Lebanon’s Hizbullah

48 thoughts on “Lebanon’s Hizbullah”

1. The Washington Post published a rather strange article about Hezbollah a couple of days ago. Its thrust was that Hezbollah, which represents the largests faction in Lebanon (the Shiites), was popular due to the qualities you mentioned – honesty, seriousness, effectiveness. If the proportional system by which Lebanon is now governed, which fails to give Shiites representation due their numbers, were reformed, then Hezbollah might be able to form a government. And this is a very troubling prospect, though the article fails to show why.
   Note the title, which suggests that the Hezbollah are somehow not Lebanese:
   Lebanese Wary of a Rising Hezbollah.

2. For some reason the above link doesn’t work. Let’s try again.
   Lebanese Wary of a Rising Hezbollah

3. Yes, i saw that piece, which ran Monday. I vaguely thought of posting a critique of it up here sometime but then I got more caught up in my own writing.
   You’re quite right to draw attention to the assumption packed into that headline. At least in the dead-wood version that i read Monday, on the “jump” page they had a ‘dline that said something like “Many Lebanese wary of… ” rather than simply “Lebanese wary of… ”
   The way the piece is written in general is extremely slanted and just plain lazy. The writer, Scott Wilson, writes about the two demonstrations that occurred in Lebanon in late November/ early Dec in this way:
   Thousands of anti-Syria and anti-Hezbollah demonstrators took to the streets Nov. 23 in Beirut, the capital 40 miles northwest of here, chanting, “The only army we want in Lebanon is the Lebanese army.” Most of those taking part were Christian opposition groups concerned about Hezbollah’s armed clout. A raucous counter-rally followed a week later, carried live on Hezbollah’s satellite television channel, al-Manar. The State Department Friday classified the channel as a terrorist organization, like its sponsors.
   
   From reading that, which demonstration would you say was larger?? Well, I noted in this Nov. 22 post that the anti-Syrian rally (which was NOT particularly anti-Hizbullah) that he’s referring to had taken place the preceding Friday (Nov. 19th), and had a participation that I estimated at around 1,200 people, whereas the Hizbullah-organized demonstration that followed ten days later had a participation of several hundred thousand.
   The next ‘graf in Wilson’s story raises a scary possibility… He writes that one of the really scary things about Hizbullah is its potential “demographic power”. Whoa! Can’t have that, now, can we? Especially if we’ve already, not-so-subtly, tried to convey to readers that the Hizbullah people aren’t really Lebanese at all…
   Except that that whole line of argument is nonsense. The Shi-ites who form Hizbullah’s strongest base in Lebanon are every bit as “authentically” Lebanese as the country’s Christians. By an amazing “coincidence” the only two Lebanese whom Wilson quotes directly by name as criticizing Hizbullah are Christians… Hey, even I could have done better than that. I talked to quite a few Lebanese Muslims who critized Hizbullah. But I also talked to lots of Christians who appreciate what Hizbullah has achieved and don’t “fear” their influence in the future.
   Why didn’t Wilson write about how Hizbullah Secretary-General Sayed Hassan Nasrallah made a point of going to visit the Maronite Christian Patriarch Pierre Nasrallah right before the big pro-H demonstration, to reassure him that it was not idirected against the Christians as such? Why didn’t he write about how the Patriarch was happy to receive Sayed Hassan?
   I guess that didn’t quite “fit” his lazy trope of “all those scary Muslims out there, posing a ‘threat’ to pro-western ‘civilization’.”

4. Thank you Helena, for covering this issue. It’s hard to get any info from the western press, or even the arab press for that matter, on the state of things on the ground. It does help to have Lebanese friends of course.
   Hezbullah has had an amazing evolution, and is a testament to the ideas and writings of Muhammad Baqr as-Sadr, Khomeini, Mutahhari, and others. What started out as armed gangs arranged according to tribal affiliations morphed into a disciplined militia, and then into an organized polity.
   Going beyond Shia’-Sunni polemics, there has been a lot more thought put into governance by the leading Shia’ religious scholars than has happened on the Sunni side. This is something still very much fermenting today, as a Shia’ polity is about to assume some sort of control over the Iraqi political process.

5. Is Shiite Political Organization in Lebanon a Sign for Iraq?

   Helena Cobban of Just World News said “Seeing the amazing political smarts inside this Shi-ite political organization in Lebanon, where Shi-ites are maybe 45% of the population, gives some clue as to possible directions the Shi-ites might take in Iraq…

6. The post elides the most relevant facts: Iran’s sponsorship of Hezbullah, and Hezbullah’s sponsorship of terror cells in Palestinian territories. (Not to mention the shared goal of wiping Israel of the map.) We shall see if these forces produce stability in the region. But I won’t be looking to JWN for any insight.

