Hezbollah

Berlin
On the eve of al Quds day, when supporters of the Iranian-led resistance bloc plan to march throughout European cities, U.S. representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Florida), chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has written a letter to José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, urging the EU to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization.

Last week the Treasury Department leveled sanctions against Hezbollah for providing support to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in his efforts to put down the 17-month-old rebellion meant to topple his regime.

Last Friday, a Lebanese military tribunal met for the fifth time in the trial of Sheikh Hassan Mchaymech, the Hezbollah dissident.

Maarab, Lebanon
Samir Geagea is reluctant to speak much of the attempt on his life last month.

New Jersey Republican governor Chris Christie is touring Israel this week, visiting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres. But right now he's gone north, visiting the Golan Heights for a security briefing and a tour.

Yesterday, a rocket fired from southern Lebanon missed its target in Israel. Instead it wounded a Lebanese woman, hinting at a possible pattern of things to come. While Hezbollah contends that its weapons are to protect Lebanon from Israel, the reality is that the arms used to defend the resistance’s patrons Iran and Syria are likely to cause Lebanon yet more suffering.

In a little noticed ruling on Monday, November 28, a Washington, D.C. district court found that both Iran and Sudan were culpable for al Qaeda’s 1998 embassy bombings. As is typical in state sponsorship of terrorism cases, neither Iran nor Sudan answered the plaintiffs’ accusations. But in a 45-page decision, Judge John D. Bates issued a default judgment. The court found that the “government of the Islamic Republic of Iran…has a long history of providing material aid and support to terrorist organizations including al Qaeda,” which “claimed responsibility for the August 7, 1998 embassy bombings.”

In the aftermath of a reported explosion earlier today in the Iranian city of Isfahan that may have targeted a uranium enrichment plant, at least three katyusha rockets were fired from Lebanon into Israel's western Galilee overnight Monday.

In today’s New York Times, Avi Jorisch argues that the U.S. should seize the Iranian embassy and other assets belonging to the Islamic Republic. The purpose isn’t retaliation for the takeover of the U.S. embassy in Tehran more than 31 years ago, but rather to pressure Iran for funding terrorist organizations, including al Qaeda.

If Sir James Wolfensohn, the cofounder of Edward Said’s West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, doesn’t deserve to be honored at the American University of Beirut (AUB), then who does? Recently, the former World Bank chief found himself in the midst of controversy after AUB had announced that he would receive an honorary doctorate and deliver the June commencement address. Faculty members and students signed a petition in protest, arguing that honoring Wolfensohn “undermines AUB’s legacy in the struggle for social justice and its historical connection to Beirut, to Palestine and beyond.”

At the end of a Washington Post op-ed criticizing John McCain for labeling Republicans who oppose intervention in the Libyan war “isolationists,” George Will writes (emphasis added):

Last Friday, protesters in Syria burned Russian and Iranian flags as they took to the streets to speak out against the regime. Today's Friday, so protesters again took to the streets.  This time, some were spotted burning pictures of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.