Category: The Middle East

Flying spittle

 I can imagine that in Mr. Greenberg’s mind, any modern comparison to the Holocaust is tantamount to its diminution/dilution and therefore an insult to the Jews’ well-documented suffering.  Also well-documented is the rage provoked by exposing the hypocrisy of Jewish nationalists.  Just ask Jesus… If Greenberg didn’t like your comments, I’m sure he’s thrilled with fellow Jew …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2007/03/14/flying-spittle/

Close call

 Friends, Four years ago this week, I forwarded this now-prescient speech by Ray Close: https://levantium.com/2003/02/09/war-coming/ It’s a long read, but remarkable in how accurately he anticipated the problems that would arise from this administration’s folly.  Well worth reading a second time (or a first, if you’re relatively new to this list). I called Mr. Close …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2007/03/12/close-call/

Baptists in Levantium

 Interesting history.  Thank you very much.  I’m curious, because it wasn’t mentioned in the article and perhaps wasn’t germane, but how much Baptist work in Israel/Palestine is with Jewish (secular and confessing) persons and how much is with non-Jewish (i.e., Arab Christians and Muslims and non-Arab visiting pilgrims/tourists) persons?  What are the ratios?  Maybe I’ve …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2007/03/10/baptists-in-levantium/

Børre’s nightmare

 http://almashriq.hiof.no/lebanon/300/350/355/july-war/20070304/20070304-images.html We left Beirut at 9 yesterday and were back 12 hours later. Drove to Sidon and checked in with the army to get permission to enter the occupation zone evacuated by the Israelis in 2000 and which is finally under Lebanese Army control. Then straight to Tyre, Jouwaya, Tibnine and Bint Jbeil. We saw …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2007/03/07/b%c3%b8rres-nightmare/

Pray for the little ones

The concluding paragraph of Fisk’s end-of-year summary: If Lebanon survives into next year, it will be the only “democracy” in the Arab world to have done so. Afghanistan is crumbling, Iraq is already a mass grave. The Palestinians face their own inter-factional catastrophe. But desperate for the help of Syria and Iran to ease his …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2006/12/29/pray-for-the-little-ones/

Olive harvest

My childhood friend Yusif Makhoul harvested his crop in Mieh-ou-Mieh, just east of Saida a couple of weeks ago. He said they had a bumper crop, but that they were small. They spent a week harvesting compared to the two days it took us when I was with them in ’97. (I guess olive trees …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2006/11/01/olive-harvest/

Shock & awe

Shocked!  World leaders are “shocked” by the outcome of the Palestinian democratic elections.  Cable TV’s faux news experts are breathlessly analyzing “what it all means” when people half a world away won’t vote the way we want them to… Let’s  see if we can break it down:  With great fanfare and general acclamation (by those same …

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Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2006/02/05/shock-and-awe/