Tunisia: Hopes, Myths and Copycat Revolutions

The success of the Tunisian uprising in forcing President Bin Ali to relinquish power last week has sparked off hopes of change across the Arab world. Considering that most Arab leaders hang on to power till the last day of their lives, this is no mean feat. Bin Ali's departure from office after 23 years of autocratic rule and as a result of a popular uprising seems to have broken the crippling barrier of fear. The question that many are asking now is who's next? Even the BBC has volunteered a few candidates and asked 'will there be a domino effect?' 

The March 8 Paradox: Thoughts on Nasrallah's Speech

On the eve of the parliamentary consultations to determine the next Prime Minister of Lebanon and, as rumour has it, the long-awaited indictment of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), the Secretary General of Hezbollah Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah delivered a speech this evening in which he declared March 8's decision not to nominate Hariri again for the post. Hezbollah's ally Michel Aoun, head of the Free Patriotic Movement, had earlier in the day made a similar declaration. Both stressed that their opposition to Hariri's return to the premiership is not solely related to the STL, but also to the shoddy performance of the government and its incompetence.

When Karl Marx quoted Hariri

"He who never destroys what he has built, ever stands

On this terrestrial world, which itself never stands still,"

says Hariri, who is no Frenchman by birth, but an Arab."
 
(Karl Marx, On Freedom of the Press)

Lebanon's self-induced paralysis

Firstly, the significance of latest ‘crisis’ to hit the Lebanese political system following the resignation of 11 cabinet ministers yesterday, and the de facto resignation of the cabinet that ensued, should be properly understood. The Lebanese confessional system appears to be exhibiting the symptoms of the law of diminishing returns: in the past this system used to function for a couple of decades in between major crises. This cycle how now been shortened to two years. By any objective measure, this system has now completely exhausted itself. Nevertheless, a viable alternative remains conspicuously absent.

Al-Akhbar/Wikileaks: A postscript. The limits of journalism.

On the 1st of December, a Syrian worker was shot by Lebanese police dressed in civilian clothes in the early hours of the morning. The murder happened in Hamra, a residential and commercial district of Beirut that is popular with tourists and locals alike. The incident received little coverage in the media, with the exception of Al-Akhbar newspaper which published detailed coverage of the circumstances of the murder and placed it prominently on its digital version. Two things conspired to keep the story from receiving the attention that it deserved: the fact that the victim Abdel Nasser Ahmad was Syrian and Al-Akhbar’s publication of the leaked cables from several Arab countries which dominated the news.

My first article for Muftah.Org 'the Key to Middle East and North Africa Policy-Making'

I've started writing about Lebanon for Muftah, they just published my first article: "Consensus in Lebanese Politics: The Authoritarian Alternative to Democracy." Muftah is an online publication concerned with Middle East and North Africa Policy-Making, and it's ran and written by an impressive group of volunteers. Please visit the website and if you want to show your support 'Like' their page on Facebook and you can also follow them on Twitter.

A Scandalous Lack of Scandal: Why Wikileaks failed to impress in Lebanon

First things first: the attacks that brought down Al-Akhbar newspaper’s website today are a despicable action that is as pointless as it is stupid. Pointless because any hope of stemming the flow of information on the internet is a delusion and stupid because those attacks will only reinforce the idea that the leaked information that Al-Akhbar published should be repressed. To me, freedom of speech in the Arab world is much more important than political disagreements and we should all support Al-Akhbar against those attacks.