How you can end the violence in Iraq and Somalia simultaneously. Well, you may have heard of a brilliant new security plan for Baghdad. I recommend that we import the security plan for Baghdad into Somalia, and thus we can solve two problems. Under the new plan for both countries, peace and prosperity will prevail in two places, all thanks to the Bush Doctrine. Good night.

I read that Tariq Aziz and other Saddam's henchmen cried when they heard of Saddam's execution. Where were their tears when Saddam was killing Iraqis in the thousands?

"Israel is now an army state. Military law has taken over once again - this time in the entire country." (If an Arab has written this, it would be dismissed as propaganda).

Editorial judgment: the New York Times printed today a picture of a pro-Saddam demonstration in Beirut on its front page. Lebanese newspapers noted that the demonstration was quite small, and the New York Times even admitted that there were hundreds only spearheaded by Lebanese Saddam Ba`thist, `Abdul-Majid Ar-Rafi`i. In that sense, hundreds of demonstrators (pro-Saddam) get much more coverage than more than a million anti-Sanyurah demonstrators in Beirut. Like MEMRI, the New York Times and US media in general confine their coverage of Arab public opinion to either pro-Saddam (or pro-Bin Laden) Arabs or to pro-Bush Arabs. The majority of Arabs are in neither camps and they don't get any coverage.

The Harvard sociologist resumes his regular I Love the White Man column in the New York Times.

Evidence of another success for the Bush Doctrine: "In Somalia, Confusion Remains in Command"

That is me.

"Worst of all, perhaps, is that the hanging of Saddam mimicked, in ghostly, miniature form, the manner of his own regime's bestial executions. Saddam's own hangman at Abu Ghraib, a certain Abu Widad, would also taunt his victims before pulling the trap door lever, a last cruelty before extinction. Is this where Saddam's hangmen learned their job? And just who exactly were those leather-jacketed hangmen last week, by the way? No one, it seemed, bothered to ask this salient question. Who chose them? Al-Maliki's militia chums? Or the Americans who managed the whole roadshow from the start, who so organised Saddam's trial that he was never allowed to reveal details of his friendly relations with three US administrations - and thus took the secrets of the murderous, decade-long Baghdad-Washington military alliance to his grave?" (Don't read Fisk on Lebanon).

"U.S. documents showed that the Bush administration will provide $86.4 million to strengthen security forces loyal to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas."

In Hariri magazine, Ash-Shira` (formerly a propaganda outlet of the Libyan regime), there is an interview with an "Egyptian psychiatry expert: Saddam united with his faith, and was outside of his body when he was executed." Apparently, Saddam was watching a movie at the time. OK.

The pro-Saddam demonstration in Amman was without a doubt conceived and manged by the mukhabarat. Even the slogans and banners: some even cited the "Shi`ite crescent" phrase. And the security forces were uncharacteristically cooperative.

My friend Joseph suggests that Saudi media are now resorting to favorable coverage of Saddam in the hope of using the execution to further instigate and aggravate Sunni-Shi`ite discord. He is right. Here, Al-Hayat carries an interview with Saddam's US nurse who tells us that Saddam "smiled a lot and was pleasant."

Here, Chirac estimates the size of the bundle of cash that he usually receives from Arab royals.

Do you want to see the face of angry Arabs? Here is an Angry Arab child in the Jabalya refugee camp.

What is the deal with Al-Akhbar's fawning coverage of the Saudi ambassador in Lebanon? Why don't you put his image on the logo of the paper? Enough already. Today, Al-Akhbar told us that the ambassador had a cold. Poor ambassador.

According to Niqula Nasif's account in Al-Akhbar, the only comment that King `Abdullah made during his meeting with the Hizbullah delegation about the Israeli war on Lebanon was that "aggression is not acceptable." The Hizbullah delegation went all the way to Saudi Arabia to hear those official words. OK.

The Saudi government is funding wars against Hizbulalh and Hamas, and Hizbullah and Hamas love to praise the Saudi government.

Hariri man (and director-general of the Lebanese internal security forces--Hariri militia in Lebanon), Ashraf Rifi says that there is no real Qa`idah in Lebanon, but copy-cat Qa`idah.

Wisam Sa`adah on Arab anti-Persianism and anti-Semitism. (When Wisam is good, he is excellent; and when he is bad, he is bland).