7. Wm: I am interested why you should choose these to be “the most relevant facts”.
   Hizbullah is first and foremost a Lebanese organization, and its representatives have been elected to positions of political responsibility by Lebanese voters. Wouldn’t you think those would actually be the “most relevant” facts?
   Sure, Hizbullah has a multifaceted relationship with the govt of Iran. I don’t deny that. But why should that be “more relevant” than what Hizbullah’s people do politically within their own national community? For example, the settlers in Israel have similarly multifacted relations with many outside forces (including many here in the US, where taxpayer money still continues to support their illegal colonial ventures). But does that mean it is not interesting or worthwhile sometimes to study the different political trends among the settlers just in their own terms? I think this is worthwhile: a person can learn a lot by doing this!
   Then, your assertion that Hizbullah “sponsors” terror cells in Palestinian territories. I’ve seen various expressions of this allegation recently. But where is the evidence? I’d like to see it. Otherwise, we just have yet one more allegation.
   As for Hizbullah having a goal of “wiping Israel off the map”, maybe you didn’t actually read any of that material by Daniel Sobelman that I cited? Sobelman is of course a respected strategic analyst who is an Israeli living in Israel, so he has every reason to try to portray things as accurately as possible. Where are you writing from, I wonder? (Country and planet would be specific enough as an answer there, I think.)
   Of course, if you enjoy living your life bathed in ideology, fear-mongering hysteria, and indifference to demonstrable historical facts, please go ahead and do so. That’s your choice.

8. “I am interested why you should choose these to be ‘the most relevant facts’.” A legalistic dodge on your part: forget most; the interesting part is that you assign no significance to obviously important facts.
   Your rejoinder, I suppose, is that “a person can learn a lot by” studying “just in their own terms” those illegal, colonialist Israeli settlers. But your own rhetoric (“their illegal colonial ventures”) defeats your assertion: it is inconceivable that you would ever discuss the “settlers” in terms that merely reflect their own internal dynamic, rather than an external judgment that you would impose. Why not apply the same standards to Iranian and Hizbullah imperialism or racism?
   But that, seemingly, is the rub. You dispute Hizbullah’s strategic goal to eradicate Israel. (Tellingly, you have no retort with regard to Iranian intentions.) Rather, you argue, I am “bathed in ideology, fear-mongering hysteria, and indifference to demonstrable historical facts.” Well, if by that you mean ignoring the Karine A. and its 50 tons of Iranian and Hizbullah-supplied weapons because it’s just not as worthwhile as studying those fun-loving imps on their own terms, maybe you’re right. Same for ignoring those Jerusalem Day calls by Hizbullah to, ahem, “destroy Israel.” But this is a silly exercise, because many such links may be found, at least in my country and on my planet. In fact, you might satiate your own curiosity by reading the very Sobelman article in whch you repose such confidence, and which you might find productive to actually read yourself — paying especial heed to his assertion, “The recent blatant use of the expression ‘rules of the game’ reflects Hizbollah’s perception of its confrontation with Israel, a perception that is contradictory to the declared ideology of Hizbollah that calls for the destruction of Israel.”
   I fear you confuse tactics with strategy. Hizbullah is currently constrained by tactical considerations, along the border anyway, and that is the burden of the Sobelman article. This shouldn’t distract from its long-range strategic goals (which are well-known and easily documented, and whose churlish denial ill-serves your own credibility).
   As for Hizbullah involvement in the territories, and its potential for upsetting the equilibrium, again Sobelman: “Consequently Hizbollah’s involvement in the Palestinian arena may be regarded as a safety valve for more activist elements in the ranks of the organization. … It is consequently possible that in fact the confrontation with Hizbollah on the Palestinian front will lead to a change in reality on the northern border.” You might want to look into this on your next Magical Mystery Tour of the region.

9. Wm., you change the grounds of your argumentation radically here, and make a number of unfounded charges against me.
   You did, in your earlier comment, assert that the “most” relevant facts about Hizbullah were its relationships with Iran and with “Palestinian terror cells”. That was a value judgment you had presumably made at that time. Then suddenly, that is no longer your argument! Poof! Instead, you argue that I “churlishly deny” some Israel-related aspects of Hizbullah’s long-range goals. I never “denied” those aspects. I merely chose, in that post, not to mention them. Though of course, given my view (in line with Sobelman’s) that Hizbullah and Israel have established a surprisingly stable, even if highly a-symmetrical, form of mutual deterrence acorss the Blue Line, it stands to reason that I recognize that each of those parties is being “deterred” from doing something aggressive against the other party that it might well be inclined to do were it not thus “deterred.”
   Meanwhile, you choose not to engage at all with the material I presented in the post about Hizbullah’s activities within the Lebanese political sphere. Why not? Is it because the stability, wellbeing, and good governance of Lebanon’s people mean nothing to you?
   For my part I’d like to clarify that when I wrote about the “settlers in Israel” engaging in “illegal colonial ventures”, I am referring to their continuing project of implanting settlements in the occupied territories, a policy that has been determined by nearly every other government in the world as a clear contravention of the Geneva Conventions and hence illegal. (The US government also concurred in this judgment until the days when Pres. Reagan stepped back from expressing it openly, contenting himself with merely saying the settlements were “obstacles to peace”.)
   By contrast, the vast majority of the violent actions that Hizbullah launched against Israeli targets over the years were actions against Israeli soldiers who were engaged in maintaining a clearly illegal foreign military occupation of Lebanese territory. Personally, I think H would have achieved its aim of ending the Israeli occupation more quickly if they had restricted their activities to nonviolent mass organizing. But that is not the same as claiming they had no “right” under international law to use force to resist a foreign military occupation– which clearly, they did.
   One of the most interesting things I’ve been looking at, however, is the degree to which H’s “victory” in forcing a unilateral Israel withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000 was a result of not just of their battlefield prowess but also of the very expert, civilian mass-organizing efforts they’d been undertaking all along, and especially in the 1990s. For example, in 1996, Shimon Peres launched an extremely violent military action against many targets in south and centrallebanon, including Beirut, the stated intention of which was to turn the Lebanese people against Hizbullah. (A classic definition of “terrorism”, by the way, is to launch violent attacks against civilians with the aim of coercing them into changing their political positions in the direction you seek.) But because of Hizbullah’s already expert efforts at mass organizing Peres’s tactic completely backfired, and Lebanese people of all religions rallied around Hizbullah as never before.
   Maybe if Shimon Peres had paid a little more attention to the internal politics of Israel’s northern neighbor he wouldn’t have ended up with egg all over his face that time? Ah, but no. Too many Israelis–and certainly, too many of their supporters elsewhere around the world– really don’t take the internal politics of other Middle Eastern nations seriously at all. Why, to do so might actually involve considering that the citizens of those nations might actually be regular human beings, just like you and me! Can’t have that, now, can we? Far easier just to think of them all as “terroristic automatons” or in some other way beyond the Pale of human reason and normal human interaction…
   (Wm. I’ve given you lots of space on my bandwidth here already and as always reserve the right to cut future comments if they go on too much. feel free to post a URL to your own website if you want to invite JWN readers over there.)

