As if the car bombs and jet strikes weren’t clear enough, we’ve apparently this week realised Syria is in the midst of a violent sectarian civil war. The footage of a man eating another man’s heart has gone around the world and has really displeased rights groups and left politicians even more slightly upset.

It has received untrammelled rolling news coverage and has set the online news consuming (and producing) communities chattering in a way I can’t remember seeing throughout Syria’s long and protracted crisis.

TIME magazine fawned over its exclusive interview with Khalad al-Hamad (nom de guerre Abu Sakkar) extolling the most nuanced of tactical rebel positions (“We will slaughter them all”). Foreign Policy – a publication I greatly admire and am fortunate enough to have written for – let its subs continue their reign of terror with this headline (quite ignoring the truism that if there is an “Is this…?” question in a headline the answer is almost invariably: “No.”

This is not the most disgusting atrocity of the Syria war so far. Not by a long stretch. For comparison on such a macabre scene one needs to cast an eye back to….oh, I dunno, last week, when piles of charred children’s corpses were filmed on top of each other following a massacre of civilians in the seaside town of Banias. Or a similar scene in Baydas. Of course, the massacres did make it on to the major news outlets, but only for as long as Israel held off bombing the site of a tea and cement factory on the outskirts of Damascus, the kind of belligerent and deeply irresponsible violations of sovereignty and international law it’s really perfected in recent years.

It did not garner the kind of wall-to-wall fetishised replaying that the heart-eater has produced.

So all of a sudden Syria is a horrifying sectarian conflict? At the posting of this video (bearing in mind the crime itself was committed back in March), Syria suddenly goes from more or less a stalemate of insurgency/counter insurgency to all out hell? The world is outraged by this one act. Leaders and commentators should save their precious hearts and cling film consciences. We don’t even talk to outrage no more. That’s ancient history, in case you hadn’t noticed.

So the single act of someone cutting an organ out of another human and eating it is more newsworthy than the fact that entire communities of internally displaced civilians have to forage for herbs and moss just to survive the day? Is it more newsworthy than the 1000s of children killed or horrifically wounded (I’m not going to link to the videos; you can work YouTube) since the conflict metastasised? Of course not.

Is the act of a man who – judging by his interviews – is at the very least a murderous, bigoted sociopath performing cannibalism more indicative of a war from which there are glaring and pressing difficulties in extrapolating fair narrative? No. But this is what the news does. It’s gruesome and it gets hits, so it gets ran with. Any number of narratives are constructed around this single, isolated, awful video to add context in reverse and give it the veneer of relevance attempting to hide what is really happening here.

We are told that this act is a sign that the Syrian conflict is descending into sectarian chaos, that internecine violence and inhumanity is now the norm; that this is the harbinger of confessional warfare, not its product; that this is a war crime from which the rational and in no way chaotic Syrian opposition has distanced itself; that this is the act of a man who represents an alarmingly proliferating rebel belligerent of subhuman ideologues.

The man himself has raised much titillation, as evidenced by the TIME piece and its detailing the ramblings of a madman (at least they are exclusive ramblings), about Abu Sakkar, as if the man came from the very depths of hell to remind news eds that they are not paying close enough attention to evidence posted online every day of the weaponisation and radicalisation of facets of fighting brigades. He is not new.

The effort it takes to familiarise oneself with the main, shall we say, “personalities” of the war is negligible, but still seems beyond the reach of many. Abu Sakkar is a feared and, in some parts, well followed individual. He was “famous” as a venerable individual even before this video. I could show you a picture of a baby, armed with a grenade and a gun with the words “Abu Sakkar” inscribed over it, but you’ll have to get your gore fix elsewhere for now.

Similarly, his group, the Omar Al-Farouk Brigades, has existed for several months. Basically, the group didn’t think that the original Al-Farouk Brigades were hardcore jihadist enough and named itself after a leading Al-Qaeda operative, calling on other Muslims (targeting Turkey specifically) to wage war against Assad. The group’s banner says it belongs to the Free Syrian Army, but we all know that that doesn’t exist (although some  only seem to realise this while in the government’s company). It carries statements on behalf of the interim opposition government on its site, so it clearly knows whereabouts its bread is buttered. Point is, it’s now that the world pays attention to a group that has had ample media opportunity and ample time to do awful things amid the fug of civil war.

And isn’t it a little disquieting that, in a war with countless thousands of videos and images uploaded in a more or less constant stream, which mass media usually eschews using on account of sourcing or verification snags, that it’s been decided that this particular unverifiable and poor quality footage is acceptable for worldwide broadcast?

I’m not sure why we are supposed to take notice and feel sick when a fighter mutilates the dead body of another fighter and to cheerily go about our business when, say, dozens of innocent civilians are torn apart by a regime jet or an Al-Nusra car bomb. I’m not sure the call to feel emotion can be so unevenly applied and still mean anything. If your outrage has only been “sparked” just now, by this particular act, and not by the hundreds of other murderous altercations and crimes in this two-year-plus civil war, then you aren’t entitled to it. Save your moralising; you’ve forgone any right to feel anything for a war you clearly don’t understand, don’t care about and only turn to when gore allows you to objectify victims as products of something that’s happening in a part of the world you’ve always thought a little bloodthirsty anyway.

