An anti-government protestor holds a picture of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut, Dec. 10. (AFP Photo)

When Israeli jets were dropping American-made-and-paid-for bombs on Lebanon 's cities, where was the Lebanese "army"? Hiding in its barracks, even as the Israelis reduced their bases to rubble. And where was Lebanon's prime minister, Fouad Siniora, and what was he doing about it? He was pleading with his masters in Washington to call off their Israeli dogs, and wiping away tears as he broke down in front of the Arab conference, when it became apparent that his pleas were falling on deaf ears. That isn't all he was doing, however, as Hassan Nasrallah recently pointed out. Addressing 2 million protesters rallying in Beirut against Siniora's government, he asked: "Didn't the prime minister of Lebanon work to cut off the supply lines?" Nasrallah and his supporters claim Lebanese government officials colluded with the Americans and the Israelis to rain death on their own country.
The war in which Hezbollah alone defended the Lebanese nation against the Israelis has given Nasrallah tremendous political authority--and created a nationalist coalition that rises above sectarian divisions. In calling for a new government of national unity dedicated to preserving Lebanese sovereignty, Hezbollah is joined by other mainstream Lebanese political forces, including Amal and the Lebanese Patriotic Front, the Maronite Christian group led by Michel Aoun. The Democratic Party of Lebanon, a Druze group led by Talal Arslan, also supports the anti-government coalition.
The unifying principle that brings together all these disparate elements is opposed not just to the present government, but to what it represents: a conspiracy of foreigners who want to assert--or, in the case of France, reassert--control over Lebanese affairs.
The Washington-backed government of Siniora came to power, you'll remember, in the so-called Cedar Revolution, which followed the assassination of entrepreneur-politician Rafik Hariri and succeeded in chasing the Syrians out of the country. This "revolution" was hailed by George W. Bush and the neocons as yet another example of the "freedom wave" sweeping through the Middle East as a result of the "liberation" of Iraq. It was a very short Beirut Spring, however, cut short by Israel 's aggression and Washington 's active complicity.
Now many of the same people who marched against the Syrian-backed regime are demanding an end to Siniora, and the West is paying the price of betrayal. A wave of anti-Americanism is sweeping the country, as Hezbollah speakers at the daily protests in Beirut declare "there is no place for America in Lebanon."
This perfectly illustrates the double treachery of a foreign policy that serves neither American interests nor the interests of freedom abroad. For all the rhetoric about the "global democratic revolution" coming out of the White House propaganda operation, the tragic reality of our actual policy was confirmed by the Israeli aggression, which we not only fully countenanced, but, some say, actively encouraged. America is blamed as much as Israel for an attack that killed over 1,000 Lebanese (hardly any of them Hezbollah fighters) and devastated much of the essential infrastructure that made Lebanon a major commercial hub for the region.
The crippling economic effects of the Israeli attack--and Hezbollah's role in throwing back the Israeli assault--have driven many Christians into the ranks of the anti-government opposition. As one Christian shopkeeper put it:
The predominantly Maronite Christian middle and upper classes took a big hit during the war, and Aoun's alliance with Hezbollah and other anti-government elements reflects a decisive shift in the constellation of sectarian alignments and ancient feuds that have dominated Lebanese politics since the end of the French Mandate. Lebanon's "confessional" constitutional arrangements call for a division of political power according to religious and ethnic allegiances, but the Israeli incursion created something new: a genuine Lebanese nationalism, forged in the fire of war.
Hezbollah is variously portrayed by the neocons as "pro-Syrian". The "Party of God" was born in resistance to the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon in the 1980s, and soon branched out into electoral politics. It also morphed into a social-service agency providing a wide array of functions: healthcare, charities, business associations, as well as physical protection from foreign forces. Hezbollah's reconstruction efforts have dwarfed those of the UN and the U.S. It is, in short, a private alternative to the profoundly dysfunctional and infamously corrupt Lebanese government. As a result, Hezbollah enjoys wide support from Christians and Druze, not just from Shi'ite Muslims, who make up around 40 percent of Lebanon 's population. As Michel Aoun explained in this interview, Hezbollah has gone beyond its origins as a sectarian organization and come to embody rising Lebanese nationalism.
Justin Raimondo
ANTIWAR.COM