10. OK, let’s keep this simple and save bandwith. You made certain related claims to the effect that “Hizbullah is first and foremost a Lebanese organization.” But you never acknowledged that Hizbullah is in bed with Iran, something which casts grave doubt on your view. I think it self-evident that your omission is singularly important. You don’t.
    More interestingly, you not only disputed my assertion that Hizbullah aimed to wipe Israel off the map, you accused me of fear-mongering hysteria, etc. But Hizbullah’s goal is incontestable, and having been confronted with documentation of this point, you engage in a bandwidth-chewing discussion about Peres and Israel’s retreat from Lebanon — a diversionary retreat of your own.
    Last point: you claim that Israel, at its peril, ignores the “internal politics” of its neighbors. But you do your readers the same disservice when you distort those neighbors’ proclaimed ideology which, after all, provide organizing principles for their politics, both “internal” and “external.”

11. tyroler, your idea is that you are faced with a “total onslaught” and so you must have a “total strategy”. This idea is exactly the same as the idea of the old regime in South Africa, now in the dustbin of history.
    What does “in bed with Iran” mean? Iran is a respectable state that has good relations with my country, South Africa. Why are you regarding it with menace? It is far from your borders. This, too, resembles the mentality of the old regime in South Africa, which also sought to project its problems beyond its borders.

12. wm., as Helena pointed out, Hezbollah’s attitude towards Israel is not its most important facet from the perspective of most readers of this blog.
    The fact is that Hezbollah has no prospect of “wiping out Israel” or even seriously damaging it. Israel, on the other hand, has a history of designs on Lebanese territory and interference in Lebanese politics.
    Hezbollah’s close relationship with Iran is of interest. What I have read suggests that Hezbollah is influenced but not directed by foreigners who give it money, including Iran and Syria.

13. NP: Yes, I’m sure you’re right, it is of no consequence in your circle that Hizbullah wants to wipe Israel off the map. Perhaps because it’s an aim you share, perhaps not. In any case, it’s difficult to understand Hizbullah geopolitical moves without coming to grips with its ideology — something Ms. Cobban apparently would prefer her readership not to know at all. And whether Hizbullah is presently in a position to actuate its express intent is irrelevant (what, though, of the day when Iran supplies a strategic weapon?); fact is, Hizbullah is up to substantial mischief in Israel and the territories and possesses the potential to destabilize movement toward peace.
    Dominic: Ascribing to me a view of a “total onslaught” is a total fabrication. All I’ve said is that it’s quite misleading to pretend that Hizbullah/Iranian meddling and desire to eradicate Israel aren’t crucial variables. Addressing your odd characterization of Iran as a “respectable” country would eat up too much valuable bandwith.

14. tyroler: Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean the bastards aren’t out to get you, right?

15. tyroler: Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean the bastards aren’t out to get you, right?

16. Hezbollah has many other concerns besides “wiping Israel off the map”. The only evidence you have presented for the latter is a seven year old clipping from the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, published before Israel withdrew most of its occupation force from Lebanon.
    It would be nice to have a discussion of Lebanon without your turning it into a fevered tour d’horizon of the Perils of Poor Little Israel, which has killed about 1,000 Lebanese civilians for each Israeli civilian killed by the Lebanese.

17. NP: No one said Hezbollah didn’t have other concerns. It’s Ms. Cobban’s indifference to one of its key, stated goals — to destroy Israel — that’s so interesting. The the dog that doesn’t bark at the Hezbollah caravan. But if you’re truly interested (dountful), there are probably thousands of documentary sources, such as this one: “Hizballah is dedicated to liberating Jerusalem and eliminating Israel and has formally advocated
    ultimate establishment of Islamic rule in Lebanon.”
    Because this goal is quite beyond dispute, I’m not really sure what you’re trying to accomplish in either denying or minimizing it (I’m not sure which). A tremendous amount of goodwill is going to be required even to establish some sort of process under which painful compromises can be made. Candid acknowledgement of the threat(s) faced by Israel and measures to eliminate same will be a vital part of the process. The stance you take simply hardens the minds of those who believe that the ultimate goal of any compromise-oriented process is destruction of the state.

