The dark age of Hizbullah is upon us

Hariri's Future TV is off the air after being threatened by the Hizbullah militia. Hizbullah is in control of much of West Beirut, spreading a reign of terror.

Hariri and Jumblatt are being surrounded by the Hizbullah orcs, who also set fire to the al-Mustaqbal newspaper building.

Hizbullah has also occupied the headquarters of Ali al-Amin, the Tyre Mufti who is against Hizbullah.

Aoun is gloating. He thinks it's a coup that will deliver him the presidency.

13:10 عون: هذه الاحداث اعادت القاطرة الى السكة الصحيحة وسنعود الى حياتنا الطبيعية وطرقاتنا ستكون امنة وسننظر الى الماضي القريب لنعرف ما هي الجرائم التي ارتكبت واضمن للجميع بألا يتعرض احد لاضطهاد باستثناء المسؤولين الذين شذوا عن صلاحياتهم

13:05 العماد عون: اليوم هو انتصار للبنان بالعودة الى الميثاق الوطني واعادة التوازن الى مكونات الشعب اللبناني الذي كان مفقوداّ

13:03 حركة امل تدعو المواطنين في الوتوات والظريف للعودة الى مواطنهم

13:02 ال بي سي: عناصر من امل وحزب الله احتلوا دار الافتاء الجعفري في صور حيث مكتب السيد علي الامين

13:00 جنبلاط لـ"العربية": حزب الله" يملي ارادته على الدولة واجتياحه لبيروت فشل في السياسة وانا باق في بيروت ولن اخرج من بيتي واتفقت انا والحريري على تسليم كل مكاتبنا في بيروت للجيش وتعليماتي للحزبيين ان حمايتنا بواسطة الجيش واقول لنصرالله لا نقبل بحرب الالغاء واتمنى على بري ان يخرج البلاد من هذا المأزق

Saudi Arabia has called for an emergency Arab League meeting.

The rest of the world watches as Iran's proxies occupy Beirut.

Bassita, as they say. This is not over. Hizbullah will not win.

Update. Syrian regime lackey is trying to move the conflict to the Chouf, threatening to occupy Jumblatt's PSP offices. Jumblatt, meanwhile, is still in his Beirut residence, protected by the  army and ISF.  Gunshots are being heard in the area, and pro-Syrian SSNP militia members were seen near his residence.

Update 2. The Future TV building in Raouche was burned down by SSNP thugs. 

Update 3. March 14 MP Musbah Ahdab: if the Lebanese army does not intervene to protect Tripoli, because of alleged fear of division, then there are officers in the army who will not accept that their institution does not intervene to protect Tripoli and other [Sunni] areas.

Update 4. The Lebanese army is watching these violations, and chasing pro-March 14 gunmen, and allowing Hizbullah to do whatever they want. Meanwhile, Berri's NBN is reporting that Siniora will resign tonight. Jumblatt however told New TV that the government's resignation is out of the question.

Update 5. March 14 strategy so far: hand over everything to Lebanese army.

Comments

[Bad Vilbel]

The ultimate slap in the face:

Iran on Friday accused the United States and Israel of fueling the deadly fighting in Lebanon between pro- and anti- government fighters.

[Charlie]

So lets say they partition..where are the Sunni/Druze of West Beirut going to end up, pack and move to the east side?

[Bad Vilbel]

Partition doesn't necessarily mean ethnic cleansing, Charlie.
We're talking de-facto partitioning, much like 75-90. There were still Christians in West Beirut and Muslims in East Beirut during that time (with no political say).

This time around, I don't think the partition is as sectarian in nature anyway. This is not muslim vs. christian, like the old days. This is "Syria/Iran" on one side and "pro-west" on the other side.

I'm thinking out loud here, but you could probably have a mixed population on both sides with a pro-Syrian government on one side (with someone like Suleiman as a figurehead, or dare I say it Aoun) and a "free Lebanon" type government in the other area, headed by Saniora (*gag*).
Very much like the Aoun/Hoss era of 88-90.

I don't know. Really. All i know is that there is a DE FACTO partition on the ground. Call it what you will, you have one part of Lebanon that's under HA control (South, Bekaa, West Beirut) and one part of Lebanon that is being "left alone" (The Christian side, for the most part). Most likely because HA has calculated (correctly) that there is no way they can take ALL of Lebanon, and that (smart cookies as they are), they'd rather take on Lebanon in smaller and more manageable pieces.
And like it or not, the Christians (seen from a more regional ME point of view) are completely insignifcant. They have no real weight in the region, and have already been made largely irrelevant by Taef, 30 years of Syrian occupation, and the vaccum in the presidency.
The "real" prize here for Iran, is the Sunnis - because it parallels the Iraq divide, and because the arab states opposed to Iran are the big Sunni states (Egypt and Saudi).
So off the top of my head, I figure HA's goal is to ignore the Christians (at least for now), and let them have their little corner enclave, if they want to, as long as they don't bother HA, or try to disarm it (which is HA's biggest fear all along). No one's going to go out of their way for the Christians. Certainly not the Saudis or the Egyptians.

See where I'm going with this?

[Doha]

Doesn't it piss you off that Saudi and Egypt are talking to Iran to try to halt violence in Beirut?

[Charlie]

BV,

It is going to be messy any which way they slice it.
At the end of the day Lebanon has degenerated to a complete failure similar to Iraq and Somalia.

[Bad Vilbel]

Charlie,

Bingo.

[Doha]

Wow, Wiam Wahhab on Al-Manar glorifying the Army and asking them to close down all PSP offices. He was talking in a way that sounds like the Syrian regime is taking over, "We (who's we?) don't want to infringe upon people's political liberties, but we will not allow thugs to be going around causing violence on the streets of the Jabal." It's surreal!!!

