The Trump Administration’s attempt to dictate terms on the new Lebanese government’s cabinet appears to have failed spectacularly. The new Lebanese cabinet has been announced, and includes multiple members from both Hezbollah and the Shi’ite Amal Movement.
The administration has been browbeating Lebanon for weeks on this issue, insisting no Shi’ite could be allowed to hold the Finance Ministry, and calling any Hezbollah representation in the government a “red line” as recently as yesterday.
The US had been suggesting Saudi Arabia’s foreign aid for Lebanon’s post war reconstruction was contingent on them not naming a Shi’ite finance minister, though the Saudis don’t appear to have set out this precondition.
In the end, the Finance Minister is Yassine Jaber, a member of the Amal Movement and a Shi’ite. Amal also got the Environmental Minister post, which went to Tarek Mitri. Hezbollah and Amal are seen as broadly allied, though they have different visions for Lebanon’s future.
Hezbollah wasn’t excluded from the cabinet, either. They also got two portfolios, the Public Health ministership going to Rakan Nasreddine, a vascular surgeon supported by Hezbollah. He reportedly aims to modernize Lebanon’s health care system.
Perhaps the higher profile Hezbollah portfolio went to the new Labor Minister, Mohammad Haider. Haider served as the Director of Nuclear Medicine at American University in Beirut, but is also a “specially designated terrorist” as far as the US is concerned because of his membership of Hezbollah’s senior military body, the Jihad Council.
Haider might be more familiar to people because just a few short months ago, he was the target of an Israeli assassination attempt, when they leveled an apartment building in central Beirut with a bunker buster bomb. Israel killed a large number of people in that bombing, but Haider was clearly not among them.
The US has not immediately responded to Lebanon spurning their demands with their new cabinet. Whether they ultimately end up doing anything to punish Lebanon for their defiance is still uncertain, and past US dictates were similarly ignored with little consequence.
In 2009, just before the general election, Vice President Joe Biden went to Lebanon, declaring that the Lebanese had better not vote for Hezbollah politicians and warning US aid would be pulled from the nation if they did. Despite this overt US meddling, Hezbollah ended up performing quite well in the 2009 election, and ended up part of that coalition government. The US briefly placed a hold on military aid to Lebanon in 2010, though they ultimately lifted that hold and sent the money anyhow.
A bit bewildering…! Do we want to help or be a hinderance?!…
We want to be a help be being a hindrance. Unfortunately, the help isn't for the people of Lebanon.
It's hard to see how 1/3 of Lebanese could be excluded from the government in a country that is very complicated by colonial design. The USA and Israel want an anti-Iran (anti-Shia) regime but that can't happen, especially when considering that the armed branch of Hizbollah is much more powerful than the whole (extremely underfunded) Lebanese Army and could, if so they wished (which they clearly don't), easily topple the civilian government.
My assumption was always that the US and its cronies offered the non-Hezbollah-affiliated elements of the Lebanes regime some kind of backing if they’d do the fake ceasefire with Israel. I won’t be surprised to see Lebanon return to full-scale civil war with US or US-backed troops backing Future Movement/Lebanese Forces/Ketaeb.
I thought the same.
What migh counterblance such plans is the current Lebanese president. Very much liked by all factions, and for a reason. Another factor is post-Gaza and the sea-change in the affluent Lebanese Sunni and Christian circles.
They have been thoroughly discredited in their decades old beliefs in US and European benevolence. Their own soft power has evaporated.
Energy is gone from Lebanese perennially ftactious political scene. Yes, there is always a danger of “seeding” the violence, to provoke internal conflict. But all three factions will tamper it down, not feed it.
The expectations are so low of Europeans, and Trumo administration has only reinforced the perception. Any low , dirty form of attack is now expected from the collective West.
Europe has particularly sunk in their opinion by meekly accepting genocide on full display in Gaza. The mental confusion has resulted in beliefs many now feel about Europe’s facade, and suspect the real, supremacist identity lies underneath.
Interestingly, they do not see US as supremacist. Ugly, bullying, empirially deluded – but not supremacist.
I am not sure I see any faction today that can capture the passions against the otherness in Lebanon.
It's hard to figure why Israel "hates" a ceasefire! Since the ceasefire Israel has not been attacked while it continues to attack and murder with impunity. Nutty Yahoo may be itching for a renewal of the fighting, but this will be a negative result for Israel when the bombs and missiles start to fly again. Israel needs to get rid of Nutty Yahoo like the Americans got rid of the Biden Mafia! And the way things are going, Trump (MAGA, GOP) may be running into the "exit sign" real soon! When the truth about Israel/USA hits the critical mass stage in the USA, Americans will be repulsed by what "their" nation did to thousands of defenseless innocent women children and old people in Gaza and the West Bank! And when they find out about the dubious narrative surrounding October 7, the reaction will be like the one to the false flag January 6 entrapment of patriotic Trump supporters!