What is really occurring here is a gratuitous attempt to drive traffic and hits – and, hence, media importance – to orientalist gawking. Everyone is disgusted by cannibalism. There is nothing valiant or differentiating in saying so. But whereas global audiences, for many reasons, aren’t usually offered the chance to be shocked about the violence coming out of Syria – since editors don’t deem killing suitable for mainstream coverage – they have been given the chance to view how inhumane the conflict “has become”. Just as the first Liberia war, which may have killed up to 220,000 people, is remembered for the cannibalism, so too has the state of the Syrian crisis been artificially distilled into that grainy footage of Abu Sakkar’s botched dissection. The inference from western media FASCINATION is clear: “Look at these animals, these savages. Is this exotic and brutal enough for you? Syria, ladies and gentlemen.”

I was going to write something long and windy on the allegations and burden of proof of chemical weapons use – from both sides of the morass – in Syria.

But I can’t not say anything on this monstrosity, detailing plans to put up a super highway across east Beirut, which will destroy some of the Lebanese capital’s few remaining (and totally lovely) old buildings.

Here’s what the area where the highway will go – through Ashrafieh, Mar Mikhael and Getawi (note the nice old red topped buildings) that will be torn down):

Now, as heartbreaking as this might be, local authorities tearing down buildings (especially old, valuable ones) is nothing new in Beirut or indeed the rest of Lebanon, hence the formation of vital lobby groups such as Save Beirut Heritage.

But the logic of this project is extremely daft. It will ruin one of Beirut’s few remaining old (some would use the horrid word authentic) neighbourhoods in favour of another avenue for traffic jams. It will further encourage car use in a city already choking from fumes and journey delays. It will further reduce the already artificially circumscribed areas that attract tourists which, for a country as heavily dependent on tourist dollars as Lebanon, can be ill afforded. And, as much as anything else, the plans cut through neighbourhoods where a lot of the press lives. So at least we can hopefully cause a stink.

There is cause for optimism and negativity. Optimism, because there is no government, nor is there likely to be one, nor are governments or local council groups ever particularly proactive and effective when they do exist. Similarly, while private industrial or commercial property projects mushroom across the town, Beirut is hardly a proactive place when it comes to investment and delivery of infrastructure, which I guess this awful project purports to be. For example, the bridges around Emile Lahoud and Jisr l Wati were only meant to last a few years. They are temporary structures that successive governments just never got around to making permanent (or safe).

Negativity, because recent history has shown us that civic interest lies at the very bottom of governmental or municipal priority. The irony in all this is that this road/bridge structure couldn’t even be argued to be necessary were it not for the intervention in the Rafik Hariri years of one Mr Ghazal, who put a stop to a big highway linking Sagesse to the sea road because his impressively tall tower stood right on its route.

He must have “lobbied” hard enough and got his wish, landing the regenerating captial with its retrospectively charming “Bridge to Nowhere”. So the biggest bars to this project remain regrettably out of public control; it’s more likely to not be built due to incompetence/nepotism than it is due to civil society. Not that that means we shouldn’t raise hell about this.

When I woke up this morning, I had little idea this article was about to enter my life.

It details an An-Nahar piece documenting what ministers in Lebanon get up to when they aren’t running their ministries (which is always).

Courtesy of http://anthologyofthings.tumblr.com/

There’s no way of making this any more brilliant, so here is the full copy:

Caretaker State Minister Marwan Kheireddine saved caretaker Telecommunications Minister Nicolas Sehnaoui from a rhinoceros attack while they were in Africa, reported An Nahar daily Friday.

It said that as the ministers were on a hunting trip in Africa, Sehnaoui decided to rest by the rhinoceros, which he mistook for a rock.

The animal soon turned its attention to Sehnaoui and attempted to attack him.

The minister began to run away from the rhinoceros, while Kheireddine and their companions scared off the animal with their sticks.

Even from an administration with a proud recent history of brinkmanship, last week’s resignation of Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati was a coup de grace of “will he, wont he?”

The beleagured premier had at several points past “offered” to hand in his wings – after, for example, the assassination of Lebanon’s intelligence chief – only to be talked down from the ledge by President Michel Sleiman.

Mikati had presided over an especially tumultuous period for Lebanon, with Syria’s vicious civil war affecting the small Mediterranean nation physically – with airstrikes hitting Lebanese border villages and close to half a million refugees fleeing violence to the relative safety beyond the ante-Lebanon mountains – and psychologically – with Syria’s sectarianized conflict picking inter-faith wounds that never really healed for its neighbour.

As a Sunni politician (and billionaire tycoon) presiding over a Cabinet dominated by the largely pro-Syrian March 8 coalition, Mikati was often characterised as a reluctant leader, drafting in to form a government from the ruins of previous administrations. He was prime minister for three months in 2005 in a cartaker capacity and it was the collapse of Lebanon’s previous coalition government, via a constitutional coup from Hezbollah, in Jan. 2011, that returned Mikati to the political mainstream.

He has long been viewed by the political establishment as something of a middle man – Sunni, yes, but independent as an MP, able in theory to bridge the ever-widening ideological gap between the opposition March 14 (largely pro-Western) coalition and what you’ll have come by now to know as the March 8 Assad apologists.

His acheivements in power are perhaps best measured by what didn’t happen in Lebanon during his 21 months at the helm. In spite of major, sporadic security lapses, not least the car bombing that killed spy chief Wissam al-Hassan in October 2012 or the tit-for-tat kidnappings that terrified many foreigners during the previous summer, Lebanon has largely not descended into the sectarian chaos many feared the Syrian crisis would precipitate.

