Sunday, May 11, 2008

Experts of the Council of Foreign Relations. Israeli Orientalists have a lot of influence on US terrorism (and Orientalist) experts. The Washington Post here thought it was doing its readers a service by linking to a report on Hizbullah written by "the staff" of the Council of Foreign Relations. It says:
"Who are Hezbollah's leaders? Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah is considered the group's spiritual leader." This is a common Israeli misconception (and explains why Israeli planes bombed houses and institutions of Fadallah during the Israeli war on Lebanon in 2006.) And of course, whatever misconceptions originate in Israel, they found their ways into US think tanks, media, and government. In reality, Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah NEVER served as "spiritual guide" of Hizbullah, and in fact had a bitter feud with Hizbullah for much of the 1990s and it continued up to 2005. There were fatwawawas and counter-fatwawawas between the two sides, and a Lebanon-based Iranian cleric specialized (with Hizbullah support) in countering the (relatively) liberal fatwawawas of Fadlallah. It is fair to say that Israeli attacks on Fadlallah's house and schools during the Israeli war on Lebanon ended the feud between Hizbullah and Nasrallah, and radicalized the cleric, who had changed much of his views in the 1990s, and moved away from Khumayni's theory of Wilayat Al-Faqih. So the Washington Post needs to alert the Council on Foreign Relations which needs to alert its Israeli sources that they are...wrong.