, Iranian and Syrian allies are targeting the media organizations that are critical of their regimes. This is an orchestrated, pre-planned campaign that includes dismantling hardware, destroying archives and intimidating Journalists.

Regardless of where we stand politically, we have to make it clear to the world that we will not accept tampering with the free exchange of ideas, the main foundation of any democracy.

Please do everything you can to spread the word and be part of this:

Bloggers and Website owners

Email with the text below to politicians, newspapers and anyone you know who might have access to international media.

Hidden under the coverage of explosions, smoke and gunmen roaming Beirut is the real story: Hezbollah and its backers in Syria and Iran can’t stand any voice that freely express a different point of view. The guns were dispatched to silence the voice. All over Lebanon, in Beirut, In Tripoli, in Saida, and in Bekaa, Iranian and Syrian allies are targeting the media organizations that are critical of their regimes. This is an orchestrated, pre-planned campaign that includes dismantling hardware, destroying archives and intimidating Journalists. We shall not accept tampering with the free exchange of ideas, the main foundation of any democracy.