The government’s official policy of “disassociation” with the Syria conflict was attacked by the opposition in Beirut, who pointed out that it was disingenuous for a cabinet containing Hezbollah ministers to claim non-involvement in Syria’s war when the group continued sending fighters across the border in support of Assad forces. Presumably, though, only as disingenuous as calling the government out while many senior March 14 figures fended off accusations they were actively arming rebel groups.

Lebanon’s diplomatic stances in the Arab League and, in particular, during its UN Security Council presidency in 2011, publicly enraged the government’s opponents, who accused Mikati of complicity in Damascus’ onslaught.

The reality, of course, was that Lebanon could never fully cleave itself from Syrian influence. Centuries of histroy and recent decades of political and military tutelage means Beirut simply cannot function without at least some sort of relationship with Damascus.

Mikati’s fall, predictably, at least in western media, has been interpreted as a power grab by Hezbollah. Convential wisdom in Lebanese-Syrian relationship analyses is that Hezbollah so totally relies on President Assad’s continuation that it is full ready to tear Lebanon apart in order to keep him in power.

This is a convenient narrative and corresponds neatly with the international media tic of diametric storytelling – that Hezbollah and, by extension, the Lebanese government of which is was part are extistentially liked to Assad’s survival.

To treat the situation between Lebanon and Syria thus is to ignore every piece of historical, political and security evidence available to this observer.

The nominal reason given for Mikati’s resignation was his support of police chief Ashraf Rifi, a popular and high-profile Sunni official in charge of Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces. Broadly speaking, Lebanon’s Sunni constituents are more closely aligned to March 14 than march 8 – a coalition comprised largely of Shiite and Christian popular support, and Mikati knew that he was losing the popularity among Sunni voters he enjoyed during 2009′s parliamentary elections simply by being in a March 8 Cabinet. Add in the fact that the Sunni political establishment in general has been losing support owing to central government neglect of several predominantly Sunni areas, such as the north, Tripoli, Sidon and central Beirut.

Mikati knew overseeing (or, at least, acquiescing in) the removal of Rifi would be a step too far and probably rightly gambled his political career and personal credibility on resigning rather than further alienating his last strands of Sunni support.

Conventional wisdom here dictates that it was Hezbollah’s insistence that Rifi leave, that his continuation would cross one of the group’s so-called “red lines”, similar to the dismantling of its intelligence network at Beirut airport in 2008 that prompted clashes across the country, killing over 60.

There are several things wrong with this hypothesis.

First, Hezbollah is by no means alone in its opposition to Rifi. The security chief may well be popular with March 14 Sunnis but his list of detractors runs longer than the Party of God.

There has been a lot of chatter involving Hassan’s assassination and Hezbollah in the same breath. The theorising harks back to a time when political assassinations gripped Lebanon between 2004 and 2008 (with Hezbollah’s “invovlvement” proven in none of them) and is little more than hearsay and innuendo. Why Hezbollah was linked to Hassan’s death when what might be the clearest example of alleged Syrian regime involvement in Lebanon came with the arrest in 2012 of Michel Samaha, a Christian former minister who stands accused of plotting assassinations, is anyone’s guess. Well, until you perform a news search of articles on Hezbollah.

The party has some red lines, doubtless. But to suggest they extend as far as seeking to wrest control over the ISF – the pillar of Lebanese Sunni authority – seems a conspiracy theory too far.

Second, Hezbollah might not like Rifi, but I believe it was quite keen in being in government. Hezbollah’s priorities often overlap with those of Syria. More frequently though, Hezbollah takes its lines from Iran.

As part of a government dominated by its allies, Hezbollah could (and did) sit back and gently steer Lebanon’s foreign policy of providing an incubation against (so the rhetoric undoubtedly ran) western imperialist and jihadist terrorist plots to oust Assad, all the while quietly funnelling token military support across the borader. Now, with the government gone, Hezbollah’s own position as a legitimate contributor to a constitutionally sound administration has been undermined.

The mistake I think too many commentators make on Hezbollah is thinking its ideology matters far more than its politics. The groups has somewhat irresponsibly been painted as an entity that will live or die with Assad, which is transparently not the case; Hassan Nasrallah last year stunned precisely no one with the declaration Hezbollah had been in contact with various Syrian opposition groups. The man, like his party, is a pragmatist more than a pedagogue.

Nasrallah takes his cheques, and therefore, instructions, from Tehran, not Damascus. Granted, a pliable ally next door in the form of Assad is convenient for Hezbollah, but losing him would not precipitate a major structural change in the party’s M.O.; it would still maintain significant military clout and funding from Iran – more so, arguably, as Damascus could no longer be counted on by Tehran to fulfil its regional policies.

With or without Assad, Hezbollah was a major, legitimate player in government. As mighty as its armed capability may still be, it was of far more use to Assad politically.

It had a malleable prime minister, the ear of most ministers, unbridled military hegemony and a conduit for Iranian policy to be channelle through Beirut. Do we really believe they throw this all away over Rifi?

The third problem with the coverage of the government collapse is mathematical. While, according to media parlance, Hezbollah “dominates” Lebanese politics, it had just two ministers in the 30-strong cabinet – the same as it had in 2009′s coalition government.

