Jonathan Paris says, “because then Syria’s 19 million people would ask why they are ruled by this clique of 15 or so who run the country like it is their own bank.”
Therefore the only thing the US has to do is to wait out Bashar until his own chaos engulfs him. He is a loser and let him continue to be so. President Bush has made the bold and wise step of beefing up US forces in Iraq. Perhaps he can do better by beefing them up to a level that will allow them to march to Damascus at the right time. The pro American governments neighboring Syria (Jordan, Lebanon, Israel, etc…) would be valuable assets in ushering the American century.
Mr. Grenier would do well to recognize that Hezbollah and its allies were only capable of marshalling less than 20% of the population of Lebanon. They were already over represented in the government before their ministers resigned. Hezbollah, on the other hand, does not even represent the whole of the Shiite community in Lebanon and is losing popularity at a fast rate. The gambit of Nasrallah is a losing one this time. He went too far and didn’t foresee the level of response by the Israelis to his reckless act of kidnapping soldiers. He can use some of the homeless Shiite he created by his foolishness to beef up the ranks of his militias. The majority of the Shiite population, however, is beginning to see the foolishness of his unilateral act of taking the country to war. Questions are also beginning to get raised as to the influence of Iran on Hezbollah decisions. Khamenei has blundered tremendously by stating his objective so clearly: he wants to defeat America in Lebanon. Well, Lebanese (Shiite and others) are not fools to allow a self declared despot to destroy their country in order to satisfy his over blown ego!

Ummm, Landis, I know your impulse is in the other direction, but do at least try to stick to facts. The clip, for example, is from Future TV, not LBC.

It has nothing to do with “Christians.” The clip only highlights Shia-Sunni tensions and the clearly Hezbollah/Shiite character of the rally. Those are the “two sides.”

I will not even bother commenting on your nonsensical and distorted comment about the workers.

Landis – you are really doing yourself disservice when you comment on Lebanon- please stick to something you know at least a modicum about. To anyone with any insight – you paint yourself as a biggot?

المصيبة الكبرى التي أصابت سوريا والتي ابتلي بها هذا البلد هي وجود قيادة جاهلة، ومغامرة. قيادة عاجزة عن التمييز بين ما يفيد سوريا وما يؤذيها، وعاجزة عن القيام بقراءة صحيحة للتاريخ والواقع، سواء أكان هذا الواقع سورياً، أو عربياً أو دولياً.

Here is a very balanced article on what the US approach to Lebanon should be:

Op-Ed Contributor
If You Love Lebanon, Set It Free

By ROBERT GRENIER
Published: December 17, 2006
Washington

ONCE more, Lebanon is in political crisis. This time, we are told, it pits “Syrian- and Iranian-backed” Shiite parties (Hezbollah and Amal) and the Christian faction led by Michel Aoun against the “Western-backed” Christian, Sunni and Druze groups that support the government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora.

These very descriptions — citing one external backer or another as a mark of political identification — illustrate the fundamental problem Lebanon must overcome. Call it the Lebanese Disease: rather than sorting out their differences internally and addressing the fundamental injustices at the heart of their disputes, the Lebanese constantly look to outsiders to gain an advantage over their rivals.

Naturally, any advantages thus gained are short-lived, for both the Lebanese and their foreign backers. In the end, the only result is greater popular suffering and instability in Lebanon and the entire Middle East.

Only the Lebanese can cure themselves of this disease, but a bit of enlightened self-interest on the part of the “Western backers” — primarily the United States and France — would greatly help. It may seem counterintuitive, but the best hope for American interests in the Middle East is not to isolate and minimize Hezbollah, but to further integrate it politically, socially and militarily into the Lebanese state.

Let’s dial back half a year, to the start of this latest crisis. The immediate reaction of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel to the cross-border attack by Hezbollah on Israeli troops was his most honest. This was not, he said, an act of terrorism — it was an act of war. And, issues of proportionality aside, it was quite justifiable to hold the Lebanese government to account.

