May Shidyaq...Dismayed: And Feltman Pontificates

May Shidyaq had a special show commemorating the death of Jubran Tuwayni and Lebanese Army General, Francois Al-Hajj. She had Al-Hajj's son, Elie, along with the daughter of Tuwayni, who can barely finish a sentence in Arabic. Al-Hajj's son had excellent command in Arabic and always appears poised on TV. She asked him whether the Lebanese Army should monopolize force on Lebanese territory. He went on to speak about the suffering of South Lebanon under Israeli occupation, and said that Israeli agents bombed his father's car early in the Lebanese civil war. He said the Lebanese Army does not have the equipments or the men/women to resist Israeli occupation and that resistance groups agaisnt Israeli occupation have the right to exist. Shidyaq was so upset that she looked like she wanted to throw sharp metal objects at him. But an American military person who served in UNIFIL in South Lebanon in the late 1970s had told me that Al-Hajj had very strong views against Israel and its crimes. In the first segment of the show, Shidyaq interviewed (for fawned over) former US ambassador in Lebanon, Jeffrey Feltman. The man annoys me more than any other American diplomat around the world. You feel he belongs to an era prior to the century in which international consensus over the right to self-determination was reached. He offers opinions about internal Lebanese matters that would cause the Lebanese ambassador in DC to be transferred to Guantanamo if he were to offer similar opinions. HE also had a tone of arrogance and condescension toward the people of Lebanon even while pretending to be a supporter of "Lebanon"--and Lebanon for him is no more than a junkyard and training ground for Israel. This man's Zionist fanatacism is comparable only to those who work at the offices of the New Republic. When asked (in passing of course) about Israeli occupation of Lebanese territories, he makes it a technical matter as if Israel has never posed a threat or even dropped a bomb over Lebanon. If Lebanon was an indepdent country, and if Lebanon was a homeland with an atom of self-respect, Feltman would have been asked implitely to go and play with marbles somewhere else, as they say in Lebanon. Feltman wants us to believe that Israeli occupation of Shib`a farms, Kfar Shuba hills, and Ghajar village is a matter of mapping, no more. Who are you fooling Mr. Feltman? You really think that you are engaged in smart propaganda? You are as effective in crude propaganda as Hurra TV among Arab public opinion.

PS Forgot to mention an important part. She interviewed also Mark Kimmitt (assistant secretary of state). She told him that people in Lebanon are mocking US military assistance to Lebanon. He said, to the effect, oh, no. The assistance is quite significant. He said that the new tanks that were provided by the US to Lebanon are really effective especially in attacking refugee camps. I kid you not.