Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Lebanon

In the hopelessly convoluted world of Lebanese politics, one of the many historical echoes in the assassination of Pierre Gemayel is that the assassination of his uncle, Bashir, in 1982, was the pretext for the Israeli occupation of then Palestinian West Beirut -- which they outsourced to Christian militias with disastrous consequences. In fact one remarkable thing is that despite the assassinations and quarter-century of turmoil since, so many of the principals and creations of the 1982 invasion are still around.

UPDATE: We should also note this now more laden sentence from Michael Young in today's Wall Street Journal --

Syria's Lebanese allies are trying to undermine the Hariri investigation from within, and are expected to escalate their efforts very soon, maybe even this week.

As several news articles explain, the Lebanese Cabinet is now very close to not having a quorum for any business, including the Hariri investigation.

And Talking Points Memo notes another association with the 1982 Gemayel killing.

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