18. Would you like to give the status of that source of yours.
    Meanwhile, here are two well-known chants of the liberation movement of South Africa.
    “Kill the boer, kill the farmer”
    “One settler, one bullet”
    We now live in peace together here. Nobody wan “driven into the sea”, which is a natural threat made to all colonialists in the anti-colonial struggle, and not just to Israelis.
    tyroler, you believe you are facing an intransigent, unreasonable enemy because that is what you want to believe. It suits you to believe that. It is the “total strategy/total onslaught” syndrome and in your mind it justifies any atrocity that your forces may indulge in.

19. Helena:
    I agree with you up to a point, and that point ends in southern Lebanon. My problem with Hizbullah as a political organization is that it (1) has its own army, (2) refuses to place its armed forces under state command or allow effective state control in the south, and (3) claims the right to unilaterally determine and act upon Lebanese national security. Hizbullah doesn’t need ministries; it already has what it wants out of the Lebanese political system by acting as a state within a state. Participation in municipal elections gives it the opportunity to expand that state into central and northern Lebanon. I have no quarrel with Hizbullah the political party – in fact, it’s arguably a model for other former guerrilla groups entering politics – but Hizbullah the unaccountable quasi-state is another story.
    I also don’t think a discussion of Hizbullah’s role in Lebanon’s internal and external affairs would be complete without mentioning (1) its relationship with Syria, and (2) the fact that it basically invented the Sheba’a Farms issue (notwithstanding UN certification of Israel’s complete withdrawal) as an excuse to keep the border hot. I’d argue that, without those factors, there would be no need for mutual deterrence along the Israeli-Lebanese border. No sane Israeli wants to go back into Lebanon at this point, particularly if the border stays quiet; the best defense against Israel is to make peace with it.
    Wm. Tyroler:
    There’s a substantial distinction between an organization’s goals and its ability to carry out those goals. As matters stand, the only way Hizbullah could pose a conventional military threat to Israel’s existence would be if it acquired WMDs – and even then, its status as a quasi-state would probably make it unwilling to face the consequences of using WMDs. It also hasn’t been able to establish itself very well in the Palestinian territories; Nasrallah wants to do so (and hoped that his brokering of prisoner exchanges would help) but thus far hasn’t been able to elbow out the established factions.
    In any event, Helena’s focus seems to be on Hizbullah’s role in Lebanese politics and national security. Its activities along the Israeli-Lebanese border are directly relevant to that topic, while its activities in the Palestinian territories are largely tangential.
    Dominic:
    The difference between Israel and South Africa is that in the latter, no organization tried to put the slogan “one settler, one bullet” into effect. (Yes, I know about Umkhonto we Sizwe; it did bomb a few civilian locations, but nearly all its attacks were on strategic targets.) In addition, the main umbrella resistance group – the ANC – was very pointedly not an African nationalist organization, went out of its way to include whites and made clear in all its policy statements that whites were part of ZA’s future.
    The dynamic of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is very different from South Africa, notwithstanding some superficial similarities. Any facile attempt to shoehorn either the conflict or its solution into a South African model is likely to end badly.

20. JE: The issue isn’t whether there’s a distinction between Hizbollah’s goals and its ability to attain them; it’s whether you can convey an accurate picture without so much as mentioning those goals. Ms. Cobban omitted Hizbollah’s stated intent to destroy Israel, and omitted Hizbollah’s efforts to carry out its aggressive intent in the territories. She also neglected to mention that Hizbollah is closely allied with Iran. (She then denied that Hizbollah indeed wanted to wipe Israel off the map, but let that pass.)
    Your view, apparently, is that, well, no problem on two counts:
    1) The post was focused exclusively on internal Lebanese politics. So? Forget the potentially distorting effects of the “external” Iranian influence on “internal” Lebanese poltics: You can’t seriously maintain that Hizbollah’s ideological desire to rid the world of Israel, and its attempt to project itself into the territories, is irrelevant even to “internal” Lebanese politics. It’s as if you discussed LePen without mentioning, oh by the way, his platform includes an anti-immigration plank.
    2) Besides (you also say), Hizbollah hasn’t (yet) figured out a way to pose a strategic threat. Right, well, until that great and glorious day let’s just ignore its fevered intent.

21. Jonathan, you make some good points. Of course in the actual article I’m writing I do go into the relatinship with Syria at greater length. (Wm seemed not to comprehend the difference between the “jotting-down-notes” nature of many blog posts and a finished article. I expect you do.) Notwithstanding that though I still think it’s most useful to understand Hizbullah as first and foremost a Lebanese political phenomenon, which is what it is, rather than perpetuating the general myth now so prevalent in many western circles that it’s some kind of a basically “foreign”, Syrian or Iranian implant into Lebanon. It isn’t. Most of its funding comes from Lebanese emigres abroad, primarily in West Africa; and certainly all the people who vote for it and give it political and financial support from inside Lebanon are purely Lebanese.
    Yes, it does have military units in the south. But I would not go as far as calling these an “army”. Indeed, one of the reasons H has so militarily effective where the PLO units that preceded it there were so ineffective has been that’s never gotten sucked into using things like creaky old tanks, or trying to hang onto massive fixed positions. It has excelled at is doing guerrilla warfare, and those are the kinds of units it has.
    The Lebanese government has zero interest in taking strategic responsibility for the border area these days and has been quite hapy to continue with the policy of, in effect, subcontracting that responsibility out to Hizbullah. The resulting situation along the entire border except the Shebaa Farms area has been remarkably stable, and the people living both sides of it have appreciated that.
    yes, Hizbollah and the Lebanese and Syrian governments did all kind of pull the Shebaa Farms issue “out of a hat” back in 2000– though it’s not that it didn’t have any antecedents as an issue before then. Still, Israel has found that situation quite manageable, too; so no need for big alarms over that, either.
    I quite agree with you that a sound, final-status peace in which all issues are resolved is the best guarantee for everyone’s longterm security. That applies to the Lebanese, Israelis, Syrians, and Palestinians: all of them need to grasp that issue fair, square, and soon. But we saw that the Likud government’s attempt to force a one-sided “peace” agreement on Lebanon in early 1983 got nowhere, and only further fueled the growth of Hizbullah and its sister-organizations back then. Next time round let’s hope everyone involved is both more realistic and more generous-hearted. (I believe in the context of final peace talks, the Lebanese may present quite a large bill to Israel for reparations for the large human and material losses suffered during 18 years of occupation.)

