Shame.

Just like when a tsunami hits a Southeast Asian country and indiscriminately wipes out thousands, and the only numbers of discrete value in the press are the "1 American and 2 (fill in blank with any Western country)" that also die in the disaster, it seems that Lebanese craziness that doesn't happen in Beirut doesn't really seem to matter to the Lebanese.

There's an isolated mini-civil war going on in Tripoli, in the north. Nearly a dozen people were killed over the last week, and an explosion there today killed 2 people and injured 20.

But as long as the Grey Goose Vodka keeps pouring and "White" and "Sky Bar" keep the glamorous Beiruti skyline lit, no one seems to give a damn.

Saudization tries too hard...

Saudization refers to Saudi Arabia's national policy to encourage more Saudis to work in the private sector, rather than to play Wii and Playstation and/or rub off dead skin from between their toes all day long.

My own father got slapped on the derriere with the Saudization sandal in 2001, when his boss told him that they no longer needed him as General Manager at one of Saudi Arabia's largest insurance firms, and put a Saudi man in his place. However, when they realized that the new guy had the intelligence of a halogen lamp, they called my father back up and offered him the job again, to which he politely declined...

Anyway, Saudization has met with little success, as there is a great dependency on foreign worker aid, especially for lower income, "menial" services jobs, often filled by Southeast Asian expats, often under inhuman working conditions and physical and psychological abuse.

Nonetheless, Ghazi Algosaibi, Saudi Arabia's Labor Minister, is trying to give Saudization new life. Apparently, this week, the Minister worked as a waiter for three hours in a fast-food restaurant , in a humbling, "you can do it too," sort of way.

So let us humor Mr. Algosaibi a little, shall we. Let's say Saudis start taking more fast-food restaurant jobs. McDonalds, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, Kudu, Herfy, Burger King, Crepaway, Fuddruckers and shawarma joints - all their Indian, Pakistani, Afghani, and Filipino employees gone, and in their place, Saudis. Two things would happen:

(1) All these new Saudi employees would hire back the Indians, Pakistanis, Afghanis and Filipinos to do all the work for them anyway, and hook up their Wii and Playstations in the back room, doing nothing to the Saudis' dependency on foreign workers, and

(2) Work-related hazards and incidents would increase, including thobes and ghutras, the Saudi traditional garb, getting stuck in heavy machinery (think of a ghutra headpiece getting stuck in a Pizza hut conveyor oven, or a sandal flip-flop slip on spilled vegetable oil), which would beckon the return of foreign aid workers anyway.

Mr. Algosaibi, I admire your heartfelt attempts to create change, but I think that the Playstation will still win out.

Don't hate the playah, Micho, hate the game...

Dubai at risk of attack?

Apparently, the Brits have announced that the United Arab Emirates is at high risk of a terrorist attack, presumably from Al-Qaeda or a similar group.

I say don't you fret, jihadis! Your checks are already in the mail, but you know how slow the mailing system is here in the Middle East!

Yayyyy for Lebanon.

The official's comments buttressed recent signals from Israel and the Lebanese Hezbollah guerrilla group that a deal was in the works to trade Samir Kantar, a Lebanese operative of the PLO, for Israeli soldiers Uri Goldwasser and Eldad Regev.

How refreshing...

Lebanon’s TV and print media scene was dynamic, provocative and covered hot topics way before Osama bin Laden put Aljazeera (and by extension its politically promiscuous Qatari patron) on the map.

Given recent events over the past three years, Lebanese political talk shows have had no shortage of topics to cover. Israel, Syria, assassinations, bombings, tit-for-tats between March 8 and March 14, internecine war, you name it…

In consideration of the euphoria surrounding St. Michel Suleiman’s recent election, however, it seems that people have moved on. Talk shows seems more into infotainment these days. For example, tonight, Al-Jadeed (former New TV) brought clown Wi’am Wahhab as the principal guest on the episode to discuss Saudi-US relations and petrol politics. Wahhab was so excited: he came prepared with statistics and quotes, and was being all scholarly-like. It was about as ludicrous as watching a prostitute give a lecture on abstinence and chastity.

The media again seems to want to talk about quality of life, and not quantity of life. The Daily Star’s editorial yesterday wasn’t condemning the political class for robbing citizens of their lives – it was condemning Electricite du Liban (and by extension the political class) of robbing the citizenry of their livelihoods. Marcel Ghanem’s Kalam elNas today was talking about stolen cars and corruption…

Lebanon is back my friends. Little will change on the ground. But at least we can have more interesting talk debates.

Some of my readers have told me that I lose scope of my target and dillute the identity of this blog by writing about non-Lebanese issues, and rightfully so. But I cannot but write about the unbelievable biases I see in the American media when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Why is it that aggression against Israelis is unjust, unprompted and always has a human face, whereas aggression against Palestinians is deserved, reactionary and devoid of any human consequence?

Israeli Ironies

Peace is seldom "equitable," and is always on the terms of the victor.

A little RSS snippit from my iGoogle desktop:

Cuckoo! Cuckoo!

Iran surely had a positive and constructive role in helping Lebanese to achieve an accord and we thanked this country for this positive role,” Aoun told...

He called on all “foreign friends and parties” to respect Lebanon’s “independence and sovereignty” and avoid blocking efforts to resolve the problems.

People often compare soundbytes or infobytes that Aoun has made over the past three years to point to inconsistencies made throughout his political career...But my friends, these comments were made in the very same interview!

The Jury's Verdict:

The US and Israel do not see eye to eye on Lebanon. Washington sees real value in preserving the only democratically-elected pro-west Arab Government. If Israel doesn't start to recognize the significant, but fleeting moment of March 14 soon, this fragile bulwark against Iranian hegemony in the Levant may disappear.

Although it is a bitter pill for peacemakers in the Jewish state to swallow, by trucking with Syria now, Israel risks inadvertently contributing to the eventual establishment of Hizbullahstan on its northern border.

Megalom-AOUN-ia

They said an example of the dispute is that Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun has demanded the ministries of finance, public works, health, social affairs as well as the agriculture or industry.

Mr. Aoun has also demanded that Mr. Saniora personally fetch him daily morning caffe lattes from Hamra Starbucks and an afternoon ice cream cone from local gelateria "Al Sa'a" at Nijmeh Square.

Now that's the kind of sacrifice I'm talking about.

Free Patriotic Movement leader Gen. Michel Aoun said Monday he gave up his quest for the presidency as a "ransom to free election constituencies from detention."Aoun, talking to reporters after a meeting of his Change and Reform bloc, said his FPM's understanding with Hizbullah is "the best settlement to reach an understanding on Hizbullah weapons."