A response to Rashid Khalidi:

1) I always say at the outset that I am indebted to Rashid: he was my undergraduate advisor at AUB and later served as my advisor for MA, also at AUB. He directed me and mentored me in my education and helped me in my PhD pursuits in the US.
2) Syrian regime and the Palestinians: I have always said that I would never forgive the Syrian regime for its military intervention in Lebanon in 1976 on the side of the Phalanges and their fascist allies (Israeli militias). Syrian regime saved those forces from defeat and Syrian intervention was coordinated with US and yes Israel. However, if Rashid was upset about that—as I am—he should also be upset about the betrayal of the Palestinians in Tal Az-Za`tar by the Syrian regime and also by Yasser Arafat, who betrayed the Palestinians as many times as the Syrian regime. And if Rashid was bothered (as I am) about Syrian regime alliance with the Phalanges at the time, Arafat and his corrupt PLO also aligned with the LF in various stages of the war and always kept secret channels with them throughout the war—even when they were slaughtering Palestinians. Read the pathetic letter that Abu Iyad wrote to Amin Gemayel AFTER Sabra and Shatila massacres (Gemayel published in his memoirs). Also, if Rashid is bothered by Syrian regime ties to LF (as I am) he should also be upset that PLO of Arafat supported in later stages of the civil war the Lebanese Forces and supplied them with arms. LF’s official representative in Israel, Pierre Rizk, was later made a special financial and political advisor of Arafat. 3) now on the question of the paper tiger. I feel strongly about this. Rashid refers to the Lebanese resistance in the last war as paper tiger. In comparison to what? To the PLO? The PLO used to run alway—LITERALLY—in the face of Israeli invasions. It happened in the invasion of 1978 and of 1982. And if Rashid wants to say but the Lebanese resistance today receive support from Iran, I will say to him: the PLO and the Lebanese National Movement received money and arms from the following countries: USSR, East Germany, Bulgaria, Cuba, China, Hungary, Algeria, Yemen, Libya, Egypt (before Sadat), Syria (in different stages to different factions), Iraq, and huge amount of money from Gulf countries which managed the glorious revolutionary leadership of Yasser Arafat. Despite all this massive aid, the PLO forces ran alway in the face of Israeli advances. In the PLO days, it used to take hours—HOURS—for the Israeli invading army to reach Beirut. In 2006 and even in this round, when Hizbullah received severe blows and its leadership was decapitated, it was not able to occupy any part of South Lebanon. And it was Israel which asked for a ceasefire (and Hizb) while in the past, Israel never accepted a ceasefire but Arafat would plead for it. In his book, Under Siege, Khalidi presented the PLO stand in Beirut as epic and yet: one battle in Southern Lebanese villages against Israel is more epic and heroic than the entire history of PLO struggle against Israel. As far as Iran being a paper tiger: in comparison to Arab armies? And Rashid (typical of many Arab intellectuals) only criticizes one Arab government (the Syrian regime) and the Iranian regime. Criticize them all you want but why sparing ALL OTHER ARAB governments which reached peace with Israel (which surrendered to Israel) any criticism whatsoever? Why? is it not noteworthy? Iran is a paper tiger which was able to send more missiles against Israeli targets than all Arab governments combined?

Thread: My first-hand experience with Israeli kidnapping. Forget about Palestine for a second, this is about Lebanon. In June 1982, Israel started bombing Lebanon. In the middle-class Muslim neighborhood where I lived, Israeli fighter jets started dropping concussion bombs which would flatten tall building. In one moment, the building right next to ours was hit, and the five-story building was leveled to the ground. There was no PLO presence in our quarter whatever. All our neighbors were crushed to death. It is the only time in my life when the

People in the West don’t realize the extent to which the carnage in Gaza is shaping and changing Arab and Muslim attitudes toward the West in general. You listen too much to token Arabs at think tanks and to UAE/Saudi propagandists. Here is an Arab director:

“Things are not… …the same in my eyes. I don’t like to speak their language, or to watch their movies or movie productions, or their songs or even follow their celebrities. Their quiet countries no longer seduce me to visit and to roam in their streets. I don’t crave their fast food anymore…

I kept wondering: how will the New York Time spin Bakhmut? There you have it. “A Russian capture of Bakhmut “will mean nothing, actually,” predicted Col. Serhiy Hrabsky, a commentator on the war for the Ukrainian news media.”