22. Jonathan, it’s easy to find differences especially when you prefer not to look at the similarities. What you have is the subjective paranoia, exactly like that of the South African whites under the old regime. That particular similarity cannot be washed away.
    At the risk of being led away from this obvious overwhelming truth, let me correct a couple of your errors. It was the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC) which had the slogan “one settler one bullet” and it certainly did “try to put it into effect”. Ask Mrs Biehl about it.
    The Afican National Congress is an African Nationalist organisation. It is absurd to say otherwise. What that reveals in you, I think, is a mentality which says “My nationalism is civilised, theirs is not. But if theirs turns out to be civilised, then it couldn’t have been nationalism in the first place”. Rot.
    Actually, all this illustrates my point perfectly. You are going on assumptions. You put the worst possible construction upon your opponent’s intentions, and then use these assumptions of yours to justify killing, torture, imprisonment, and house-bulldozing.
    I want to tell you that it is the house-bulldozing that makes me want to cry all the time. I know it is not the worst thing, but somehow I just can’t bear it.

23. One final remark: the claim that the initial post was merely about “internal” Hizbollah / Lebanese politics is an obvious dodge. Indeed, the bulk of the post is introduced with this tease: “Oh, and about their relationship with Israel…” And that led to thinly-veiled criticism of Israeli “aggression” against Hizbollah, along with sarcasm about Israeli perceptions of the threat posed by the group.
    So, the post was concerned in the main with Hizbollah’s interactions with Israel — something that, the post averred, made a “fascinating story.” Well, yes, and even more fascinating when you refuse even to acknowledge let alone address the murderous intent of one of the parties. But that, of course, would take JWN places where it doesn’t want to go.

24. tyroler, head in the sand, backside in the air.
    When you take a breath, you have just enough time to gasp: “Look at their murderous intent! Kill more of them! Quickly! Now! Now!”
    Then the head goes back in the sand. What a horrible sight you are.

25. Helena:
    I understand the difference between rough notes and a completed article; that’s why I didn’t make my points in an accusatory manner (or at least not intentionally). I agree that the “subcontracting” of border security to Hizbullah is at least as much a problem of the Lebanese state as of Hizbullah or any of its patrons, and I take your point about it being a guerrilla force rather than an army (although I’d point out that such a force is uniquely unsuited for maintaining frontier security). And it is important to understand Hizbullah as a Lebanese phenomenon, not least because Hamas is likely to make a similar transformation.
    I guess we’re not all that far apart on this, although I’m still less sanguine about Hizbullah’s intentions vis-a-vis Israel. Yes, the conflict along the border is “manageable,” but now that the Israeli occupation has been over for more than four and a half years, there’s no reason for it to exist at all. The whole Sheba’a Farms issue seems symptomatic of an intention to artificially prolong the conflict, whether or not in a manageable way.
    Dominic:
    You’re making quite a few assumptions about what I do and don’t justify, aren’t you?
    Since we’re psychoanalyzing each other’s comments now, I think what yours reveals is that you don’t know me very well. I’m inclined both by training and by temperament to look for parallels between situations – Helena will tell you that. On the other hand, I don’t let parallels between two situations fool me into thinking that they are the same – i.e., that they are necessarily driven by the same force, or that they can always be solved by the same method. Sometimes they can, sometimes they can’t, and
    I will clarify what I meant about the ANC, because it goes to the heart of one of those differences. (As far as the PAC goes, I think Joe Slovo’s remark that it “intensified an armed struggle that it had suspended for thirty years” was pretty much on the money.) I agree that the ANC was a nationalist organization, but it espoused South African nationalism, not a specifically black African nationalism. At no point, as far as I’m aware, did the ANC advocate black self-determination separate from white South Africans, or argue that minorities should not be part of South Africa. The ANC nationalist model is that of the “rainbow nation,” which is an admirable one if all parties agree to it.
    Palestinian nationalism is something different. The overwhelming majority of Palestinian factions don’t want to establish a rainbow nation – they want independent self-determination. That’s an entirely legitimate goal and one that I support, but it shows why the South African model can’t be applied to the I-P conflict (at least not without major adjustments). It seems self-evident to me that if the goals of two nationalist movements are different, then the resolution of their struggle will be different. In ZA’s case, the resolution was a rainbow nation. In the case of the I-P conflict, it will be two independent states.