Thursday's decision by the Serious Fraud Office to abandon a two-year long investigation into allegations that BAE Systems paid kickbacks to unspecified members of the Saudi royal family from a £40bn arms deal may go unnoticed in the pyschodrama over the report into the death of the Princess of Wales and amid the public clamour over the serial killings of prostitutes in Ipswich. Add to that Tony Blair's being interviewed by police in the cash-for-honours affair as well, and Thursday may have turned out to be a good day for, as it were, burying the news. But the SFO decision should cause dismay.
Lord Goldsmith, the attorney-general, told the House of Lords it was the opinion of the prime minister and the government that to continue the investigation would seriously damage UK-Saudi relations, and by extension, British national security. Britain's chief legal officer then made the specious assertion that we had "to balance the need to maintain the rule of law against the wider public interest".
Saudi Arabia appears to have brought pressure to bear on the government about the investigation, strongly hinting that it would jeopardise a new multibillion-pound deal for Eurofighter Typhoons. Saudi officials have held meetings in France to discuss alternative suppliers, just as they did two decades ago in the concluding stages of the Al Yamamah contract.
Al Yamamah was Britain's biggest export deal and one of the largest arms contracts ever signed. There are jobs at stake, and not just for BAE, if Riyadh were to pull the plug on its successor. But what else should we be balancing in Lord Goldsmith's curious scales?
First, to give into Saudi pressure is tantamount to issuing a general invitation to blackmail. It has been Britain's policy that governments cannot interfere with the course of enquiries or meddle with the rule of law. What will they say now when, for instance, Moscow demands the return of Chechen dissidents or Riyadh objects to BBC broadcasts?
Second, Britain's sermons about transparency and good governance, as well as adherence to anti-bribery conventions, will be blown away by gales of derision--and rightly so. The reputation of the SFO, moreover, will be badly tarnished.
Third, does it really advance UK and western strategic aims to pour arms into Saudi Arabia? It is doubtful this really contributes to the kingdom's defence. Military spending, at about three times the average for a developing country, is used as a mechanism for distributing wealth and power within the top ranks of the House of Saud. A bloated absolutist monarchy squandering fabulous public wealth is not exactly a recipe for stability.
Presumably this was not what Lord Goldsmith had in mind when he spoke portentously yesterday of "our highest priority foreign policy objectives in the Middle East ".
FT.COM

Human rights activists celebrate Augusto Pinochet's death in Santiago, Dec. 11. (AFP Photo)

As the world marked International Human Rights Day, one of the century's most notorious dictators, Gen. Augusto Pinochet, died under house arrest in Chile at the age of 91. His 17-year reign left a deep scar on Chilean society. Yet Pinochet's legacy includes an ironic upside: His regime and the U.S. support for it galvanized the modern-day international human rights movement.
On Sept. 11, 2001 , as the planes hit the towers of the World Trade Center , on our daily broadcast of "Democracy Now!," we were looking at the connection between terrorism and Sept. 11, 1973 . It was on that day that the democratically elected government of Chilean President Salvador Allende was overthrown in a violent coup, and the forces of Pinochet rose to power. The coup was supported by the U.S. government. Henry Kissinger, national security adviser and U.S. secretary of state, summed up the policy this way:
"I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its own people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves."
As Pinochet seized power, first among the dead was the president himself, Allende. Then there were the thousands rounded up. Among them was Victor Jara, the legendary Chilean folk singer. Jara was beaten, tortured, then executed. His body was dumped on a Santiago street and found by his wife in the morgue.
Charles Horman was a U.S. journalist working in Chile . He, too, disappeared in those days following the coup. His body was found buried in a cement wall. His story was immortalized in the Academy Award-winning Constantin Costa-Gavras film "Missing." His widow, Joyce Horman, sued not only Pinochet for the death of her husband but also Kissinger and others at the U.S. State Department.
Pinochet's reign of terrorism extended beyond Chile's borders. On Sept. 21, 1976, the former foreign minister of Chile, Orlando Letelier, and his American colleague, Ronni Moffit, died in a car bombing, not in Chile, but on Embassy Row in Washington, D.C.
Then there was Chile 's current president, Michelle Bachelet. Her father was a general under Allende and opposed the coup. He was arrested and died of a heart attack in prison. She and her mother were detained and tortured at the notorious Villa Grimaldi, a secret torture site in Santiago. Bachelet and her mother survived and went into exile. Her return to Chile and eventual election as president on the Socialist ticket has brought Chilean politics and history full circle. In October 2006, she returned to Villa Grimaldi. In November, Pinochet was placed under house arrest and charged with the kidnap and murder of prisoners there.
This was not the first time Pinochet was arrested. In 1998, while on a medical visit in London , he was put under house arrest after Spanish judge Baltasar Garzon issued a warrant for his arrest for the torture and murder of Spanish nationals. After 18 months, Britain finally allowed Pinochet to return to Chile for health reasons, avoiding extradition to Spain.
Pinochet's death allows him to escape conviction. Kissinger, whose support for the Pinochet regime is increasingly well documented, is still alive and still of interest to those seeking justice. Kissinger has been sought for questioning by Judge Garzon and by French Judge Roger Le Loire, both investigating the death and disappearance of their citizens in Chile. While Kissinger is frequently questioned by the media in this country, he is almost never asked about his own record. Instead, he is treated like royalty.
Questions remain about the brutal regime of Pinochet. Kissinger likely holds many answers. If we are to have a uniform standard of justice, then answers need to be demanded of the genuine terrorism experts such as Henry Kissinger.
Amy Goodman
COMMONDREAMS.ORG

