Monday, June 18, 2007

So I should report on the views of my mother now. Her and I have been discussing the events in Lebanon. Lately, she has come around on one issue. Knowing of my views against the very existence of Lebanon as an entity, she would always ask me how that is possible. I would tell her that the dissolution of the entity (into a larger Arab entity) is the solution. But Lebanon is not "like sugar," she would always counter. I told her that the dissolution of Lebanon as an entity strikes many Lebanese today as offensive because they fear a link with the lousy Syrian regime. But I said that imagine when Syria is run well, and the Asad regime is overthrown (and hopefully not by the Muslim Brotherhood or the Khaddam version of Ba`thism): Lebanon would be better served by dissolving into a larger Arab entity. Like the Zionist entity, Lebanon has posed a danger to, and inflicted harm on, its inhabitants and on the Palestinian cause. My mother is not pleased with my scorn and contempt for lousy Lebanese Army. She likes the Lebanese commander-in-chief: she finds him refreshingly non-showy and low-key. When I told her that he is related to Syrians by marriage (his son married the daughter of Jubran Kuriyyah, the long-time spokesperson of Hafidh Al-Asad), she was even more impressed. She finds him non-sectarian. Unlike me, she does not blame the Lebanese Army for the Nahr Al-Barid carnage. She puts all the blame on Hariri Inc and the March 14th crowd (like all or most old Beiruti families with property in downtown Beirut, she hated Rafiq Hariri from the very beginning, although she believes that his successors are even worse than him). She thinks that the Lebanese Army was dragged into this by Hariri Inc.