By way of comparison, Hezbollah’s March 8 cohorts, the Christian Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) had seven portfolios, including the strategically crucial interior ministry. With just two votes in Cabinet sessions, Hezbollah had the same legislative power than Amal, Tashnag and Marada movements and less even than the mainly Druze Progressive Socialist Party (PSP). The PSP is headed by Walid Jumblatt whose infamy as a political chameleon has led to a change of heart over Syria a number of times in recently years; it was the support of PSP ministers that propelled Mikati to the top in the first place.

Finally, I’m not sure why the FPM seems to have gotten away scot free here. It had the most ministers reportedly against Rifi’s continuation – the largest single government bloc. It is led by Michel Aoun, the former general who fled Lebanon to exile and announced his triumphal return decades later, only after his mortal Syrian enemies had departed. He then proceeded to make alliancies with some of Lebanon’s biggest pro-Syrian factions.

If Mikati’s departure has sown chaos (which it hasn’t; Lebanon is plenty used to not having a government) then it is Aoun who sees the most opportunity. If, as we are led to believe, Lebanon will vote using a new electoral law this summer (one that Aoun himself pioneered), Aoun believes, probably correctly, that he will become the single most popular politician in the land. This will give him and his FPM a stronger mandate to govern than ever before and could lead to the formation of an even more homogenous March 8 administration.

What does this have to do with Syria? That’s open to interpetation, but don’t fall into the trap of assuming Aoun’s support for Assad is unwaivering (he spent a good proportion of 1990 fighting Hafez al-Assad’s troops). I’m not even sure Aoun values Hezbollah as much as he proclaims. The fall of Assad might provide him with a chance to further entrench his position as Lebanon’s leader.

Aoun’s public, if lightly coded pronouncements against the ISF - the very force that dragged Samaha unedifyingly from his bed at dawn last summer – only add to the suspicion that the government’s collapse might have something to do with March 8 Christians, not its Shiites. But, as we know by now, that never makes as good a story.

Update: Mikati has resigned. So, all of the below still applies. We now have a few options:

a) The “government” carries on in a caretaker role until the elections, which are guaranteed (chuckle) to be held on June 9 care of a presidential decree. 

b) Like when Hariri’s government fell in Jan. 2011, the issue of Prime Minister will be subject to a parliamentary vote. Last time, in Mikati’s nomination, Walid Jumblatt and his PSPers were kingmakers, backing Mikati. Jumblatt’s position regarding Syria has since shifted significantly (comme toujours) far closer to that of March 14. Who might March 14 put forward for PM? I think all the usual suspects (bar, at a guess, Saad Hariri) will be throwing their hat into the ring.

All this, of course is fairly moot in the events that elections do happen on time. Which could happen just as Sheikh Ahmad Assir could turn out to be a lap dancer. 

According to multiple news reports, Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati is poised to resign, which leaves the future of the troubled nation’s current government extremely uncertain.

In many ways this doesn’t change too much; the cynical observer will note that the Cabinet has failed more or less totally in its mandate to ensure the smooth running of Lebanon. Like previous governments, it has repeatedly failed to agree on issues of economy, security and diplomacy.

It is not yet clear wether or not Mikati plans to stay on as an MP and if he will run in the forthcoming parliamentary elections, scheduled for June. He won his seat in Tripoli by defeating Omar Karami in 2000 and held it most recently as an independent Sunni candidate on March 14′s list.

He is often characterised as a reluctant PM; Mikati has on numerous occasions offered his resignation only to be reportedly persuaded to stay on by President Michel Sleiman.

Mikati took control of the Lebanese government during one of its most testing times in recent history, after the pro-reform movements in Syria and Bashar al-Assad’s military response morphed into all out war in Syria – Lebanon’s closest and most influential neighbour.

Under Mikati, Lebanon has maintained an official policy of “disassociation” with the Syrian conflict, although the success of such a strategy is a subject for fierce debate in political circles.

He was seen as influential in providing Lebanon’s 2011 and 2012 share of funding to the Special Tribunal for Lebanon but his government has been battered by a series of damaging public sector strikes and bombarded by successive security breaches, largely in Tripoli and the Bekaa Valley, but also in central Beirut.

Ultimately, it seems Mikati and Sleiman, with their ministerial allies, have been unable to secure Cabinet’s support for the extension of the term of Ashraf Rifi, the head of the Internal Security Forces and an immensely popular Sunni figure.

When Lebanon’s intelligence chief, Wissam al-Hassan was assassinated in a car bomb attack in Beirut in October last year, Mikati offered his notice in the wake of the violence that followed. This time, Mikati appears to have been unwilling to stomach the prospect of an official who is arguably Lebanon’s most popular Sunni being ousted under his watch.

The Sunni political establishment has been hemorrhaging support for many months, ostensibly due to governmental neglect of the Sunni dominated regions of Tripoli, Minyeh, south central Beirut and Sidon. Major Sunni political parties, such as the Future Movement, have struggled in opposition, especially with leaders such as Saad Hariri in self-imposed exile.

Mikati leaves Lebanon in an undoubtedly bigger hole than when he took the reins, but it would be churlish to suggest things have unravelled so rapidly due solely to his leadership. Politically speaking, Mikati presided over one of Lebanon’s most homogenous Cabinets in recent memory – and still wasn’t able to get anything done. That a government composed almost exclusively of allies of March 8 parties cannot even begin to address Lebanon’s myriad problems does not bode well for the future.

