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Brief ceasefire shatters at Palestinian refugee camp

Mark Tran and agencies
Tuesday May 22, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

A ceasefire between Lebanese forces and Islamist militants at a Palestinian refugee camp today collapsed after less than an hour.

Fighting stopped at the Nahr el-Bared camp outside the northern Lebanese port city of Tripoli at about 2.30pm after Fatah al-Islam, an al-Qaida-inspired group, announced it would stop firing.

But less than an hour later, heavy exchanges of fire and several explosions were heard.

The UN took advantage of the truce to deliver food, water and medical supplies to the camp, while many civilians packed their cars and fled, flying white flags from their windows.

Other camp residents emerged from their homes to view huge holes in buildings from shellfire while gunmen with assault rifles were roaming the rubble-strewn streets.
"What the hell were they [the army] doing? Did they think they were fighting the Israeli army?" camp resident Mahmoud Tayyar asked.

Fatah al-Islam has little local support, but the firepower turned on the camp by the army has begun to anger Palestinians.

Nearly 50 combatants were killed in the fighting, but civilian casualties are not known because relief workers and officials have had limited access to the camp.

Relief workers said they had been told that dozens of houses had been crushed by bombardment, with residents buried inside.

Nahr al-Bared is home to more than 215,000 refugees, out of a total of 400,000 Palestinians in Lebanon.

The impoverished camp is the size of a small town, with more than 31,000 people living in two- or three-storey white buildings on densely packed narrow streets alongside mosques, schools and businesses.

The army is seeking to uproot members of Fatah al-Islam without entering the camp itself, in keeping with its 1969 agreement with the Palestinians.

Violence was not confined to the camp. A militant from the Fatah al-Islam group blew himself up in a building in Tripoli, a security source said. The building was empty and no security forces were wounded in the attack.

The Lebanese government, led by the prime minister, Fouad Siniora, has said it wants to root out Fatah al-Islam, which it sees as a tool of Syria - something denied by Damascus and the group itself.

In Ramallah, the Palestine Liberation Organisation's executive committee, led by president Mahmoud Abbas, urged the Beirut government to distinguish between the "terrorist group" and Palestinians in Lebanon.

Major Palestinian factions have distanced themselves from Fatah al-Islam, which they see as an offshoot of al-Qaida with ambitions of carrying out attacks around the region.

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[ 22 May 2007: Message edited by: Bubbles ]

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Originally posted by Bubbles:
With 400 000 Palestinian refugees in Lebanon it should not be difficult to see the cause of the problem.

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Originally posted by ohara:
Are the Lebanese army not attcking terrorists? Seems the thread title might need revision.

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Great idea. Or, we can just call them "bastards". Or: "Bad guys."

Any other suggestions out there?

ETA: C'mon, folks, let's get with it!! I'm adding "scumbags".

[ 23 May 2007: Message edited by: unionist ]

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ohara: Are the Lebanese army not attcking terrorists?

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In addition to the fighters of Fatah al-Islam, the number of dead Palestinians is yet to be determined as the Red Cross and other aid organizations are being prevented from entering the refugee camp(s).

There are some - none here on babble of course - who are unable to distinguish "terrorists" from Palestinians and consider large numbers of casualties in either group to be a good thing.

Where was this Lebanese "army" when Israel bombed Lebanon into smithereens last summer? The Lebanese horrors continue and the world watches.

Robert Fisk has a few words over here. "A Front Row Seat for this Lebanese Tragedy"

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Fisk: There is something obscene about watching the siege of Nahr el-Bared. The old Palestinian camp - home to 30,000 lost souls who will never go “home” - basks in the Mediterranean sunlight beyond a cluster of orange orchards. Soldiers of the Lebanese army, having retaken their positions on the main road north, idle their time aboard their old personnel carriers. ... And then comes the crackle-crackle of rifle fire and a shoal of bullets drifts out of the camp. A Lebanese army tank fires a shell in return and we feel the faint shock wave from the camp. How many are dead? We don’t know. How many are wounded? The Red Cross cannot yet enter to find out. We are back at another of those tragic Lebanese stage shows: the siege of Palestinians.

Only this time, of course, we have Sunni Muslim fighters in the camp, in many cases shooting at Sunni Muslim soldiers who are standing in a Sunni Muslim village. It was a Lebanese colleague who seemed to put his finger on it all. “Syria is showing that Lebanon doesn’t have to be Christians versus Muslims or Shia versus Sunnis,” he said. “It can be Sunnis versus Sunnis. And the Lebanese army can’t storm into Nahr el-Bared. That would be a step far greater than this government can take.”