The honesty of that initial reaction, however, was quickly replaced by the old formula to which Israel has resorted since 1978. Israel did not intend to attack Lebanon, its spokesmen insisted, but was just trying to help the Lebanese by attacking Iran-controlled Hezbollah. This was a polite way of saying to Mr. Siniora: We’re going to rid ourselves — and you — of Hezbollah, for which you should be grateful, and you’d better make sure they don’t rise again.

Now let’s try to view this from the perspective of a Lebanese nationalist. To acquiesce to the American-Israeli formula for Lebanon would be to accept that one’s nation should be entirely supine before a neighbor; that any time the Israelis decided to react to a limited provocation or threat, the only defense one could mount would be the tearful pleas of a powerless prime minister.

Thus it should not be surprising that many Lebanese, including Mr. Siniora, at least temporarily put aside their factional mistrust and embraced Hezbollah as the sole available means of national resistance. This, along with Hezbollah’s surprisingly successful resistance, has permanently changed the political calculus of the nation.

For one thing, it is harder today to suggest to Lebanese nationalists that Hezbollah is simply a mindless proxy for the Iranians. Throughout the Middle East, religious extremism and Arab nationalism are becoming identical, with the former becoming the only effective means of pursuing the latter. This is true of the Sunni extremists in Iraq and throughout the Arab world, as well as of the Shiite extremists of Hezbollah in Lebanon, whose resistance to the Israelis, clearly motivated at least in part by a desire to support the Sunni Palestinians, has paradoxically made them a hero of the Sunni Arab street.

Likewise, Hezbollah’s support of the Syrian presence in Lebanon — which should be anathema to any Lebanese nationalist — should be seen less as obeisance to a neighbor than as the cynical price the group must pay to ensure its logistical link with Iran.

As Hezbollah becomes more enmeshed in Lebanese politics, however, domestic political considerations will become increasingly influential in its calculations — a tendency that should be encouraged. Indeed, the closing stages of last summer’s war provided a fleeting opportunity for the Beirut government to gain a greater measure of state control over Hezbollah.

The hardship caused to average Lebanese by its recklessness meant that the group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, had some explaining to do. He quickly admitted that the raid had been a mistake. And his desire for a cease-fire, gained through the external political engagement of Mr. Siniora, put the prime minister in a relatively strong position to demand Hezbollah’s cooperation in demonstrating that it was being brought under at least the partial control of the state.

On the other hand, the potent demonstration of Hezbollah’s ability to resist Israeli forces gave many Lebanese nationalists, even Sunnis, a new desire to preserve the radical group in the service of all Lebanon.

Given a more farsighted leadership, these two factors could have given the Lebanese an impetus to forge a new political compact for the country. It has long been obvious that the Shiites are under-represented in Lebanon’s complicated power-sharing arrangements. In return for a greater measure of political representation for Shiites, Mr. Siniora could have insisted that Hezbollah’s militia be brought under some sort of state control — perhaps as a sort of home guard for the south, with its fighters under the command of senior officers drawn from the Lebanese armed forces.

This sort of overarching agreement would not have been easy to reach, and it would be naïve to suppose that somehow the Hezbollah leadership would allow itself to be totally stripped of control of its militia overnight. But its involvement in Lebanese politics since the summer has already brought discernible changes in Hezbollah’s attitudes and behavior. Its leaders understand that if they want to influence the policies of the state, they will have to accommodate the interests of other religious groups and political factions. This change of attitude would, over time, undoubtedly have a moderating effect. In sum, if Hezbollah were given a greater stake in Lebanon, it would progressively become more Lebanese.

WHICH brings us back to the barricades now dividing the center of Beirut. All sides are indulging themselves in an orgy of historical recrimination, and stoking fantasies that they can achieve their goals through confrontation. Not only would a civil war be a disaster for all Lebanese, but among the ever-present foreign backers, the United States would lose most.