26. Jonathan, the “National Question” in South Africa is something we are still working on. “Rainbow Nation” is a piece of nonsense invented by the Anglican bishop, Desmond Tutu, who has never been a member of the ANC.
    I don’t know if the “2-state solution” was ever a Palestinian idea. It looks like a dead duck right now, anyway.
    You want to stick on me that I am psychonalysing you. Meanwhile, you are supposed to be allowed to psychonalyse Palestinians, Lebanese, Iranians &c. to your heart’s content. No, I am going by what you write, that’s all.
    You and tyroler want to drive down any consideration of Hezbollah as a mass organisation of the people. If ever there is a parallel with the ANC, that’s it, and you don’t want to let it past. That alone tells me enough. There is good mass organisation, which is not conspiracy, and you don’t want to know.
    The “National Question” is hard work. You can’t be bothered even to start. Of course, as an ANC member, I’m not impressed with you.

27. You and tyroler want to drive down any consideration of Hezbollah as a mass organisation of the people
    I have never said this. Dominic, when you’re ready to stop putting words in my mouth, let me know.

28. I’m reading Helena and the comment she generates for better insight into mass movements in the anti-imperialist struggle in the Middle East.
    What I see is that there are others coming here who want to close down such an examination in favour of the universal demonising of all popular organisations as having “murderous intent” and no other features.
    If that cap doesn’t fit you, Jonathan, fair enough. Then let’s get on and have a good look at what really is out there.

29. If I wanted to continue the conversation with Wm., I would ask him just how he comes to the conclusion that undertaking an extrajudicial execution of someone, under any circumstances, is NOT an aggressive act.
    Especially, perhaps, when it involves traveling to a foreign country and doing this. Israel has been doing this in Lebanon for more than 30 years now.
    Extrajudicially going out and intentionally snuffing out the lives of people whom they “accuse” (but always in secret hearings) of doing bad things is another habit the Israelis have in common with S. Africa’s old apartheid regime. Btselem’s count of the number of Palestinians killed in that way in the OPTs since the beginning of the intifada is somewhere above 130 at this point, I believe.
    If Wm wants to defend this practice, perhaps he should start his own blog and express himself there?

30. Well said, Helena.
    I can count at least three individual people I knew personally who were extrajudicially “snuffed out” by South Africa’s old regime.
    The Israelis have turned it into an industry.

31. A lot of people say that the greatest beneficiaries of South Africa’s liberation are the whites. They have not been as secure as they are now for decades past.
    The old regime tried to pick off leaders so as to weaken the mass organisations of the people. These are the same organisations that now defend the security of the whites.
    The assassinations the Israelis are doing are of exactly the same kind. They may accuse people of bad things as you put it Helena, but it is leadership they are after: heroes, not criminals.
    The Israeli military establishment, like the old South African “securocrats”, are trying to remove the option of a settlement with the mass organisations of the oppressed, by assassinating the leaders of the oppressed.
    They cannot succeed becasue the “peace of the brave” is always an option. It always will be.

32. If that cap doesn’t fit you, Jonathan, fair enough.
    Since you’re the one who’s putting the cap on me, maybe you can tell me where it does fit. Was it where I said “I have no quarrel with Hizbullah the political party – in fact, it’s arguably a model for other former guerrilla groups entering politics?” Yeah, I can see how you might confuse that with “universal demonising of all popular organisations as having ‘murderous intent’ and no other features.”
    And while we’re at it, I’d like to know the exact words in which I “justify killing, torture, imprisonment, and house-bulldozing,” given that you claim to derive that from what I write.
    Anyway…
    Then let’s get on and have a good look at what really is out there.
    All right then, let’s have one more go at comparing Palestinian and South African nationalism.
    Upon rereading the ANC’s policy statement on nation-building, I realize that you’re right about “rainbow nation” being a popular conceptualization of its doctrine rather than an official position. (Given that Madiba has used it, I think that’s an understandable mistake). At the same time, it’s clear throughout that the ANC’s program includes the creation of a common, nonracial South African identity – not a white nation as the apartheid-era government intended or a black nation as the PAC advocated. (If you, as an ANC member, believe I’m wrong about this, please correct me.)
    The goal of the overwhelming majority of Palestinian nationalists, in contrast, is Palestinian Arab self-determination. As the 1968 PLO charter indicates, this is seen in terms of an Arab state. Article 6 defines as Palestinians “the Jews who had normally resided in Palestine until the beginning of the Zionist invasion,” which has generally been interpreted to mean the indigenous Jews who resided in the Mandate prior to the first yishuv in the 1880s. This is basically equivalent to a South African group stating that South Africans include those whites who were there before the Dutch. It is also premised on complete denial of Jewish nationhood (see article 20) and a view of Jews as a religious group only. In other words, the PLO was a specifically Arab nationalist group – in fact, a form of ethnonationalism somewhat like Zionism itself.
    At a certain point beginning in the late 1980s, the goal of the PLO member groups shifted from “a Palestinian state in place of Israel” to “a Palestinian state alongside Israel,” and toward acceptance of Jewish nationhood. But while this was a change in tactical aims, it was still a reformulation of the same basic goal: Palestinian self-determination within an Arab state. You’re right that the two-state solution was not originally a Palestinian idea (although the Palestine People’s Party supported it prior to 1948), but most of the Palestinian factions have now embraced that idea as a means of achieving their nationalist goals. The idea of a binational state has gained relatively little traction within the movement beyond a few intellectuals, many of whom realize that it’s impractical as matters currently stand.
    The critical difference is that, in the South African case, there was enough of a shared sense of belonging in a single nation that the idea of a common identity was feasible. This sense of belonging is not present in Israel and Palestine. Maybe if the Mandate had lasted longer, such a common identity might have developed, but it didn’t. This means (at least to me) that the only viable solution is separatism, because an artificially created binational state would go the way of other such states where shared identities were never developed – for instance, Cyprus, Bosnia and Lebanon.
    And Lebanon, of course, brings us back to Hizbullah. What you call a “mass movement in the anti-imperialist struggle in the Middle East,” I see as a quasi-state that is a contender for power within Lebanon and the region. As such, it’s more multifaceted than a simple “anti-imperialist” label; it’s also a popular movement, a military force and a governing body, and its ideology embraces subjects other than imperialism (e.g., corruption and Islamic social issues). To a great extent, it has transcended its Shi’ite roots, which gives it more popular appeal within Lebanon but has also distanced it from its founding ideology. It seems to me that the key aspect of Hizbullah is not any single part of its program but the way it has transformed from a primarily military faction into a political party. There are quite a few other factions in the region that might profit from the example, and some that are already doing so.

