Tensions on the Israel-Lebanon border flared up in recent days due to a confusing July 27 incident near the Sheba’a Farms, a Syrian area occupied by Israel since the 1967 war but is also claimed by Lebanon. Tensions erupted when Israeli jets bombarded a target in the Syrian capital of Damascus, killing one Hezbollah fighter. The…
Talks between IMF officials and politicians broke down recently when it transpired that the latter wanted a ‘brown envelope’ in any aid deal. Don’t blame the politicians though. It’s all they know and it was, after all, the UN who showed them the way. But can the UN in Lebanon actually feed the Lebanese? It…
A structural problem inherited from the past From the beginning of the events in Lebanon, we stressed that the structural problem was not corruption, but the organization of this country according to a confessional community system [1]. Moreover, before the banking problem became public, we announced it and explained that, like all banks, Lebanese women have…
For two decades Washington has been trying to “reshape” the “Greater Middle East”, an arbitrarily defined region stretching from Afghanistan to Morocco. However, over the last three years two strategies have clashed: on the one hand the Pentagon, which wants to destroy the state structures of all the countries in the region, whether friends or…
Protests, stemming from an internal crisis, have once again erupted in Lebanon. In light of worsening corruption throughout the country, prices of staple foods are rising despite the government’s attempts to stop the Lebanese pound from decreasing in value. Demonstrations are taking place in Beirut, Tripoli as well as other towns and cities. Protesters have…
The enactment of “Caesar’s Law” – the new US sanctions designed to “pursue individuals, groups, companies, and countries that deal with the Damascus government” – is apparently directed against Syria but in reality aims to subdue Lebanon and its population to accommodate Israel’s conditions. Lebanon’s “Axis of the Resistance” member, Hezbollah, has an open conflict…