The Arab media (and a good deal of its Western brethren) has had a real hard time of things recently when it comes to Syria.

This week, we were told by Syrian state media that the “chemical weapon” attack on Khan al-Asal was launched by the rebels. It even ran photos of the victims, who appeared to be struggling to breathe, allegedly after inhaling some sort of chemical respiratory inhibitor. We were also told that it was in fact the Syria army that had executed the rocket attack, and Israel at least told us that it was sure chemical weapons were used in the war this week, even if it has no idea whodunnit. We even heard that MI6 has smuggled soil samples out of Syria to test for chemical agents (although if the UK wanted to relieve Arab lands of their soil then I dunno why they didn’t get Israel on the job). But I digress. Now, it seems, a probe into the incident has found no evidence of chemical weapons usage after all. Quelle surprise. 

This week we were told that a Syrian airstrike had hit the town of Arsal, well inside Lebanese territory. The Lebanese army moved into the eastern town of Al-Qaa, which has long been the origin of reports suggesting it is home to training camps for Syrian rebel fighters. The information coming from both places was sketchy – pro-Assad media in Lebanon denied that a strike had ever taken place. This didn’t stop the largely anti-Assad Naharnet and the wholly horrid MTV declaring that an Israeli strike had occurred in the eastern Bekaa. This must have been an elaboration too far, and was quickly removed from both sites. I suspect the association of the word “Israel” contained within the same sentence as the phrase “air strike” may have been born from force of habit on the part of the sites’ headline writers, but still.

Naim Qassem: Not dead.

In Syria, as in any war, so goes the maxim, the first casualty has been the truth. If the violence was being waged online or on paper, the result would surely have been mutual annihilation, as pro- and anti-Assad media outlets pump out increasingly unverifiable claims to keep their plates spinning.

Take last month, when Now, the Lebanese website patronised by some extremely anti-Assadians, quoting a Facebook update from the FSA (is that nemonic means anything anymore) that Hezbollah’s “number two” had been killed in Syria. The online shock was immediate and we began to hear confident predictions that Naim Qassem’s death would rapidly spark a full-scale conflagration across Lebanon. That the phraseology of the claim – “number two” – could have meant several things – from deputy military commander, deputy commander in Syria, deputy intelligence officer, etc. etc. – or that the claim was made by a group that eminently has lots to gain by making people believe it to be true, were apparently of secondary importance. It wasn’t Now’s fault that the rumour spread – it was just reporting a news source that regrettably turned out unreliable. As I said at the time, the idea that Qassem, a hugely important and influential individual with widespread popularity, had even been in Syria, let alone killed there, registered very highly on my bullshitometer.

This rumour, which, needless to say, proved entirely false, was swiftly pursued by one suggesting the Lebanese pop superstar-cum-Salafist had been killed in Syria. This was once again proven false.

Fadl Shaker: Also not dead.

Now, there is nothing necessarily dangerous about false or inaccurate reporting in and of itself, so long as the reports are quickly rectified and/or withdrawn. I would hazard that most sane, rational, slightly knowledgable people would dismiss reportage as rumour and get on with their lives.

But there is a knock on effect of bad journalism. This was most terrifyingly evidenced when Al-Jadeed TV wrongly reported last summer that 11 Lebanese pilgrims held hostage in Syria had been killed in a government airstrike on Azaz, Syria. The response from family members and partisans was swift, and led to general disobedience and anger across much of the country that culminated with the tit-for-tat kidnappings that so shook Turkish and Khaleeji foreign nationals in Lebanon.

Now reports of chemical weapons use – something which the US and others have labelled a ‘red line’ which must not be crossed by either belligerent – are proliferating. I’m not necessarily saying these reports naming “western” or “Israeli” diplomats or intelligence officials aren’t accurate, I’m just wary that these coupled with the UK and France’s apparent willingness to arm Syrian rebel groups in contravention of international law form a worrying picture. The amount of information actually contained in these reports means all those column inches could be summed up with the headline: “Individual or organisation that has a vested interest in saying Syria has chemical weapons says Syria has chemical weapons.”

Again, please don’t take this as a belittling of the potential problem. I’m just saying that, after the Iraq war and its dossiers debacle (the 10-year anniversary of which was marked this week) neither “western and Israeli” intelligence sources, nor the media that quotes them, deserve the benefit of the doubt.

Hugo Chavez, Venezuela’s president, died last night after losing a long battle with cancer. The reaction to his passing has varied wildly, and he seems to be as divisive a figure in death as he was in life.

For what it’s worth, I think the world needs more leaders like Chavez, who saw to it that millions were lifted out of extreme poverty (that not without its controversies) and was a constant thorn in the side of the United States. Differences of opinion on world affairs is a good thing, surely. It prevents hegemony and calls on the superpowers to explain their actions, ideally.

But, as colleague Brian Whitaker has pointed out, via the venerable Juan Cole, Chavez was uneven in his approach to the Middle East.

Aside from his stance on Iran, which earned Chavez the highest honor Tehran can bestow and prompted Iranian President Mahmoud Amhadinejad to declare that one day Hugo will return to earth alongside Jesus and the Mahdi [Shiite Islam's anticipated 12th - or disappeared - Imam], the Venezuelan president showed some inconsistencies when it came to Libya, Egypt and Syria.

