From Inside Lebanon

From David Nabti, expressing his views from inside a country facing imminent invasion:

Dear All,

The purpose of the information below is to educate,
and to spur action. I just wrote up a bunch of
clarifying information (FAQsheet, if you will) about
the current assault on Lebanon. The devastation is
vast and increasing rapidly. The death toll in
Lebanon has climbed well over 300. The vast majority
civilians, and according to what I heard on the BBC,
about 1/3 of all killed are children. The response by
the Western media and governments, especially the US,
is angering. We NEED your help. I will send you more
information soon about other media activities, but I
want to send this out the soonest…

To all who have written with concern about me and my
family and friends, so far we are all safe. I am in
Damascus, doing the best I can to educate about the
current situation, and helping with humanitarian
efforts here with the Red Cross/Red Crescent. My
parents are in the north of Lebanon, in the small
village where my father is from (we have a small house
there), and also trying to figure out next moves. I
have a lot of friends still in Beirut, some trapped
with nowhere to go, and others refusing to leave and
working full-time on relief efforts. Some friends have
left in the evacuations and are working to spread the
word about the atrocities from wherever they are.

After reading, please consider (1) choosing the key
points that hit you hardest, and writing up a quick
“letter to the editor”; (2) sending a note to your
local congressperson and senator; (3) sending this to
other friends.

If you have any questions, comments, additions, ideas
for what we can do, please contact me at dm@nabti.net

More soon.

Enraged, but not hateful.

Peace.


David Munir Nabti


///////////


Hillary Clinton gave a speech at a pro-Israel rally a
few days ago. It was grotesque. I wrote this up but
haven’t sent it to papers yet. Please consider
looking through your own local paper and seeing how
they covered her speech, and sending in your own
letter to the editor. Feel free to copy/borrow
whatever material you want from what I have written.

*Not My American Values*

Our dear Hillary Clinton seems to have a twisted sense
of “American values”. According to what she said
at the recent pro-Israel rally in NYC, she seems to
think that massive disregard for human life, ignoring
international law, making no distinction between
civilian and military targets, collective punishment,
and gross deceit are values that we should all live
by. I am American, and those are not my values. But
that is what the US is supporting in words and deeds
in terms of Israeli actions and behavior in Lebanon
(not to mention Gaza and all Palestine). I am ashamed
by our government, angry by its gross and active
betrayal of democratic and humanitarian values, and
fearful of the long-term consequences. And please
bear in mind, this is not a political attack. I used
to be a proud Democrat, and worked as staff on two
Democratic political campaigns in California. Bush
Inc is no better, but bears the additional blame for
being in charge now and actively supporting such
injustices. I am not anti-Israel (I have many Jewish
and Israeli friends, and to the dismay of some Jewish
mothers have even dated a few wonderful Jewish girls),
and I believe that it is possible for a peaceful
Israel to live alongside a peaceful Palestine and a
peaceful Lebanon. However, I think there is little
interest for that among the Israeli and American
war-mongering regimes. Larger racist, hateful,
anti-democratic, oppressive, and violent geo-political
objectives are in the works, the media is complicit,
and the public are being suckered into towing the line
and paying the bill, with huge ethical, financial,
political, and human costs and consequences.



POINTS TO KEEP IN MIND:

WHO PROVOKED WHOM?
- Many claim that the actions against Israel were
unprovoked. I disagree. In Lebanon, a secret Israeli
cell (suspected government intelligence, but more
rightly called “terrorist cell”) was recently
broken up after planning and carrying out many
terrorist attacks in Lebanon. Investigations were
under way when the latest crisis erupted. At the same
time, Israel has violated Lebanese airspace regularly
(400 times per year) over the last several years with
flyovers by fighter jets and military drones
(frequently reported by UNIFIL, the UN monitoring
force in southern Lebanon), and holds a large number
of Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners captive in
Israeli prisons, including many women and children,
and most with no charge or trial. Israel also still
occupies Lebanese territory (in the Shebaa Farms
area), and until recently there was word that Israel
was planning on ending its occupation of that area.

In Palestine, the last months have witnessed a massive
siege and oppression of the Palestinian people in the
Gaza Strip. They have been subject to continued
arrests and targeted assassinations, economic assault,
and increasing restriction of their daily lives.
Civilians – non-combatants, women, elderly,
children, even whole families in their homes or on the
beach – are killed indiscriminately, and without
remorse, investigation, or international condemnation
and action. On occasion that someone in the
international community finds the will to condemn such
atrocities, it is usually followed by words of
rationalization and promises of aid and continued
support for Israel.

If the objective of Israel is peace (which I don’t
think is true, at least not the hard-core militant
Zionists who control the public sphere), they acted in
a way that promotes violence. When a militant group
like Hamas makes a dramatic step away from violent
action and towards political participation, that
should be encouraged. Instead, the Israel and the US
made all Palestinians suffer for electing the Hamas
government. The US, after calously pushing the
Palestinians to hold elections when there was rising
anger against the ineffectiveness and corruption of
the previous government and rising support for ANY
change, made clear that they were only interested in
“democracy” if the outcome was the US puppet
regime they were looking for. Ironically, one
democracy specialist who has worked on conducting and
monitoring elections in the Middle East and around the
world, and was also a key player in organizing the
different elections in Iraq, told me recently that the
Palestinian elections that brought Hamas to power, and
the political campaign of the Hamas party, were the
most clean, most democratic he has ever seen in the
region, and were far better and more democratic than
elections held in the US and many parts of the
“democratic” world.

