Lebanon's New 'Great Satan'

In this mailing: - Khaled Abu Toameh: Lebanon's New 'Great Satan' - Alan M. Dershowitz: Beinart's Final Solution: End Israel as Nation-State of the Jewish People [] [Lebanon's New 'Great Satan']( by Khaled Abu Toameh • July 16, 2020 at 5:00 am [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [WhatsApp]( [Telegram]( [Send]( [Print]( - Hezbollah's financial crisis is the result of US sanctions on its patrons in Iran, which had been supporting the terrorist group annually with about $700 million from oil revenues.... — Fahim al-Hamid, Saudi journalist, okaz.com.sa, March 22, 2020. - For several weeks now, a hashtag titled "Nasrallah has ruined the country" has been trending on Twitter, with many Lebanese and Iraqis accusing the Hezbollah leader of destroying their countries. - "Nasrallah has taken Lebanon hostage and accused the US of Lebanon's economic collapse. Hezbollah is a major partner of the network that looted the Lebanese treasury and banks. Hezbollah is a terrorist organization running an entire country." — Video clip posted on social media platforms. - "No one has the right to drag us into the place they want, and no one has the right to impose on us a lifestyle that we do not want.... We do not want to live in isolation and be cut off from the West, Arabs and the entire world." — Sami Gemayel, Lebanese Member of Parliament, Asharq Al-Awsat, June 18, 2020. - Hezbollah (Arabic for "Party of God") has long been functioning as a state-within-a-state in Lebanon and its leader, Nasrallah, is the de facto ruler of the country. Now that he is having trouble paying salaries to his terrorists, Nasrallah is hoping that the US will step in and rescue Lebanon (and Hezbollah) from collapse. The Iranian-backed terrorist group Hezbollah has long functioned as a state-within-a-state in Lebanon and its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, is the de facto ruler of the country. Now that he is having trouble paying salaries to his terrorists, Nasrallah hopes that the US will rescue Lebanon (and Hezbollah) from collapse. Pictured: Lebanese supporters of Hezbollah, carrying the flag of the group and a portrait of Nasrallah, at an anti-American demonstration near the US Embassy in Awkar, northeast of Beirut, on July 10, 2020. (Photo by Joseph Eid/AFP via Getty Images) Has Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah changed his mind about the US, which he always considered a great enemy of the Arabs and Muslims? Not likely. More likely is that he is trying to dupe the Americans into giving Lebanon money to prevent the collapse of his Iranian-backed terrorist group. Dominated by heavily-armed Hezbollah, Lebanon is currently facing the worst economic crisis in its history. The crisis is seen as the biggest threat to stability since the 1975-90 civil war in Lebanon. The World Bank warned last November that if conditions worsened, the proportion of Lebanese living in poverty could rise to 50%. Since then, the economy has been further hit by the restrictions imposed to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, so the crisis has only deepened. As the country's currency collapsed to an all-time low against the US dollar, thousands of Lebanese have been protesting by blocking roads with burning tires and setting fire to banks. [Continue Reading Article]( [] [Beinart's Final Solution: End Israel as Nation-State of the Jewish People]( by Alan M. Dershowitz • July 16, 2020 at 4:00 am [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [WhatsApp]( [Telegram]( [Send]( [Print]( - If Israel were to end its existence as the nation-state of the Jewish people — as Beinart advocates — and become a Jewish "homeland" in a single binational, bi-religious state, a demographic war would become inevitable, in which Jews and Muslims would compete to become a majority. As soon as a Muslim majority materialized, the Jewish "homeland" would become precisely the kind of "Bantustan" that Beinart has railed against in the context of South Africa. - The Jewish minority would be ruled by the Muslim majority, even if it were given some degree of autonomy. Their protection would be largely in the hands of the Muslim majority, many of whom believe there is no place for a Jewish entity anywhere in the region. - A Palestinian majority would not allow persecuted Jews from around the world to seek asylum, as they can today under Israel's Law of Return. Instead, the Palestinian state would enact its own law of return that would allow millions of exiles to "return" and assure a permanent Muslim supermajority. Pictured: Alan Dershowitz in the US Senate Reception Room on January 27, 2020 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images) Peter Beinart's New York Times op-ed advocating the end of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people is a study in historical ignorance, willful deception and arrogant rejection of democracy. Beinart proposed that a single binational, bi-religious state in what is now Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip replace current Israel, whose Jewish population would then be given a "homeland" within the new nation. But Beinart is woefully ignorant of previous attempts to create or maintain binational or bi-religious states. [Continue Reading Article]( [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [RSS]( [Donate]( Copyright © Gatestone Institute, All rights reserved. You are subscribed to this list as {EMAIL} You can change how you receive these emails: [Update your subscription preferences]( or [Unsubscribe from this list]( [Gatestone Institute]( 14 East 60 St., Suite 705, New York, NY 10022