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The thread title is perfectly apt. It's only missing which installment or chapter this is.

[ 23 May 2007: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]

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What's the connection? Lebanese and Palestinians hate each other?

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It's astonishing really, in all the "mainstream" media coverage, how little context there is. No mention is made about where the Palestinian refugess are "from" and why they are in Lebanon in the first place.

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
How does that explain the enmity between the Palestinians and Islamic Jihad on one side and the Sunni Muslims on the other?

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According to you, it has nothing to do with imperial amibitions of the U.S., Israel and other forces, their "divide and rule" methodology, and preying on normally insignificant cultural or religious differences to use people as cannon fodder.

Rather, it's just crazy people who hate each other in a part of the world where life is cheap. Not like our civilized society.

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Stockholm: How does that explain the enmity between the Palestinians and Islamic Jihad on one side and the Sunni Muslims on the other?

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As Fisk points out in his article (which I have included in my quote) it is now Sunni Muslim fighting Sunni Muslim. So regurgitating sectarian divisions doesn't really explain anything, does it?

Supplemental: Stockholm - Aren't you at all embarrassed by using classic right wing debating tactics like these? Divide and rule. How about YOU explain why Sunni are killing Sunni? Then you will have to make use of explanations OTHER than those based on an analysis that presumes irrational hatreds by those involved. Yea, I know it's difficult. But it might just be worth the effort.

Fisk is of the opinion that the Lebanese army will not dare to go into the camps - something about an agreement that can't be violated. I predict that more Palestinian civilians will die as a result of this conflict. And, as I have noted, there are some that are happy or indifferent about that. But why are these Palestinian refugees still in Lebanon ... over 50 years after the Naqba? When will they be allowed to return "home" ?

If there were no Palestinian refugees there would be no place for these terrorists to hide among. Why is nothing being done about this?

But we all know the answer to that question. The ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Palestine and Israel continues. And there is no pressure on Israel from its bosom buddies like Canada and the USA to stop these atrocities anytime soon.

[ 23 May 2007: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]

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Stockholm: Right now, Jordan is the only country in the Arab world that allows Palestinians to become citizens.

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Why is it the duty of Arab countries to solve a crisis created by Israel? Similarly, the South African Apartheid regime created all sorts of fake little statelets to which "coloureds" could become "citizens" of. It's the same shit and just a different pile with Israel.

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Stockholm: It's been almost 60 years since 1948 and it's about time that people took their heads out of the sand and would give up on this ridiculous notion ...

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I will leave the ridiculous caricature out and ask you the following similar question: should Canadian aboriginals "take their heads out of the sand" and give up the ridiculous notion of the settlement of land claims, compensation for residential school atrocities, and so on?

I can't help but notice that you used the word "assimilate into Lebanese society" to describe your preferred "solution" with respect to Palestinian refugees.

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unionist: Methinks Beltov and I are saying the same thing, only he appears to have more detailed knowledge of the current situation.

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should Canadian aboriginals "take their heads out of the sand" and give up the ridiculous notion of the settlement of land claims, compensation for residential school atrocities, and so on?

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I'm all for compensation along the lines of the settlements that Canadian aboriginals are seeking. But, notice that Canadian aboriginals have given up on the notion that all of the people of European descent in Canada are going to pack their bags and move back to Europe leaving Canada to become an all aboriginal country.

[ 23 May 2007: Message edited by: Bobolink ]

The odious policies of Israel are continuing to this very day and show no signs of stopping. Furthermore, if you use the argument of "two wrongs make a right", as you seem to be, then what's wrong with three wrongs? Four wrongs? When do the wrongs end?

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Bobolink: not one word of criticism of Fatah al-Islam fleeing to a refugee camp where Palestinians become their human shields. Just the usual anti-Israeli crap from the usual suspects.

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I'm not reading anyone in this thread defending Fatah al-Islam. I could just as well insist that anyone who discusses mid-East politics ought to denounce the Israeli use of phosphorus and cluster bombs, targetted assassination, child prisoners, etc., etc.. What would be the point?

But it is entirely fair to ask why these refugees, in their thousands, are in Lebanon and why nothing is being done about it. Remove the water and the fish will drown. Seems pretty clear to me as a possible solution to a problem that is currently intractable.

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Lebanese leaders vow to strike at terrorism
LAILA BASSAM

Reuters

May 24, 2007 at 9:29 AM EDT

BEIRUT — Lebanese leaders vowed on Thursday to stamp out an Islamist militant group that has been fighting the army at a camp in the north of the country.