See how you can get a job in Western media? This guy worked for a Lebanese newspaper (L'orient-Lejour) but after publishing this pro-Zionist article, he was hired by The Washington Post. It is easy for a native to learn to impress the White Zionist Man

today.lorientlejour.com/article/130272… He was not even bothered by the fact that those refugees (or most of them) later moved to Palestine and fought against the native Arabs and participated in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

Thread: I strongly disagree with Maya’s favorable take on Seinfeld. 1) the show has zero sensitivity to gender issues and women were always in the background, a side-story. 2) the show portrayed one of the most diverse cities in the world as almost purely white and male.

https://twitter.com/maya__salam/status/1657039046391091205

3) the show had no gay characters at all in all those years. 4) I personally take what the creators of the show said from the start: that it is a show about “nothing”. 5) they talk about living in New York City and always going out without mentioning the stress of daily living

How WINIP is cooking the books to manufacture Saudi public support for normalizations with Israel. WINEP has been frustrated. Saudi public in all surveys continue to register high disapproval for normalization. Even officials spoke about that. washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysi… So what does WINIP do? They play with results and with this: First, they say they rely on this firm:

“by a highly qualified, experienced, and completely independent and apolitical regional commercial company licensed to conduct market research across most of the Arab world.”

خيط عن وسام اللحام والنقاش الدستوري. ١) اتابع كتابات والظهور الاعلامي لوسام اللحام. هو عليم ويعرض بطريقة واضحة وسلسة. يدرس الموضوع قبل النقاش فيه. ٢) اختلف معه في العودة الدائمة إلى التفسيرات الفرنسيّة للجمهوريّة الثالثة عندهم. لماذا نكون ملزمين, ولماذا يكون النص الفرنسي مقدسا؟ ادمون ربّاط كان له إصرار وطني على أولويّة النص الدستوري العربي على الفرنسي. وعندما اعتنق لبنان دستوره في عام ١٩٢٦, كان بالعربيّة وعليه النصَ العربي مُلزِم بصرف النظر عن مصدر الوحي الاستعماري. ويذمّ اللحام بربّاط عندما يقول عنه إن لديه عقدة بسبب قوميّته العربيّة. هذه ليست نقيصة,

مش معقول كيف بيطلعوا بتنظيرات. الخاصرة الرخوة؟ شو يعني؟ انا بعلّم علاقات دولية ما بعرف المصطلح. متى قال حدا ان لسوريا حق السيطرة على لبنان لأن خاصرتها رخوة؟ واليمن في خاصرة الإمارات والسعوديّة معاً؟ شوف: بلا تنظيرات وبلا تبريرات. ساعة خاصرة رخوة وساعة انه في لبنانيّين رهائن في

https://twitter.com/allouush/status/1499030890508337165

دول الخليج. وبلا كليشيهات ان الحوثيّين هم "بروكسي" لإيران. يا رجل, لما شنّت السعوديّة الحرب على اليمن ما كان في علاقة بين الحوثيّين وإيران. ارجع لوثائق ويكيليكس. بس ليش اللف والدوران؟ عندما اعلنت الإمارات التحالف مع إسرائيل, كان علي جابر اصرح وأصدق منكم جميعا إذ قال: شو ما عمل

سلسلة. "أصحاب ولا أعزّ": بين الادانة الترويجيّة والتضامن المصطنع. ثقافة الإن جي أوز ليست جديدة. هناك أجندات خارجيّة تُفرض في الفن والثقافة والأدب: اصبح كاتب قصّة نشأ في حي اللجا يُقحم المحرقة في أول رواية له فقط لعلمه ان ذلك يروِّج لها ويضمن ترجمتها. أقرأوا كتاب جوزيف مسعد "اشتهاء العرب". هناك عدة جوانب للتعليق على الفيلم. ١) الضجة حوله كانت مفتعلة ومصطنعة وكلّها تعود لموقع لم أسمع بها من قبل يزعم ان هناك دعاوي وخلاف ذلك. أعتقد ان ذلك كان بفعل الشركة الاعلانيّة الترويجيّة كما ان إعلام الاستعمار الغربي يحبّ اي تعبير عن نيّات طهارنيّة أخلاقيّة

A Thread: who met with Blinken and what did they discuss. List was arranged by Hady Amer

James Zogby: of Lebanese origin and close to UAE and PA.
George Salem: a Republican official and was in the Dahlan Task Force on Palestine.
Taleb Salman was with Najdah (close to DFLP) and Later with Ford.
Ghada Najjar, her husband worked with Zogby.
Hanna Hanandia: appointed by Mahmoud Abbas to PNC.
Ed Gabriel: a Lebanese-American who served as ambassador in Morocco.
Khalil Barhoum: was with United Palestinian Appeal.
Samar Ali: her father is with the Jerusalem

Listing the biggest friends of the Palestinian cause in the world: 1) China of Mao which was the first to provide arms and support to Palestinian groups (USSR later came but used leverage to reduce the demands of the PLO); 2) Nasser who supported the first resistance in Gaza 3) Algerian revolution and state; 4) Cuban revolution; 5) African National Congress, which in turn received support from Palestinian groups; 6) North Korea; 7) Japanese Red Army; 8) there were far left groups in Western Europe but many were infiltrated;