[Stuck Visitor]

Hello again,

Still stuck here trying to find out if there will be a way out.

I have to say I am very amused reading your comments, since from your opinions it seems that most of you live outside Beirut, or Lebanon even. Keyborad pontification from the confort of your seats outside of Lebanon seems to be the trend on these blogs.

Some personal observations:
-Right now there are armed gangsters roaming the streets of Beirut. It seems that HA has delegated the gangstarism to Amal and other insignificant foot soldiers (SSNP, etc...)
-The people in Beirut are taking all this shit and then some. Peaceful resistance is what I'm seeing. Again I am talking about the simpleton Beirutis taking abuse and provocation from armed thugs and just ignoring this shit.
-Not sure what goals HA has achieved with this stunt. Fighting unarmed civilians and terrorizing them, is no better than pretending victory over an incompetent and confused army (IDF 06, Winograd report).
-HA launched psychological warefare on Beirutis by staging fake street fights. How? They were shooting in the air all night and were using 'sound bombs' (decoy bombs). It was very annoying and nerve-wracking to hear this all night. The streets that did not show resistance, had tons of used emtpy bullet shells next morning and no damage to the cars or shops. I was surprised to see this the next morning because I swear after all the shooting I heard during the night I expected to see the whole neighborhood in ruins.
-Manar TV must have the biggest supply of pot because the stuff reported on that station can only be invented when you're high.
-Aoun and other insignificant peons have the same supplier of pot as Manar TV.

Finally, the only thing I can conclude after the dust settled today was that HA was terrorizing Hariri Junior and Jumblat because they are really pissed at them.

Thanks for letting me rant again.

I heard a rumor that you can go to the airport if your airline has a scheduled flight for the day and you have the ticket to prove it. Anyone knows if this is true?

[AK]

Stuck visitor,

I have no idea if the airport rumor is true. You are right, many of us live outside the country. Keep updating us though. Thanks!

[Stuck Visitor]

No problem and thank YOU AK for this space.

I just wanted to add that the biggest indicator that HA has a beef with Hariri was the way they destroyed his media outlets. Not to mention the seige on his residence.

Also, you fellow blogger Charles Malik just posted an entry with some important questions about HA's terror circus in Beirut.

http://lebop.blogspot.com/2008/05/march-14-didnt-fight-so-what-did.html

The cockyness displayed by Nasrallah in his speech yesterday was very telling.

P.S. if you can catch Kalem el Nass with Marcel Ghanem right now please watch it (14:45 EDT). He is hosting the Future media reporters.

[Lover]

I hate it how people can blaitantly lie and convince themselves that there is victor or loser. There is. Hezbollah has won, or at least is winning and very close to total victory.

This is how I see this. Every single demonstration of Hezbollah's or the oppostion has seen and average of 7 people die. In every single flippin one. Then look at it this way. When Amal (Hezbollah is more logistics than activist militants in this battle) intervened and shot back at them, and punished them by 1) overpowering them and 2) handing them over to the army, not a single opposition civilian has died - only like 4 have died, all of whom are armed Harriri militia members.

The way I see this is two-fold. Firstly, Hezbollah has grown sick and tired at the absence of law in Lebanon and the continued bullying and smear campaigns against it by the government. 2) it has decided, rightly so, that this government does not understand nor respond to the language of democracy (i.e. resignation of ministers, million/s-strong marches/demonstrations etc, media campaigns and so on). If the government had an iota of moral sense, it would have stopped denying there is anything wrong in the country and 'conduct day-to-day/bussiness as usual' attitude, but rather either resign if they can not solve the problems or resolve them seriously. That is the responsibility of a government. Hezbollah is today using their power on the pretext of Harriri's militias' aggression to force the government, through violence, to go back on it earlier decision. Nasrallah made it clear, no one can force Hezbollah to give up it's weapons or infrastructure and the government knew it - they just betted on a army v. Hezbollah scenario, hence the responsibility of initiating the dismantling of the Hezbollah telecommunications network was given to the army, who refused to obey the order - again, rightly so.

If anything, this is not Hezbollah's war against the state. Firstly, a war between a state and another faction has the army fighting alongside the state. In this case, the army has sided with Hezbollah (they are arresting harriri militants not hezbollah or amal ones). This is a militia-vs-militia struggle (and all this time you really thought Harriri, Jumblat and GaeGae had no weapons - HAH!). Secondly, there is an absence of authority both in the illegitimacy of the government and it's actions (the demand of dismantling Hezbollahs telecommunications network goes in direct contradiction to the 2005 governmental (current one) statement of a policy to protect Hezbollah arms, therefore loosing the mandate it was handed to by the people by contradicting its manifesto or platform). There is no government and thus no clear 'state' as of 1/12/2006.

"and all the SUNNI Arab world to come to the aid of their occupied brethren in Beirut"

HAH, not a safe bet. If all the arab world didn't squeak for 60 years in the case of it's 'sunni brethren', the palestinians, you really think they'd come anywhere near these 'brethrens' and in direct confrontation with Hezbollah? Come on, be serious.

Anyway, I do think a mini-civil war has erupted, but you have to admit, Hezbollah fights pretty professional and bloodless civil wars. Furthermore, you can not blame only Hezbollah of terror, and by terror i mean the fear that civilians feel in the area of conflict. There are two sides fighting this war and both are to be held responsible ofr any 'terror' they cause. But if anything, the opposition have the moral high-ground because of the army's support of its campaign.