It was sad to see Ma`n Bashshur (who told me stories of Saddam's assassination attempts against him when he split from the Ba`th in the early 1970s) leading a funeral procession for Saddam in Tariq Al-Jadidah. Would it not have been better to organize a funeral procession for the victims of Saddam and Bush in Iraq?

Future executions in Iraq will be "better", says the US, according to Joseph Samahah.

Regarding the post about the fabrication of MEMRI. Here, Gen. Michel `Awn talks about tas`id (escalation) by the opposition in Lebanon but insists that it will remain in the "peaceful framework." That will not be translated by MEMRI. You see why academics, journalists, and diplomats have to learn languages; if you don't, you will be like Thomas Friedman (at least Friedman took a few courses in Arabic but did not do well, I am told) and Judith Miller who rely obsessively on MEMRI's reports. Zalmay Khalildzad, by the way, studied Arabic while at the University of Chicago; his adviser (Prof. Leonard Binder, now at UCLA) told me that he did take Arabic seriously, and was a regular on the Arabic table. He wrote his PhD dissertation on the Pakistani nuclear option. I today watched an ad for foreign language CDs: and the narrator said that the "technology" of the CD has been long in use by US diplomats. Now, I know why the Russian, Chines, and British ambassadors in Lebanon speak fluent Arabic (the Chinese ambassador has a PhD in Arabic literature and she never uses a translator), while the US ambassador has been practicing the word fa-la-fil for the last two years. Keep trying.

To stay on good terms with the US government, Chirac now rations his criticisms of the Iraq war to one speech per year. During the year, Chirac is busy meeting with rich Arabs: with whom he has been enamored since his days as Mayor of Paris. When will Seymour Hirsh publish what he has on that matter? When?

The leader of the Lebanese political party, Carlos Iddi, has no clue. Not only he can't speak Arabic, but he does not understand basic of Lebanese politics. I knew Carlos when I was a graduate student some 20 years ago. He did not care about Lebanon, and did not bother to follow its developments. He did not bother to learn Arabic when his family summoned him to go back to Lebanon after the death of his uncle Raymond. Today, he made a statement. He wanted to use the famous Arabic expression (for bitter criticisms): "what even Malik has not said about wine". Instead, our friend (and clueless) Carlos said: "what has not even been said by Abu Nuwwas about wine." The problem is that Abu Nuwwas praised wine, and poor Carlos did not even know. And Carlos did not mention in this statement that the regime of Saddam Husayn was (allegedly) subsidizing his uncle Raymond in Paris, where he lived in a hotel since he was made to leave Lebanon by the Syrian regime, which tried to kill him a few times.

"In a similar way, Saddam Hussein’s regime was an abominable authoritarian state, guilty of many crimes, mostly toward its own people. However, one should note the strange but key fact that, when the United States representatives and the Iraqi prosecutors were enumerating his evil deeds, they systematically omitted what was undoubtedly his greatest crime in terms of human suffering and of violating international justice: his invasion of Iran. Why? Because the United States and the majority of foreign states were actively helping Iraq in this aggression."

"In the five years since the Sept. 11 attacks, the Bush administration has solidified a trend of supplying high technology weapons and millions of dollars in military assistance to allies in the “war on terror.” Support for the United States – either in its quest to stamp out international terrorist networks, or for its operations in Iraq and Afghanistan – seems to take precedence over other criteria usually taken into account when the United States considers an arms transfer." (thanks May)

How nice: "The Iraqi government has placed a $1.5 billion order with the United States for additional military equipment." (thanks Laleh)

The Lies of MEMRI. You and I know that members of congress (including the new Muslim member of Congress who promised to memorize MEMRI's reports, and recite them in prayers) and the US media rely religiously on the reports of MEMRI and cite them at every corner. I would never link to MEMRI or to any Israeli intelligence source (former or current) but today it issued a report under this headline: "Hizbullah Threatens Violent Escalation to Begin Monday." I thought that maybe there is some new information that I don't know about although I read all Lebanese newspapers last night, and receive all Lebanese TV stations. It turned out that MEMRI just made up that headline and that it was a typical MEMRI fabrication. They attributed the the report to an article by Ibrahim Al-Amin (identified as editor) although he is not the editor of the paper; Joseph Samahah is the editor-in-chief and Al-Amin is chairperson of the board of the company that owns Al-Akhbar. I read the article in question by Al-Amin last night, and said no such things. Al-Amin is not Hizbullah: he is a former Communist fighter who participated in key battles during the Lebanese civil war on the side of the Lebanese Communist Party. The article in question spoke about tas`id (escalation) but in the rhetoric of the opposition in Lebanon, it has been made repeatedly clear that all the steps of escalation will adhere to non-violent struggle and protests. (For MEMRI, you need to read the important expose on it by Brian Whitakker.)