Indeed, after Israel’s unilateral evacuation from
southern Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, many problems and
issues remained unresolved, and a state of war and
low-level conflict remained between Israel and those
groups. Israel may have withdrawn from those areas in
the interest of its own stability and security, but
not in the interest of justice and resolving the
complicated situations that existed. Without
addressing justice, there will be no security, and no
stability.

Let’s not forget how this current conflict began.
Both Hamas and Hezbollah carried out precision attacks
on military positions, far from civilian structures,
and which left no civilian wounded or killed, no
civilian infrastructure damaged, and (according to
reports) are treating the captives well. While
Israel, the US and other countries are pushing for the
return of those soldiers, thousands of Arabs and
Palestinians languish in Israeli jails, many without
accusation, trial, or conviction, no recourse to
lawyers, secretly abducted, refused visits by family
or international humanitarian organizations, many of
them civilians themselves, non-combatants, and many of
them for long periods of time. For one combatant -
one soldier of an oppressive, occupation army - Hamas
demanded the release of women and children,
non-combatants, from Israeli prisons.


PRECISION ATTACKS?
Many Israeli military officials and political figures
have called Israeli attacks in Lebanon “precision”
strikes. One called them “surgical”. If that is
so, never go to a doctor in Israel. Israel’s
“precision” and “surgical” violence in Lebanon
has left well over 300 killed (and rising daily), the
vast majority of them civilians. Some media have
reported that more than a third of the victims are
children. Many civilians were killed in vehicles,
escaping from villages and cities that had received
notice from the Israeli military to evacuate only
hours earlier.

My greater fear is not that these are accidents, but
that the officials were right, the targets were chosen
carefully and hit precisely, and they are
intentionally targeting civilians. This follows a
pattern of Israeli aggression in Lebanon during and
after the Lebanese war ended in 1990, and during and
after the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon ended
in 2000, and it will continue as long as those attacks
garner them international support and little to no
international condemnation. Many humanitarian
assistance vehicles have also been bombed.


EXTERNAL SUPPORT AND LEGITIMIZING TARGETS
Israel is claiming that Iran and Syria are supporting
Hizbollah and Hamas, and those countries are being
pressured and threatened with military attacks.
Israel also made claims that some munitions used by
Hizbollah were supplied by (or through) Syria and
Iran, thus legitimizing potential military action
against those countries.

The US is the biggest military supplier for Israel,
and American munitions are now raining down on the
civilians of Lebanon. The Pentagon recently released
a statement about a government approved (funded?)
contract to send jet fuel to Israel “in use to keep
peace and security in the region.” By Israel and
America’s logic, disregard (and support) for Israeli
atrocities in Lebanon and Palestine and unwavering
support by the US government for whatever Israel does
makes the US and US interests abroad legitimate
targets for attack, increasing the danger to US
businesses, ex-pats, embassies, and tourists abroad,
and increasing the threat of attacks within the US.


WHICH CAME FIRST, THE CHICKEN OR THE EGG…
This question in this context is not so profound, nor
the answer so difficult. Hezbollah was founded in
1982 to counter Israeli aggressions during the
Lebanese war (some call it “civil war”, but it
involved many foreign groups). The gross violence
perpetrated by Israel during that war led to a
stronger, more determined, more sectarian group in
Hizbollah. This current round of violence will not
weaken Hizbollah, but will probably lead to a stronger
Hizbollah, and the emergence of even more extreme,
more determined, more violent groups to fight Israel,
the US, and other supporters of this criminal
violence. Hizbollah and Hamas negotiate, they
participate in governments, they have long-term
interests and desires, and they have objectives that
can be understood and discussed (even if you disagree
with them). This kind of senseless violence and
injustice will likely lead to the emergence and
strengthening of groups like Al-Qaeda, which have
poorly-defined objectives other than the destruction
of the West, don’t negotiate, have weak hierarchical
structures (making them difficult to control, contain,
negotiate with, or pacify), and commit senseless acts
of violence against all people.


ACTIONS DON’T MATCH STATED OBJECTIVES
There is fear that Israel is trying to spark a larger
conflict – first Lebanon, then Syria and beyond - in
order to rationalize and cover for an attack on
nuclear facilities in Iran. Reliable sources (some
publicly available) say that both Israel and the US
have been working on plans for months (or longer) to
knock out Iranian nuclear facilities by various
military means. The response to that from Iran and
many groups in the Middle East and globally will be
massive, violent, long-term, and global, and will
strengthen the most violent elements in the region and
the world.

Israel must be contained. Efforts must be made to
strengthen moderates, in both Israel, Palestine, and
in the Arab countries. The US must support peace and
security, not just for Israel, but also the Lebanese
and the Palestinians. Indeed, without peace and
security for the Palestinians and the Lebanese, there
will never be peace and security for Israel.