Chavez was a staunch supporter of Bashar al-Assad until the end. Long after the peaceful uprising calling for reform in Syria had morphed into an brutal civil war, he continued to pump Assad’s regime full of oil and his support of Damascus was such that SANA – the Syrian state news agency – ran this gushing eulogy of Chavez earlier today. He was also apparently quite well thought of by Bahraini a leadership accused of heinous human rights violations. Make of that what you will.

The late president was also a vocal supporter of Moammar Gadhafi, the Libyan leader who was killed by rebels in late 2011. Chavez wasn’t the only South American leader to support Gadhafi in the face of the perceived colonialist onslaught to rid Libya of his rule, but he may have been the most open in his admiration for a man accused of torture, terrorism and mass killings.

In Egypt. as the revolution against Hosni Mubarak gathered steam, Chavez railed against foreign interference in the popular movement to remove the dictator, a movement which was, plainly, Egyptian.

Chavez accused Israel of “genocide” following its indiscriminate killing of Palestinian civilians during Operation Cast Lead in 2009, which earned him much support from across the Arab world (he was easily the most popular non-Arab leader among Arabs according to this 2009 poll). Under his leadership, Venezuela became the first country to abolish entry visas for Palestinians.

There was obviously some disharmony in Chavez’s approach to the Middle East – the one common thread perhaps being his seeking to undermine US foreign policy in the region. It’s laudable that his stood up and called the IDF out for what it was/is, and he justly blazed a trail for the rights of Palestinians.

Thing is, Chavez’s support of Assad and Gadhafi and – by extension – Mubarak did somewhat contradict his self-hewn reputation as a man of the people and the enemy of inequality, wherever that occurred. He stood by Assad and Gadhafi, in particular, from the  ideological perspective of the anti-imperialist, manfully resisting the neo-colonial aspirations of the old powers in the Middle East, even after such a stance was superseded by events. Say what you will about the colonialist Britain and France carrying out airstrikes on Gadhafi positions or the west’s “non-lethal” support of the Syrian rebels, they both only came after domestic, internal and even nationalist objections to governance in Tripoli and Damascus.

NATO didn’t move (although I don’t doubt it was itching to) in Libya until it became clear the rebels had widespread domestic support and the backing of the Arab League. In Syria, the peaceful protests that began against Assad two years ago were Syrian in as much as they represented the aspirations of at least part of the Syrian population. What happened later is the direct result of foreign interference – from Iran and Russia as much as the US and the GCC – but to say that the war is solely the intention and result of an imperialist plot…well, there are some causation issues in that.

There are and were many Syrians and Libyans who claim Gadhafi had and Assad has lost the mandate to rule due to a catastrophic loss of popular support. This is debatable, sure, but the nuance here didn’t enter Chavez’s Middle East rhetoric.

I don’t know enough about the man himself to know if Chavez’s affection for Gadhafi was genuine or reactionary, but one wonders what he felt for the Libyan leader during that period of Libyan-western rapprochement that gave us images such as this. Gadhafi was no bone-deep anti-imperialist; he allowed himself to get cosy with western leaders as and when it suited him; for him to declare his ousting was a western plot just years after he invited most of its leaders to obsequious banquets in Tripoli was a double-standard into which, in his well-timed support of the late Libyan leader, Chavez may have inadvertently fell.

Yesterday I likened the dilemma one has when assessing Chavez’s Middle East policy to Homer Simpson’s conundrum when voting for Sideshow Bob. He was courageous in his support for Palestine and his (valid) criticism of the crimes committed by Israeli authorities, but I don’t think his support for Assad and Gadhafi stands up on the grounds he intended.

With the news today that the Lebanese Army has barred media from accessing Abra, a neighborhood in the hills around Sidon that houses firebrand cleric Sheikh Ahmed Assir, I thought I would share with you all an interview I did with Assir, at his offices in Abra, towards the end of last year.

The piece featuring excerpts of the exchange can be found here.

After waiting in a grocery store car park, I was picked up by one of Assir’s henchmen, with full black garb, flowing beard and Nike Air Jordan trainers (black of course). We went through security, then had this conversation.

The transcript in full:

Patrick Galey  Hello Sheikh. Can you give me your take on the situation in Lebanon right now, particularly for Sunnis?

Sheikh Ahmad Assir  The Sunnis, like all Lebanese, are being dominated by the Iranian party [Hezbollah] in terms of weapons and they are suffering more than ever.

PG  Why are they suffering more than ever?

AA  They are living nearby and whenever there is an attack it is by a group they think opposes them. Most people in the region are Sunni and refuse the Iranian project [of keeping Assad in power].

PG  Do you feel that the Sunnis have been particularly let down by the current government, which has some Hezbollah ministers in it?

AA  In general, Sunnis have not only been disappointed by this government but also by the governments that went before.

PG  Can we say that the Sunnis have been neglected by successive governments then?

AA  There are continuous attacks by the Iranian government but this mostly affects the Sunni population, if we take into account the deaths of [Former Prime Minister Rafik] Hariri etc.

PG  What is your view of Lebanon’s mainstream Sunni movements? How have they looked after their communities, since Hariri [was killed]?

AA  The Future Movement is living a duality. Firstly, it has no place in power without Sunni support. At the same time it is trying to show that it doesn’t only care about the Sunnis, that it cares about everyone. This led to them not acknowledging the rights of the Sunnis and in the way that they faced Iranian policy in Lebanon, they have failed.

