The Audacity Of Peace In The Middle East

It appears President-elect Obama is flirting with the 2002 pan-Arab peace plan as a way to address the stalemate in the Middle East.
Back in 2002, When I was listening to the Arab peace plan as proposed by the King of Saudi Arabia, I remember having mixed feelings. The plan, branded as “historic”, proposed peace [...]

A Tale Of Two Systems.

It’s a sad fact of life that Lebanon as we know it can never produce a president Obama.
If you really think of it, Lebanon is the very opposite of what president Barrack Obama represents. The notion that any young citizen, with enough hard work and ambition, can become whatever he or she wants to be in [...]

Kings And King-makers

Hello your excellency. I’m a Lebanese Christian leader and I’m here to offer you my services.

The simultaneity is almost comedic. As the Lebanese President hugged and kissed the king of Saudi Arabia, M.P Michel Aoun swiftly set off to cuddle the prince of Persia. Not to be outdone, the Egyptian president promptly summoned the L.F [...]

Bummer…

The good news: The Lebanese all over the world can vote using nothing but their passports or I.D. cards. No need for those troublesome voting cards anymore.
The bad news: This will take effect in 2013.
Read more…

The Table That Is No Longer Round

The shape of the new hiwar (dialogue) table symbolizes the difference between the first, ill-fated hiwar and the one that will start tomorrow.

So how different is a rectangular table from a round one? Very different.
A round-table is an egalitarian setting where those who are taking place are given equal importance. Depending on your point of view, [...]

A Foreign Journalist’s Blunt Account

British Journalist comes to Lebanon and chronicles his day-by-day impressions. Unvarnished, almost comedic impressions of the coutry and its people ensue.
Here is one of my favorite paragraphs, from his visit to the LF.
We park outside the local LF headquarters. On top of the buildings are two immense crosses. There is an urgency to Christianity here; [...]

The Jumblat-Jalloul Spat. House Cleaning?

The high-profile criticism of M.P. Ghenwa Jalloul by Mr. Jumblat could be the beginning of an electoral purge by the Future Movement.

Back in the days of Hariri the father, a young woman who taught Computer Sciences in the American University of Beirut asked for a meeting with “Sheikh Rafik”. They had never met her before, but he [...]

Ramadan Lethargy…

I just found out that fasting and boring politics are not the blogger’s best friends.
It must be the sugar. Or maybe the caffeine. Or perhaps the slow news. But for some reason these days, I am not finding the energy to pounce on lebanese news items and toy around with them in this blog as [...]