The ceasefire was an Israeli-US trap to begin with: it allowed Israel to occupy towns that they had never conquered and interposed Lebanese politics as a shield between Hizbollah (which was smashing Israel just the day before) and the genociders. Right away came another masterful strike by the Empire with the Turkish proxy invasion of Baathist Syria in a mere week, what left Hizbollah and Lebanon quite surrounded by all sides. Now both Israel and HTS (read: Turkey by proxy) are attacking Lebanon and particularly Hizbollah and their allies from the south and the north simultaneously. Their goal is to destroy Hizbollah and probably divide Lebanon among the two. Trump is totally in, as he warned Lebanon against integrating Hizbollah and Amal (i.e. all the Shia parties!) in the government.
Anotating on a Wikipedia religion map of Lebanon:
· arrows: current offensives by foreign powers (blue: Israeli, black: HTS)
· red line: ceasefire defined non-Hizbollah zone under Lebanese army suppossed control
· orange lines: possible partition of Lebanon (my speculation): south to Israel as "buffer zone" (to be eventually annexed and genocided), NE to to HTS (to be religiously genocided too), center-West to residual Christian-dominated Lebanon (possibly under US-France "protection").
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/374fd94158945e87a2f815252fd7d548f63acbf1daca769370cef528e3c35109.gif
The administration has been browbeating Lebanon for weeks on this issue, insisting no Shi’ite could be allowed to hold the Finance Ministry, and calling any Hezbollah representation in the government a “red line” as recently as yesterday.
Would that be considered election interference? Do we sanction ourselves?
US politicians have been howling for years about phantom interference in our elections. Yet they don't even seem to notice the Yankee Empire interfering in foreign elections.
It is good to be a globe spanning hegemon.
Nice 2C the Lebanese stand up to the terrorists who support the Genocide in Gaza, sending the ZioNazzis tens of thousands of two & five thousand pound bombs to drop on the helpless women & Children imprisoned there. These are warcrimes and anyone who helps the genocide could get a death sentence for complicity!!!
The Nuremberg Commission executed people for less than the things our recent presidents do routinely.
October 7 and its aftermath is a giant crap stain on BOTH the USA and Israel's "legacy"! The world will never forget. Israel's SOLE foreign policy is to let the USA pay for and cover for Israel's crimes!
The time of US suppression in general and this 4-year bullying Trump in particular is long over…!
Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Ukraine have shown the world that the US is neither as powerful nor as generous as it so loudly proclaims. The blatant shit-for-brains stupidity and outright chaos of the Rump clique is just tearing off the bandage off of the illusions of the world's rightwingnuts.
Everything is now in the path of greed…!
How do you know when a superpower is losing its grip?
When it tells allies to fall in line, and they form a new line… on the other side.
The Other Line is thinning every day…!
Hardly. Everyone fears an islamic resurgence.
The EU alliance is thinning…!
Not me. Radical religions are and have been a problem throughout history… Christians included.
So what religion is not radical in your mind?
No religion needs to be radical. Religious energy focused on defense against an actual aggressor is not necessarily mindless or radical,
I tend to be enthralled by the advance of science yet do not ridicule devout faith that also tolerates my curiosity.
Today NASA photo of the day is interesting with regard to building blocks of life being present on the asteroid Bennu https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
I agree that extremist human beings can be any race, ethnicity, nationality, religion or no religion. The fanaticism is not in the race or creed, necessarily. However, there are radical or extremist ideologies and/or religions. When it comes to Islam, for example, it in of itself is not radical or extremist but these fanatics can be Muslim.
Islam by definition is willful submission to the one Creator. Islam is viewed as the last true representation of monotheistic religion. Science says the universe has a beginning and science is showing us that the universe and world around us points to intelligent design. Since observation would conclude something can not come into being from nothing and we didn't create ourselves, its prudent to entertain the existence of a self sustaining intelligent Creator. That worldview is not radical and doesn't by belief lead to extremism.
Furthermore, Islam is simple yet comprehensive. Its simple in its creed (to become a muslim one merely needs to testify there is no god or anything worthy of Worship except the One true God, and Prophet Muhammad is His messenger). It is comprehensive in its compatibility with human nature and its principles and practice comport with justice and human dignity. Its main source of guidance has been preserved in the Quran and the tradition of its last Prophet. Yet its adaptable to new and changing circumstances.
It is the fastest growing religion in the US and the world. It's also very misunderstood. For example, although it is maligned as oppressive to women, women converts in the West outnumber male converts by a wide margin. In addition, jihad and violence is associated with Islam, yet a casual observation of the past year and a half show that religion is not what fuels violence in the Middle East. It is Israel and occupation.
Thanks for the video. It's beautiful. It just causes me to glorify its Creator.
I agree that Islam is not what fuels violence in western Asia and that Israel and the US are the root problem.
Religion is, by definition, radical (“relating to or affecting the fundamental nature of something”).
Those uppity Lebanese! What's next???
They are going to sic the Syrian terrorists on them now …
the right of the LEBANESE PEOPLE and no one else in a vote…