PG  With the lack of political guidance from the Sinioras or Hariris of this world, there are other movements – social or religious – taking their place on the Sunni street. What’s your view on that?

AA  It’s not about someone replacing someone else. In my opinion there is a glitch here and all parties need to be aware of it.

PG  You’re referring to Hezbollah’s dominance of arms?

AA  Hezbollah’s arms.

PG  Now, you campaigned against Hezbollah’s arms. Why stop at Hezbollah? They are not the only party with weapons here. Are you against all violence in political life, or just Hezbollah’s?

AA  Firstly, because the weapons of the Iranian party are more powerful than the [Lebanese army]. From these arms, individual arms [guns, RPGs] are being born. These weapons have always existed and we are not afraid of them. We are afraid of arms on a bigger scale that could bring Lebanon into a war without consulting the Lebanese. We are against all types of weapons.

PG  To take a recent example, I was in 6ari2 l Jdideh last week following the death of Wissam al-Hassan and I saw very heavy arms fire between Sunni groups. These were the men I always see on the street, who come out and fight, not just against each other, but the army as well. Who is telling them to do that?

AA  This is why we should focus on the glitch. The weapons of parties exist and their use internally has provoked the Sunnis into arming and defending themselves. Where they get the arms from, it’s not difficult to obtain them.

PG  That’s all true, but I’m interested in who is telling people to come out and fight. For example – I don’t know what political affiliation these guys were – but they are the same sort of Salafist groups that come out to see you yourself Sheikh. They are out with guns on the streets and they are fighting the army. Who is telling them to do that?

AA  I can assure you that these people are not organised. It was a personal reaction. Every five friends that felt they were targeted reacted and went down. They have no leader. And I would like to say that I am not a Salafist.

PG  In the Palestinian camps, two days ago there was a meeting in Ain el-Helwe, close to here, between Asbat al-Ansar and Hezbollah. What is your reaction to that? Is that unusual? A meeting between an Al-Qaeda backed group and Hezbollah?

AA  They are not necessarily backed by Al-Qaeda, they might have some ideas in common -

PG  But, I mean, the US State Department designates them as a terrorist group with clear affiliations to Al-Qaeda.

AA  The situation today with Islamist Salafists is that you find some of them that find it in their interest to have something in common with the Iranian party, while you see others that completely oppose it. In the case of Asbat al-Ansar, they found it was in their interest to meet with Hezbollah.

PG  They are only a small group with 2000 members. Was [the meeting] a bit of political convenience, do you think?

AA  Yes, they saw it in their interest to have connections with several parties.

PG  I’d like to continue with this in a moment, but something you said struck me a little, you said you’re not a Salafist. But that is what you are always referred to in the press. Can you clear this up; if you’re not a Salafist, what are you?

AA  First of all, Salafist is not an accusation. The term is being used now for anything resembling the Ikhwan. There are groups that have different motives and views. For me, I am the Imam of a mosque and I give sermons. I have no affiliation with any political party.

PG  Thank you for clearing that up. Your position – not being affiliated with any party – is laudable, but you’ve taken a very clear position on Syria. Why have you taken this position on Syria, recently?

AA  When the uprisings happened in the Arab world, most people supported them. But when the Syrian uprising happened, it didn’t receive as much support, even though this may be the most deserving uprising because the people have been oppressed for more than 40 years. Also, the Lebanese and the Syrians have been suffering for many years from the Iranian axis.

PG  The Islamist groups in Lebanon suffered very much under Hafez al-Assad. Is there a sense that this is an opportunity to gain revenge on Assad?

AA  I don’t think it is about revenge because the biggest demand we have is to have a system of justice. There can not be a sectarian war in Lebanon unless the Iranian party decides so. In this case, it is less a sectarian war, more than it is an attack by a heavily armed army against a people who are not heavily armed. The west is currently studying the possibility of the war in Syria spreading to Lebanon and the Sunnis cannot face any attack from the Iranian party because they are divided and weak. There will not be a sectarian war, there will be an attack.

PG  An attack on who?

AA  An attack on Sunnis, the same as happened in May 2008. There was an attack by people with heavy arms on people without. [The Sunnis] will not last one day.

PG  So what is happening in Syria is mirrored in Lebanon, with a big party with big arms, as you say, against a small party with small arms?

AA  There is a big difference. What is happening in Syria is a revolution that has been organised. Most Syrians already have fighting experience, with three years compulsory military suffrage, and you have soldiers evading the army. In Lebanon, we are opposing the Iranian party – there is no other party that is similarly organised. Even with the FM, the popularity it has is dispersed. Even if we wanted to be armed and organised, we would fail from the first step.

PG  That may be true, but the opposition or revolutionaries in Syria are getting arms and fighters – sometimes extremist fighters. There are reports of extremist, armed groups. They are dangerous and yet you support the movement to get rid of Assad, even though there are these armed extremists among the rebels.

AA  This is normal. The revolution is popular, not organised. On the margins of it you will see some wrong behavior but they don’t represent the revolution. There is no way that these extremists will endure in the face of the regime; the Syrian people will. The involvement of the international community in Syria prepared the environment for Al-Qaeda to be present.

PG  Al-Qaeda is also present in Lebanon and you see when there is a March 14 rally there are Al-Qaeda flags mixed in with the rest. There is a small yet potent minority that are armed Sunni radicals in Lebanon. If you support a revolution containing radical movements in Syria, what do you do with them in Lebanon?