33. If I wanted to continue the conversation with Wm., I would ask him just how he comes to the conclusion that undertaking an extrajudicial execution of someone, under any circumstances, is NOT an aggressive act.
    Not exactly an invitation to respond, but nonetheless: you seem to misapprehend my concern; I didn’t critcize your characterization in and of itself, I merely referenced a crucial underlying feature that you omitted. How do people in certain quarters put it? Like this: you decontextualized the narrative. It might or might not justify Israel’s “aggressive act” but Hezbollah’s own murderous (and arguably genocidal) intent is undeniably relevant to making such a judgment.
    If Wm wants to defend this practice, perhaps he should start his own blog and express himself there? Not to eat further into your bandwidth, but if nothing else this has been a livelier discussion than usually graces your board: what’s wrong with that?

34. Dear Jonathan,
    Thank you for the long response. I

35. P.S. On the ANC web site you can read our President’s famous weekly letter, and all the back numbers if you wish.
    How many other Presidents do that? I bet George W Bush doesn’t!

36. Thank you for the long response.
    And thanks for yours. I’ve got an answer, but you’ll probably have to wait until after the new year.
    I’ll clear up one misconception now, though; I’m not Israeli, I’m American. That doesn’t mean I look on the situation with detachment, of course; it’s just a different kind of attachment, no doubt like yours.

37. It seems that all the partitions of occurred around the same time; Late 1940s to early 1950s. One would suspect a hidden hand. Perhaps we will know more in due course, if we live long enough.
    These partitions were Germany, India, South Africa (National Party Government 1948), Israel, Korea, and Vietnam.
    With the exception of Germany (unless you count the Cold War and/or Yugoslavia) all these partitions caused wars. The threat of war is still imminent in Korea, India, and Israel.
    There was no good faith in any of these partitions. Therefore it is idle to argue pros and cons. All the partitions have been disastrous. Thank goodness the Koreans want to end theirs, although the US is obstructing them. The Indians and Pakistanis are talking. Leaving Israel as the hold-out.

38. While we are looking at history, Afghanistan achieved independence in 1919, I think it was, Egypt in 1920, and Iraq in 1927. These dates are not too far out. The point is that the first wave of independence struggles, not forgetting also developments in Iran and Turkey, took place in that Middle East region, soon after the great Russian Revolution of October 1917.
    The second wave began after WW2, surged in the 1960s, reached a finale with South Africa, (leaving a few minor strays). Now we are dealing with reaction, right back where the process started. But the trend is still one way, which is towards independence, and self-determination.
    A luta continua!

39. Dominic’s rhapsodizes about the Zionists chucking their history in favor of a new national identity in a future Palestine. (And, he says expectantly, under the watchful gaze and informed tutelage of Fair Helena — who seemingly is uncncerned with the badnwidth taken up trying to show that Israel is indeed an abomination — worse than apartheid! — and thus must be dismantled).
    My prior reference to Hezbollah’s stated intent to wipe Israel off the map — a factually indisputable assertion — elicited impassioned claims by Dominic that I was paranoid. Nonetheless, he now avers that, by the way, partition was a scourge, that Israel is an apartheid state (worse, for that matter, because the Jews actually deigned to defend themselves with a security fence). Why, he says, once the Jews see that all they need to do is build a new national consciousness, they will gladly join the Palestinians in a workers’ paradise.
    Nice piece of work, Dominic. You share Hezbollah’s goal of eliminating Israel. Dress it up any way you want: the Jews can’t go against the tide of history; they’re better off anyway in a new and better state; etc. But bottom line is the same. If Hezbollah represents the crocodile’s bared teeth, you represent the crocodile’s malevolent smile. And, yes, I’m wary (paranoid, if you prefer) of the croc’s offer of ferrying across the river.

