Sol,

A commenter, Joe, Apr. 21, 2010 at 3:07 pm, makes this following statement:
The only government that was literally blocking or hindering any US measures against Syria was Israel (thanks to AIPAC members).

Do you have any knowledge on the details; do you remember anything that occurred some 5 years ago?

I find it strange to say the least considering the attitude towards Syria and America's inaction when the Syrians were aiding and abetting the insurgency in Iraq.

Cynic - Sol - if you'll permit me: to the best of my knowledge that is a misinformed and even silly comment.

People are always blaming AIPAC for something.

And, this latest comment is essentially making the claim that AIPAC and/or Israel control the media and of course the US government and well as the UN.

The Hariri assassination continues to be investigated, several years after the fact. This is a UN investigation conducted on the highest levels.

There's a concensus among many Lebanese that Syria is to blame or possibly its proxies but it's suspected (from what I have gathered) that there's a lack of will on the part of the UN investigators to actually indict the offenders OR there isn't enough hard evidence, which seems to support the idea that the Syrian government itself was involved.

There's a lot of information about this on Tony Badran's blog, you can check his archives.

There are lots of Lebanese blogs with commentary about the March 14 movement and the history of the Hariri family, the Lebanese Civil War and Lebanese factions and their struggles against each other and also their relations with, respectively, Israel and Syria.

In no case do I think AIPAC has that kind of juice in UN level matters involving Syria and Lebanon; and in fact, it seems to me that the Cedar Revolution, ie March 14 movement which drove Syria out of Lebanon was wholly in Western interests.

The establishment of Lebanese sovereignty over Lebanese soil remains an issue though especially since the murder of Hariri, the many bombings that have killed and maimed other pro-Western politicians and journalists and the ascendancy of Hezbollah which is now part of the Lebanese national government and remains beyond the power even of the Lebanese army to control let alone disarm. These factors of course make the possibility of civil war and/or war with Syria or Israel very serious.

Also, the issue of Lebanese sovereignty is directly related to Syrian interests in the region as many forces in Syria do not recognize Lebanese sovereignty.

Also, Nasser in the Cairo Accords granted the Palestinians in Lebanon sovereignty over the "refugee camps" and although this was later rescinded and sovereignty over these territories returned to Lebanon, the fact is the camps are heavily armed and only by bombing Nahr al Bared to the ground was the Lebanese Army capable of getting rid of a few hundred terrorists who'd taken up residence there (members of Fatah al Islam).

This displaced tens of thousands of Palestinians who are not wanted as citizens in Lebanon, who are restricted in movement, residency and rights and who are supposed to be disarmed along with Hezbollah - yet nobody has the power to disarm either group.

Given all these complexities and the pro-Western nature of March 14/Cedar Revolution I don't see how Israel let alone AIPAC would benefit in any way from interfering with a UN investigation into the murder of Hariri, as if this were possible.

And after all Hariri was a pro-Western player. Like Gemayal before him his murder was an attack on the kind of pro-Western movement that would actually argue for detente or even alliance with Israel.

As for fearing an even more radical government in Syria - that doesn't really make sense. It's true that Assad's father oppressed the Muslim Brotherhood, brutally in fact - but the current Assad is host to the leaders of Hamas, is directly linked to Ahmadijenad's government in Iran and supports Hezbollah and funnels arms to them so how much more radical can it get?

I suppose there's some truth to the point that Assad is a somewhat known and relatively rational player but that begs the question: doesn't this sound like a typical "Jewish conspiracy" theory?

After all Assad is also a person with whom the US deals, and in fact has sent people to (extraordinary rendition)(shamefully imo) and also with whom we are now "engaging," despite the drawbacks of his government and the presence of real would-be dissent among the Syrian people.

Many of these dissidents are of course in jail.

So much for human rights. It is a mistake to assume the dissidents are all MB too - many are pro-Western from what I have gathered and include journalists and poets.

***

Here's a link, which in turn links to other blogs:

http://beirut2bayside.blogspot.com/