Thus lied Muwaffaq Ar-Rubay`i. Somebody should find us the transcript. Apparently, the permanent Iraqi National Security Adviser, Muwwaffaq Ar-Rubay`i, appeared on CNN today and tried to explain the scene of Saddam's execution--where he was present (allegedly) shooting the cellphone video footage. He said that there was nothing unusual during the execution. But when asked about news that the men present danced on or around the body of Saddam, he claimed that it was customary in Iraq for men to dance on the body of the deceased. Here is a link to the video interview, but the section of the question about dancing, is not on it.

Look who's talking. You guessed right. The new Muslim member of Congress. Well, he has this to say on his website (after blaming the Palestinians for the absence of peace in the Middle East): He wants the Palestinians to recognize "the absolute right of Israel to exist peacefully." Now I am familiar with the obnoxious cliche that Arabs need to "recognize Israel's right to exist" but this is the first time that I find a reference to "the absolute right of Israel to exist." I never understood nor did I like the first reference, and I like even less the new phraseology of this new member of Congress. Watch. This guy will go very far to allay the fears of anti-Muslims in the US. Let me predict: that when Israel kills Arabs: he will say that Israel did not kill enough Arabs. When Israel bombs, he will say that Israeli did not bomb enough. When Israel occupies, he will assert that Israel needs to occupy even more Arab lands. And maybe in a number of years, he will be permitted to take his oath without having to carry a book by Thomas Jefferson. How am I doing, o White Man, asked the new Muslim member of Congress. Very well. Very well. Take your seat now. (thanks Scott)

This brought back Angry Arab memories. This is an interview with Lebanese poet, Qaysar `Afif. `Afif was my philosophy teacher in high school (yes, we have to take Arab/Islamic philosophy in high school) at IC in Beirut. Once during a class, he said something unflattering about Karl Marx. And I was a dogmatic Marxist-Leninist back then. So I was furious, and told him that he can't talk about Marxism when it is very clear that he did not know what he was talking about. I told him that he can't talk to students about Marxism when he was biased and ignorant of the subject matter. What happened was then odd--or so thought Angry Arab brat. He started yelling and screaming--non stop--for something like 20 minutes. Just yelling and screaming at me: "and who do you think you are" he kept saying. "A student", I kept telling him back. Students from other classes came down because they heard the noise. I don't know what it is about me but that happened to me a few times in my school years although I think of myself as easy going. It happened to me once before when I was in what you call junior high here in the US: it was with my Arabic teacher, Hamdi Huwalla. He gave us a sentence as an example of a grammatical form of Arabic speech, and I said that the substance of the statement (about early Islamic history" was quite inaccurate." And he really got mad too, and also started yelling and screaming at me, saying: "You have not even hatched out of the egg" yet, you arrogant kid. I was an arrogant 13 year-old then. I ran into Hamdi Huwalla this summer, and he was most nice and kind to me. It finally happened to me at AUB in a class on Islamic thought with Nadim Nu`aymah. Nu`aymah had (has?) a very annoying habit of having us read a passage (from the Albert Hourani book, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age--I still remember) and then asks us about the intentions each of the authors cited. And if you read the wise teacher's mind, and guess what he understood from it, you were right. Otherwise, you were wrong. It was my last semester as an undergraduate, and I just wanted to finish the ordeal of this course. So one day, he had us read a passage, and he asked that same question: What did the author intend to say. People raised their hands, and offered their interpretations. He thought that they were all wrong. I obviously did not raise my hand. So he said: AbuKhalil. What do you think? And I said: What do I think? I am not going to answer. I refuse to play this game. You want not students, but mind readers, and I am no a mind reader. I watched you play this game all semester long, and want no role in it. So I thought that I gave a polite but firm answer. The man lost it, literally. He started yelling and screaming, and then yelled: I can't see you in the class anymore. Leave the room immediately. I don't want you in the room ever again. So I left. I had to go and talk to him later because I had to graduate. He let me back in, but he stopped playing that game I, noticed. I always tell my students the first day of class that story to remind them that we are not dealing with exact science here. Maybe I should start a new section: Angry Arab memories.