AA  I don’t agree that Al-Qaeda is in Lebanon. There are people who might sympathise with Al-Qaeda because they feel they have been wronged and this is a way they can speak out against injustice. As for the flags, the person who raised it might also just sympathise with their ideas. There’s a contradiction here because holding the flag of Al-Qaeda – firstly, Al-Qaeda doesn’t protest in Lebanon. They won’t go down and protest the death of Wissam al-Hassan when he had a big role in Nahr al-Bared.

PG  Speaking of Nahr al-Bared, Asbat al Ansar on Thursday claimed they were influential in getting you to end your sit in in the Summer. You’ve had run ins with armed groups from the Palestinian camps in the past, is that right?

AA  Who attacked me?

PG We saw numerous reports of attacks against your protest. Grenade attacks, intimidation…

AA  That’s true, but what does that have to do with Asbat al-Ansar?

PG  They said they were influential in getting you to end your sit in. And it wasn’t meant kindly, Sheikh.

AA  From the first week of our sit in the interior minister was communicating with us. Our demands were very simple but they couldn’t even deliver them to us so we had to continue. In the end, when no one was able to stop the sit in, we had a visit from Asbat al-Ansar. They wanted to hear my demands. I told them and they told me that they would give these demands to the authorities. I said I didn’t have problem because the prime minister and government already have my demands. When the party saw all its allies couldn’t stop the sit in, they came up with a ruse saying that they would discuss Hezbollah’s weapons, which was one of our demands. We wanted a serious discussion on Hezbollah’s weapons. So the liaison between me and the government became an influential Palestinian who has relations with both Asbat al-Ansar and myself. Asbat al-Ansar paid us a visit but the person who liaised was just a person I knew. The Iranian party tricked the prime minister into thinking that they were serious in talking about their arms and when we broke our sit in it turned out they lied. Asbat al-Ansar took this into their interest to show they broke up the sit in.

PG  They were just taking credit?

AA  The meal was all ready. They just opened the lid.

PG  I see. Sheikh, we have a saying: “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” You are calling for regime change in Syria and there are a lot of groups not doing this peacefully. Are you allied with them? Is this something that you are prepared to tolerate – these extremist groups – in order to get rid of Assas?

AA  I am with the Syrian people people defending themselves and I am for the guards of Bashar to repent and to kill him. But I do not support any military action from Lebanon in this regard because this wouldn’t serve the revolution or the Syrian of Lebanese people.

PG  So you advocate non-violence against the Syrian regime but you say Assad will be killed?

AA  It is only just that a person who kills thousands gets killed.

PG  Killed by whom? Fairly, in front of a court or the UN, or is this going to end the way Qadhafi ended?

AA  If the rebels were able to take Assad, then yes through a court. But if he is killed in battle, so be it.

PG  What about a terrorist attack? We’ve seen them against the defense minister etc. Is terrorism a necessary evil to remove Assad?

AA  In battle – in history – there is no clean kill. You always have inappropriate things that happen that people don’t agree with. I want to see Bashar killed in battle. But in the end, Bashar al-Assad is the head of the military, so he is a legitimate target.

PG  What will happen in Lebanon if Assad falls?

AA  The Iranian project in Lebanon will be weakened, but it won’t go away. In order to get a modern state in Syria will take 10 years or more. This is why I separate myself from March 14 because I rally peacefully to end armed groups in Lebanon.

PG  And how long will you continue doing this, against arms in Lebanon?

AA  As long as I’m alive.

N.B. A matter of days after this interview, two of Assir’s bodyguards died in a gun battle in Tripoli, prompting Assir to renounce his former non-violent protest methods. His followers have since undertaken numerous displays of force, with armed marches throughout the town. 

Aftermath of Egypt balloon crash. (via @chrismichel)

Here’s a link to the full story.

With the fallout still – well – falling from the decision taken by Lebanese MPs to adopt a new electoral law stipulating that voters may only cast ballots for candidates of the same religion, the following is an unorthodox – pun intended – response to developments.

Protests have erupted following the decision, with opponents suggesting it is a backward step for democracy in a country with 17 recognised sects and where sectarian tensions have lingered for decades. It also makes it impossible for voters who wish to identify as atheist or as belonging to any non-Abrahamic religion to vote. Many have been scratching their heads, wondering how they can circumvent the new rules without spoiling their ballots.

I have colleague David Kenner to thank for this.

Article 2, Section c of the proposed Orthodox Gathering electoral law states:

Voters exclusively elect candidates of their own sect. Christian voters of minority sects shall vote for minority candidates whereas Muslim voters of minority sects that are not represented by any parliamentary seat shall have the right to vote for the Muslim candidates of their choice regardless of their sects. Jewish voters shall have the right to vote for the Muslim or Christian candidates of their choice.

So only Jewish voters will have a full choice between candidates of different sects in Lebanon – a country where until recently the faith was referred on ID cards as “the Israeli sect.” Will we see Lebanese politicians identifying themselves as Jews in order to with cross-sectarian support? Obviously, this is unlikely, given the often rocky receptions the few Jews present in the country often get.

And then there’s the rigmarole one has to go through to even update their address on the electoral register – a process that can take months and, due to the previous gerrymandered electoral districts, often attracts intimidations from local party officials. Still, it’s good to know there is at least some theoretical (and no-doubt unintended) avenue of recourse for voters miffed by the new sectarian measures.