40. Gosh I’m tired. I feel as though we’ve had these discussions on “wiping Israel off the map” etc numerous times already. So I’m going to close this comments threat in a moment.
    In a fairly civilized discussion I had with Jonathan someplace, on another JWN thread I think, we discussed issues like whether all national groups necessarily have a “right” to a state. It seems to me that whenever the extremely plausible idea of a binational state–as pioneered by Judah Magnes, Martin Buber, etc– is raised these days, some ultra-staunch defenders of Israel get very exercized and accuse the idea’s proponent of deep anti-Semitism, of unfairly singling out the Jewish people as being not entitled to their own state, etc etc.
    But as I pointed out to Jonathan, there are plenty of “national” groups– many of them of considerably greater size than the Jewish people– that don’t have their own soveriegn states. If people can have a rational discussion about the desirability or non-desirability of fully independent soveriegn statehood for, e.g., the Kurds, the Catalans, the Afrikaaners, the Luxembourgeois, the Kosovars, the Palestinians, the Germans, etc etc– why on earth not have such a discussion with respect to the Jewish people?
    As I recall, Jonathan pointed out that of the many peoples I had mentioned in my earlier question to him, it was only in the case of the Jews that the discussion concerned the disestablishment of an existing national state. So that’s why I added “the Germans” in to the above list, because of course the big trend in Europe over the past 50 years has been precisely to dissolve many of the aspects of sovereign statehood into a broader shared sovereignty.
    I think that is what nearly everyone who these days wants to discuss a unitary-state outcome in Israel/Palestine is talking about, too. It is certainly very possible to discuss the concept of a unitary state in which all the existing Jewish-Israeli citizens retain the entire gamut of civil and political rights that they now have. No-one in this discussion is talking about stripping Jewish Israelis of their democratic rights, but two other major changes would need to be made: the Palestinians would be accorded exactly equal rights to those enjoyed by the Jewish Israelis; and the extreme (and extremely anti-democratic) forms of anti-goy discrimination that now exist in Israel in the crucial areas of immigration policy and land-use policy would have to end. It is truly amazing that a non-Israeli Jewish person from LA or wherever who enjoys stable citizenship in a wealthy, non-Israeli country now has more “right” to immigrate to Israel than a Palestinian who was born there and then expelled, and may have been living stateless and destitute for nearly 60 years now. It’s also extremely anti-democratic that said Jewish person from LA should have access to land-rights in 93% of the land of Israel that are far, far greater than those enjoyed by the 20% of Israelis who happen not to be Jewish.
    But talk about “wiping israel off the map” takes no account of the exciting possibilities of such rights-equalization moves and simply plays to the fears of the same kind of people who once expressed extreme fears that “the Jews are about to be driven into the sea”– all the while, driving large numbers of Palestinian Arabs off their lands and into a quite frequently more than figurative “desert”.
    People can share land and resources, in Palestine/Israel as elsewhere. Is that so hard to understand? If the members of the two peoples choose to share the land of Mandate Palestine within a single binational state or in two states, that’s overwhelmingly up to them. But if there is to be an independent “Jewish” state, then justice and good sense alike indicate that the Palestinian state established alongside it within the bounds of Mandate Palestine should have completely equal independence and sovereignty and a proportional share of the land’s resources.
    After all, what possible basis could there be for peprpetuating the presently existing inequalities between the two peoples into the long term? I hope no-one here would suggest that one of the two peoples is somehow more intrinsically “deserving” of benefits than the other? Both have suffered a lot in the past. Most of the historic suffering of the jJwish people did not, of course, occur at the hands of the Palestinians or other Arabs, but at those of Europeans. Jewish people in Israel and elsewhere have, over the decades, benefitted from the “reparations” that Germany (mainly) has paid to the survivors of the Shoah. But when will the Palestinians see any reparations at all for the massive material (and human) losses they suffered in 1948, and that they have continued to suffer at Israel’s hands since then? It is way past time that they were thus compensated and “repaired”, and that they and their Israeli neighbors be allowed to live in a region freed from the perpetuation of inter-group conflict.

41. Since the thread is reopened, I will throw in another two cents on Hizbullah that comes from talking to a Lebanese Shia’ friend. From his point of view, the civil war is not actually over. That is, the imbalances within the political system have not been addressed. The Christian militas have not disbanded, the Syrians are still an occupying power, and the Lebanese Army is still a joke. So why would Hizbullah unilaterally disarm?
    Also, as Helena points out in another post, Hizbullah provides basic services that the Lebanese government cannot or will not provide. The Christian areas still get a disproportionate share of available resources. Until political power and economic resources are redistributed more equitably, the status quo will continue.
    One thing that has changed is the place of the Palestinians. Palestian power has been effectively broken in the south, and they no longer pose a threat to Israel. It is Hizbullah that is keeping them in check, and keeping the border stable. The Lebanese Shia’ are not fond of their Palestinian “guests” in the slightest, to put it mildly.
    Whatever the rhetoric may be, Hizbullah represents the needs and aspirations of it constituents, primarily Lebanese Shia’, who do not have the slightest interest in invading or harming Israel, but are mindful that Israel has harmed and invaded them.

42. Haydar’s point about Lebanon today makes me wonder, then, how much of a “state” Lebanon actually is nowadays. Typically, when we (in modern political parlance, anyways) speak of a “state,” it refers to an authority endowed with a monopoly over authority and the means to enforce it. Haydar’s description, and the poins raised by Jonathan E. earlier, suggests that Lebanon is still, to a large degree, divided into regions where political militias (one might, I supposed, count the Syrians as one such militia) rather than the “state” hold sway, while the official Lebanese “government” does nothing worthwhile. It seems also to follow naturally, then, that it would be pointless for anyone to negotiate with the “Lebanese,” but rather with individual militias separately–say, with Hizbullah or Damascus, but not necessarily with Beirut.

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