Apparently, some officers in the "new" Iraqi army paid their tributes to Saddam.

The heroic occupation army of Israel today attacked vegetable stands. The vegetables were accused of terrorist links. US Congress acted immediately: all the offending vegetables were put on terrorist-watch lists.

I swear to you that US media invent a new language just to legitimize and rationalize Israeli mass violence against the Palestinians. Look at this headline in the Washington Post: "Israeli Arrest Raid in West Bank Kills 4 Palestinians." Arrest raid? What is that? Was the raid on Dunkirk also "an arrest raid"? Where do they come up with this stuff?

"The New York Daily News today reports on a signing statement President Bush quietly issued two weeks ago, in which he asserts his right to open mail without a warrant. Signing statements have historically been used by presidents mostly to explain how they intend to enforce the laws passed by Congress; Bush has used them to quietly assert his right to ignore those laws."

"Meanwhile in Palestine"

This just in. The saga of the first Muslim congressperson continues. He today pledged that if reelected he will take his next oath on a revised version of the Qur'an: he will permit representatives of the Christian Right to delete whatever they find objectionable, and then he will print a new copy just for the swearing-in.

This is Oslo: "Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh entered the Gaza Strip on Thursday after undergoing unprecedented security measures to ensure that he is not bringing in money or weapons. Haniyeh was returning from a pilgrimage to Islam's holiest city Mecca. The measures were planned by representatives of Israel, the Palestinian Authority, the United States and the European Union."

This is the Fath Movement. "During a short hiatus in the fighting earlier in the week, Haaretz interviewed a member of Fatah and asked him to explain the calm. "The Israelis have no need to worry," he said sadly, "We are just at the start of the war.""

"Even Kuczynski knows women are deluded if they believe getting breast implants is expressing sexual freedom. Because it’s not freedom so much as it is a slavish obedience to the womanly caricatures found in celebrity gossip magazines and ever-proliferating pornography. "We want to be wanted -- by our husbands, by our lovers," Kuczynski writes, as if to mean these men won’t love these women unless they have a D-cup. Some of the women Kuczynski writes about have taken their habit to such an extreme that they get labiaplasty." (thanks Maryam)

It has been more than three years already, but the Iraq war is now officially over. No, I really mean that. The Iraq was has ended. You think that I am being sarcastic, but I really am not. When I read this, I knew that the end has come. Ticker tape parade will soon follow: "Bush shaking up his Iraq team."

"Incoming Archbishop of Warsaw 'spied for communist secret police'" That only proves Robespierre's dictum: that "clerics are to virtue what charlatons are to medicine."

"Historians tend to ignore Pompadour and instead celebrate Don Juan, Casanova, and Cleopatra as the apotheosis of the sexual personae. What they fail to consider, however, is that these latter three, when seducing others, demeaned themselves and their gender considerably."

Not only is he the first Muslim congressperson but he also is the first one to take an oath on a pile of books. Why not add the multiple volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica and Kitab Al-Aghani while you are at it, dude? And how could he carry a book by Thomas Jefferson who (in his book Notes on the state of Virigina) said that "blacks, whether originally a distinct race, or made distinct by time and circumstances, are inferior to the whites in the endowments both of body and mind" and he compares African-Amerians to monkeys? But maybe he is honoring the only worthy achievement of Jefferson. He was the one who introduced the eggplant to the US (having discovered its deliciousness in France).

Well, well, well. Sen. John Kerry not only botches "jokes" but he also botches articles and ideas. Apparently, Ahmad Fatfat made a deep impression on the senator during his visit to Lebanon this winter: "Anyone who has longed for a George Washington or Thomas Jefferson to emerge and lead the fight for democracy in the Middle East should come to Beirut and meet the patriots who have made incredible sacrifices for a free and independent Lebanon. There is the son of slain former prime minister Rafik Hariri. There is the Cabinet minister whose husband was assassinated soon after becoming president, and the minister of defense, who after 12 surgeries still bears the scars of an assassination attempt. There is the mother of recently slain 34-year-old Lebanese parliamentarian Pierre Gemayel, who said to me simply: "We pay a high price for sharing what you believe in," and ask yourself whether we are paying her the debt owed for our shared beliefs." When I read this deep analysis of Lebanese affairs, I really wanted to get in touch with the senator. I was dying to ask him: so, how was the Hummus in Beirut?