Tacitly encouraging civil war is seldom wise, and particularly when the side with which one is affiliated cannot win. It should be obvious that American — and Israeli — interests are best served by a unified Lebanese state that has clear control over its people and its territory. We now know that Hezbollah is not going to be eradicated, nor its influence reduced.

So the only way of making the Lebanese government accountable is to encourage the progressive, moderating integration of Hezbollah into the political, social and military fabric of the state.

How could Washington help this happen? Well, for one thing, we should give up talk of greatly enlarging the multinational force in southern Lebanon, and convince the Europeans to do likewise. Fortunately, the plan to insert such a force this fall foundered when the French (wisely) decided they were not up to the task of disarming Hezbollah, although smaller numbers of European troops are apparently headed there soon. It is folly, particularly with lightly armed foreign forces, to try to get regional actors to do things that they see as fundamentally against their interests.

Second is to end the proxy battles between foreign powers. I don’t know what the Americans are telling the Lebanese government privately, but the public statements are disappointing. Last month the White House issued an official statement citing “attempts by Syria, Iran, and their allies within Lebanon to foment instability and violence” and insisting the United States would “continue its efforts with allied nations and democratic forces in Lebanon to resist these efforts.” In other words, we’re still trying to rile Lebanese sentiment as a wedge against our enemies in the region.

A far more genuine American commitment to Lebanon would focus on helping the parties to come up with a reasonable formula to redress the under-representation of Shiites in the power structure while getting greater government control over Hezbollah’s war-making capacity.

Make no mistake: Hezbollah is no friend to America. As a former United States intelligence officer, I know there are a few accounts yet to be settled with that organization. But Washington will never achieve its objectives in the Middle East — including its obligation to ensure Israel’s long-term security — unless it puts emotions aside and deals realistically with facts on the ground. Like it or not, Hezbollah is one of those facts. A less-than-pliable but strong government in Lebanon would be far preferable to no real government at all, which is what we have now.

Robert Grenier, a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency’s counterintelligence center, is a security consultant.

“If you were Bashar, the one thing you would be afraid of is regional stability,” says Paris, “because then Syria’s 19 million people would ask why they are ruled by this clique of 15 or so who run the country like it is their own bank.”

This as one commentary puts it is the critical key!

Since you are doing a news round-up, here is the most important article of the say (if you ask me):

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3340750,00.html
Towards the end of this article:

“I know this will annoy many of your readers… But the anger is over the fact that Israel did not fight against the Syrians. Instead of Israel fighting against Hizbullah, many parts of the American administration believe that Israel should have fought against the real enemy, which is Syria and not Hizbullah.”

Did the administration expect Israel to attack Syria?

“They hoped Israel would do it. You cannot come to another country and order it to launch a war, but there was hope, and more than hope, that Israel would do the right thing. It would have served both the American and Israeli interests.

“The neocons are responsible for the fact that Israel got a lot of time and space… They believed that Israel should be allowed to win. A great part of it was the thought that Israel should fight against the real enemy, the one backing Hizbullah. It was obvious that it is impossible to fight directly against Iran, but the thought was that its strategic and important ally should be hit.”

Very good Enlightened. Hope Israel gets the message and acts on it.

Gibran utters: “Perhaps he can do better by beefing them up to a level that will allow them to march to Damascus at the right time.”

You seem to be disconnected with the world around you. People like you are those who roll the red carpet for the dirty American boots to tread upon. Those who are dellusioned by the inevitablilty of the American vision for the new middle east. It is you who think the American way is impecabble. People like you are the LOSERS in the new game.
…
We’ll wait and see who’s vision is more genuine and valid…

It is as easy for me to say and in upper case letters YOU ARE THE LOSER – That is you Dubai Jazz

Yeah..that is a peculiarity at which you excel; thinking that things are easy when they are not!!
And that is you GIB-RAN…