Some advice for supporters of Palestine on social media:
1) verify facts as much as you can before posting.
2) it is ok to be emotional (I am one) but don’t allow your emotions to make you lose temper and use abusive or harmful language: your enemy is watching every word and want us to slip. Let us try to not slip especially that our cause is too valuable for us to be careless as emotional as we are.
3) Reject any antisemitic expressions and suspect any account with a pro-Palestinian name which spews hate and antisemitic trash.
4) don’t allow the enemy to

In 1990-91, I was a visiting prof at Randolph Macon’s Woman’s College in Lynchburg, VA. I befriended the local rabbi and she was a progressive woman. She invited me to address the congregation and they asked me about the future of the conflict. And I said then: how could there be a settlement when the very minimum demands by the political leadership of the Palestinians (and those minimum demands are unacceptable by someone like me who insists on the maximalist demands) are categorically rejected by successive Israeli governments. Israel is a violent

A thread: There is something happening to Edward Said at the hand of Western liberals (academics and journalists). There is an earnest campaign to make Said less radical than he was and to turn him into another Arab/Western liberal.
Adam Shatz · lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v43/… The worst part is that some wish to employ Said into their political campaigns today regarding Syria or against Iran or against armed resistance. Take this for example: of all the things Said said about Israel and Arab governments, Shatz ignored all that and dug a sentence Said

What is happening in Jordan. It was a UAE-Saudi-Israeli coup. But Muhammad bin Salman rules by miscalculations. He miscalculated when he invaded Yemen; he miscalculated when he killed Khashoggi; he miscalculated by not ascending to the throne when Trump was president, and now He miscalculated by arranging for this attempted coup which is not going to receive the support of the Biden administration. Hamzah’s recording all but confirmed the news of the coup attempt and he even declared himself a savior for Jordan. The funny part about Hamzah’s

ملاحظة (بودّ) على مقابلة شربل نحّاس مع جاد غصن أمس. ١) ارى نفس اتفق مع كل توصيف نحاس للأزمة الاقتصاديّة وحجم المشكلة ويمكن كنتُ سأتفق معه لو كان هناك للحركة مشروع واضح المعالم بعيداً عن شعارات عامّة عن الجردة وعن تسلّم السلطة (وبصلاحيات استثنائيّة). ثم إذا كان رياض سلامة الحرامي يعني لا يمكن ان نقول إذا كنا نتفق مع شربل نحّاس على العلاج لأنه لم يُحدّد العلاج (رجاء, لا تقولوا لي "الدولة المدنيّة هي الحل" لأن ذلك يثير نفوري بنفس الدرجة من شعار "الدولة الاسلاميّة هي الحلّ" مع أنني طبعاً أميل للأولى على الثانية). والصلاحيات الاستثنائيّة يجب ان تثير حساسيات

Top Middle East official at State, David Schenker, just gave an interview to a Lebanese website (US propaganda now favor websites over traditional media to disseminate their propaganda). 1) he actually threatened Lebanon if it reaches economic agreements with China and spoke About China being this intimidating global power. He must have had his government confused with China. He actually threatened Lebanon if it reaches agreements with China. As one reader on FB asked: has China ever threatened a country if it were to reach agreements with US? No.

What is wrong with Bernie Sanders’ stance and rhetoric on Palestine. 1) the man has a long record of support for Israeli aggression and occupation; whether in the House or the Seante, he has signed letters blaming Israeli violence and war crimes on its Arab victims. 2) he Supported US military and economic aid to the Israeli occupation state, year after year; 3) he was never as a House member or Senate member outspoken about Palestinian rights or even about Israeli violations of human rights. People may be surprised, but the other mainstream

Nassim Talib in Lebanon. I watched two lectures that Talib gave on Lebanon, one in English and one in (bad) colloquial Arabic. 1) he refers to the Lebanese dialect as his native “language” (as opposed to Arabic) but we discover that his command of his native Lebanese is quite Weak. Also, he proposes Lebanese dialect as the language but people are free to use the dialect and they do. There is no Classical Arabic language pressures. But how come there has never been literary production in Lebanese dialects despite decades of advocacy? (He is not the

Benny Morris on those bad Palestinians: “But from 1933 onward, Palestine’s Arabs...mounted a strident campaign to pressure the British, who governed Palestine, to bar all Jews from entering the country.” You are telling me that the Palestinians were theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… Opposed to the immigration of hundreds of thousands of Jews who wanted to create a Jewish state on Palestinian lands and who wanted to displace the natives? And they were opposed to that? That is certainly anti-Semitic. If the Palestinians wanted to prove that they were not anti