Tag: Hezbollah

The HISHee Rebellion!

The assassination of Pierre Gemayel is not some haphazard ill-timed event, but a carefully calculated one meant to help push Lebanon further and further along the path of internal implosion. And the HISH (Hezbollah-Iran-Syria-Hamas) Alliance is definitely to blame here, the particular considerations related to their particular decision-making and implantation strategies notwithstanding. Continue reading “The HISHee Rebellion!” →

Should The United States Engage Syria? A Saban Center Policy Forum Debate

The Saban Center for Middle East Policy hosted a debate on October 23, 2006 between Joshua Landis, assistant professor at the University of Oklahoma, and Ammar Abdulhamid, a Saban Center Nonresident Fellow, on whether the United States should engage with Syria. Martin S. Indyk, Director of the Saban Center, formerly Assistant Secretary of State for Near East Affairs and twice U.S. Ambassador to Israel, and Tamara Cofman Wittes, Saban Center Research Fellow and Director of the Arab Democracy and Development Program, chaired the event. Continue reading “Should The United States Engage Syria? A Saban Center Policy Forum Debate” →

A Note on Apathy

First posted on my short-lived blog Tharwalizations. 

Apathy is probably one of the most puzzling and serious social diseases affecting regional youth these days. Yet, we can blame economic conditions and the local fear culture, stemming out of authoritarian predilections of ruling regimes and the potential for ethnic strife in some cases, only so much before we have to stop and consider the involvement of other factors in this matter as well. For fear and economic hardships only represent the inhibitive side of the equation, while human behavior is equally shaped by motivating factors. Indeed, the lack of credible leaders and the lack of a promising vision of the future, both of which are necessary factors for inspiring people into action, seem to be involved here as well.  Continue reading “A Note on Apathy” →