"90 % of us are pimps"; and there is a fly in my...Hummus. I was at a cafe with a British correspondent. It was the first time I see somebody eat Hummus with..French fries. And then a fly landed in the Hummus. It was so tempting to yell out: "o waiter. There is a fly in my Hummus." I was walking to the GYM this morning, while talking on the cellphone. I noticed that this guy, who was eating a manqushah, was following me. I stopped, and he stopped. I walked, and he followed me. I got off the phone, and he said: "I have to talk to you." He added: "I see you on TV speaking passionately about the Arabs. But don't you agree with me that we all are pimps ('akarit)?" I asked him what he meant by "we." He said: "Arab peoples." I said: "No, I don't agree that we are all pimps, unless you are talking about the Arab governments." He said: "OK, don't you at least agree that 90% of us Arabs are pimps?" He then proceeded to express his outrage at Arab public apathy at carnage in Palestine. The carnage in Palestine. When you watch those events, words--all words--seem trivial and silly. The Palestinians, as always, face Israeli brutality while the Arabs--governments and people--are busy doing something else; many are busy watching the sleazy programs of LBC or watching the World Cup finals. I saw footage of a huge demonstration in...TURKEY. The plight of this one Israeli soldier is now everywhere. His life is, according to CNN and UN, worth more than the lives of all the Palestinian peoples combined. Are you trying to convince me that even resistance against Israel, even when directed against brutal Israeli soldiers, is illegitimate? But this is the crux of the problem. When Western voices speak against suicide bombings they really don't mean to imply that they would not object at Palestinian attacks on Israeli military targets. They mean that the Palestinians should just accept their subjugation and occupation with glee. That is right; with glee. This one Israeli soldier--who most likely has killed scores of Palestinian civilians--I mean given the record of that army, the chance is that once you serve in that army, you will most likely kill Palestinian civilians WITH GLEE. That is the message of Zionism. Hamas: how foolish they now seem, despite all the pressures and the clear signs of an US/Israeli/UN/EU/Arab government conspiracy against free Palestinian elections. For the life of me, I still don't understand why Hamas did not get rid (politically speaking "of course") of Abu Mazen and Dahlan first: by putting them behind bars, and charging them with collaboration with foreign enemy occupation. Every national resistance movement dealt with collaborators--in the US war of independence, the French resistance, the Algerian resistance, and the Vietnamese resistance movement. Why should the Palestinian movement act differently? The standards are always different with Palestinians, and the Palestinians should from now on insist on adhering to their own national standards, and not to the standards of white colonial settlers dripping with contempt for other races. It is high time for the Palestinian national movement to discard the Oslo process altogether, and to go underground. That requires an end to any Arab governmental role: Arab governments, since the 1936 revolt in Palestine, always interfere to ease the way for Zionist colonization. The lessons are not absorbed yet. One lousy Israeli occupation soldier is getting all that media coverage: where was Kofi Annan when Huda Ghalyah was running around the beach of Gaza checking on the dead body of her father? Where were they when Israeli fighter jets were killing children? More than before, I now firmly believe that the early slogan of George Habash--from which he later wavered--("The Road to Palestine Passes through every Arab capital") is so true. You will not read in your press that the Jordanian government has decided to prosecute a poet (Ibrahim Nasrallah) because a poem of his referred to Jordanian massacres of Palestinians in 1970-1971. I have the poem in question, and will reproduce and translate for you when I return to US. And the Egyptian government, crying "law and order" a la Nixon, confiscated illegal copies of Davinci Code. The security of the state was at stake, one police person said. Here in Lebanon people are mocking the "dialogue" sessions. Those dialogue sessions. Mini-Hariri has started to spread money in the last month. He received reports and inside polling that his standing is slipping. This explains his latest visit to Sunni neighborhoods, where mostly kids showed up to greet him on cue. Each family in Tariq Jadidah neighborhood received a $100 the day before. Just like Saddam's visits to Iraqi families in 1980s. And M. went to Sporting "swimming center" here in Beirut to register her family. She wanted to include the nanny. "What is the color of the nanny's skin?", the attendant asked her. She went elsewhere. I met with youths from the Lebanese Communist Party; it was frustrating. But it is courageous to be communist in these times, and under current circumstances. But the Lebanese Communist Party lacks initiative and determination. They are running away from their ideology, thereby giving the impression of principleness. CNN International has changed; it now copies the fluff of the American CNN. It is the trend. Look at lousy AlArabiyya. Polls here show that New TV has the most watched evening newscast. It has credibility: they attack Syrian intelligence and mini-Hariri. And no: I am not saying that becuase they air segments from my talks here, wherever I give them. Only last month have people started to criticize, albeit timidly, Rafiq Hariri in the public media. Here, I refer to the government as "sulalah hakimah"--the ruling dynasty. Neighbors of mini-Hariri complain about the security measures that are imposed in a large radius around mini-Hariri's residence. But mini-Hariri is learning...the alphabet. If I have time, I plan to go to Lady of Bishwat church, to take pictures and report on the miracles for you. A foreign correspondent here--who once worked for the paper--tells me that Daily Start is like a college Newspaper. This blog, not to be confused with "that blog", can make things more difficult for me. A major leader here complained to me about something I wrote about him months ago on my blog. How did he know, I wondered to myself. Another major leader's member of parliament complained to my sister that I dared to criticize his leader on TV, and that those criticisms don't apply to his leader. Wait: I see something. "O Waiter. There is a fly in my Hummus."