After the landslide victory comes the landslide of lies. Last week, Hugo Chavez was re-elected as president of Venezuela with 63 percent of the vote--in an election declared Òtotally free and fairÓ by the international legal monitors, in a country where almost all of the media militantly opposes him.
I know the reason why. Her name is Maria Gonzalez. She is a lined, stooped 60 year-old grandmother I stumbled across last year in Barrio Neuva Tacagua, a fetid slum made of tin and mud in the high hills around Caracas.
Maria grew up in a Venezuela that was dripping in oil wealth--but she never went to school and she never saw a doctor, because the countryÕs petro-profits surged only into the bank accounts of the countryÕs 25 richest families. Like the vast majority of Venezuelans, she was left to live and die in makeshift rust-and-cardboard shacks.
The day I met her, Maria wrote her name--in shaky handwriting, on a blackboard--for the first time in her life. Since Hugo Chavez was first elected, in another free and open election in 1998, MariaÕs world has begun to change. The new president began to use the countryÕs oil wealth to build clinics where Maria could be treated free of charge, to subsidize food prices for the 70 percent of Venezuelans who, like her, live in grinding, binding poverty, and to establish mass literacy programs to teach his country--and a million Marias--how to read.
But somehow, somewhere in-between MariaÕs Venezuela and the newspapers and television screens of the US and Britain, Chavez undergoes a strange transformation. He ceases to be the most popular leader in the democratic world, and instead morphs into Òa grotesque dictator,Ó Òlike Hitler, Stalin or Mao.Ó
Why is that? I know of only one persuasive explanation: These people reporting on Chavez are deeply ingrained in a political culture that views the rest of the world as a trough for corporate profit. When a developing-world regime funnels its profits to a handful of rich, they instinctively describe it as aiding Òregional stabilityÓ and Òdemocratic.Ó
But when a government uses its resource-riches for people who live in slums, they become suspect and Òa threat to stability.Ó
LetÕs go through the lies about Hugo Chavez one by one to see how this deception occurs:
Lie No.1: Chavez is a dictator. In reality, he has been chosen by the Venezuelan people in elections praised by the Carter Center--the gold standard for election monitoring across the world--as Òimpressively open.Ó This is hardly, as some critics who have never visited Venezuela jeer, because the people are pickled in Chavista propaganda. Pick up any of VenezuelaÕs seven national newspapers any day and six of them will blast you with ferocious anti-Chavez invective. I have been to dictatorships and they are nothing like this.
Lie No. 2: Chavez is suppressing human rights. This accusation is screamed loudly but with little evidence. Sometimes, the critics claim there are 200 political prisoners in Venezuela.
Lie No. 3: Chavez is a communist who is determined to nationalize the whole of the countryÕs economy. This is a Rumsfeldian lie that, ironically, is also reinforced by some of ChavezÕs old left supporters in Britain, such as that smirking Stalinist carbuncle George Galloway. In reality, Chavez is a European-style social democrat who believes in an active government that lifts up the poor alongside a vigorous market economy. He calls this Ò21st-century socialism.Ó
Johann Hari
INDEPENDENT.CO.UK