Relief workers planned aid deliveries to thousands of Palestinians forced from a refugee camp by fighting between the army and militant group Fatah al-Islam as a fragile truce held.

"We will not surrender to terrorism," Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said in a televised speech to his nation, referring to Fatah al-Islam and three bomb attacks in Lebanon this week.

"We will work on uprooting terrorism and finishing it off."

Dozens have been killed in recent days in Lebanon's worst internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.

Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, a leading member of the governing coalition, urged Palestinian groups Fatah and Hamas to act against Fatah al-Islam in the Nahr al-Bared camp.

"Either they root out (the group) in Nahr al-Bared or the state will root out the terrorism," he said. "The state cannot ... accept a compromise. The moment that it accepts a compromise, the state will vanish," he said.

Heavy army shelling of the camp has drawn criticism from rights group Amnesty International and stirred anger among Lebanon's Palestinian community of nearly 400,000. An Arab agreement stops the army from entering refugee camps in Lebanon.

Mr. Siniora sought to assure Palestinians that his government was not targeting civilians. "There will not be strife or any feud between the Lebanese and the Palestinians," he said.

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The most disturbing aspect of the fighting in Tripoli though, has been lost--or deliberately obfuscated--by discussion of the above.

Namely, the absolute complicity of Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora and allies like Saad Hariri, leader of the parliamentary majority in Lebanon, in bringing groups like Fatah al-Islam to Lebanon, where they knowingly allowed them to operate, all in a greater bid to stem the ascendancy of Hezbollah.

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Yes, boys and girls. The same Hezbollah that won the hearts of the Lebanese people in their heroic and astonishing resistance to the monstrous Israeli bombardment and invasion of last summer. Siniora and the Lebanese army was, at that time, nowhere to be found - except perhaps denouncing Syria for border violations while Israel dropped phosphorus and cluster bombs on the Lebanese civilian population.

Amiri quotes Seymour Hersh:

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Hersh: Crooke said that one Sunni extremist group, Fatah al-Islam, had splintered from its pro-Syrian parent group, Fatah al-Intifada, in the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp, in northern Lebanon. Its membership at the time was less than two hundred. "I was told that within twenty-four hours they were being offered weapons and money by people presenting themselves as representatives of the Lebanese government's interests-presumably to take on Hezbollah," Crooke said.

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Acknowledgements to Rufus Polson over at EM for doing the work to dig up these quotes. EM on the same topic.

[ 24 May 2007: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]

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In an interview in Beirut, a senior official in the Siniora government acknowledged that there were Sunni jihadists operating inside Lebanon. "We have a liberal attitude that allows Al Qaeda types to have a presence here," he said.

Along with Fatah al-Islam, the Siniora government has the blood of dozens of Lebanese soldiers and Lebanese and Palestinian civilians on their hands.

And that is a fact which hits us straight between the eyes.

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Leader
Friday May 25, 2007
The Guardian

Once again Palestinian blood is being shed, as shells are dropping in overcrowded refugee camps. This time, however, the guns are not Israeli, but those of the Lebanese army. More astonishingly, this military action has the qualified approval of the leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, who have allowed Lebanese soldiers to take up positions 500 metres inside Nahr al-Bared camp, where the fighting has been raging since Sunday. For 38 years 400,000 Palestinians have had the status of being "guests" of the country, and an agreement with the PLO stops the Lebanese army entering the camps.

But since last November the Palestinian camps have been getting some unwelcome guests of their own. Quite who Fatah al-Islam are, or where they came from, is a matter of dispute. The US-backed government of Lebanon claimed they were tools of Syrian intelligence, but there is little concrete evidence that they are: Syria's foreign minister, Walid Muallem, has publicly condemned the organisation, arguing that it does not serve the Palestinian cause.

Palestinians fleeing the fighting in the camp report that the militant group is composed of Syrians, Jordanians, Saudis and Iraqis. The armed jihadis - Sunnis by religion - appeared in the camps a year ago on motorbikes and scooters, and have been there ever since. Their aim was not to fight their holy war against the Lebanese, but to use the camps as a logistics base. They count Lebanese among their supporters, as there are Salafi Sunnis in the poor communities in the north of the country.

We are treated like dogs
....
Children carrying teddy bears or plastic bags full of clothes hurried behind weeping mothers heading out of the camp. Farmers led their cows to the safety of nearby fields. Some families carried little more than a few clothes and, most importantly, their ID cards – a crucial document to show soldiers at checkpoints outside the camp.

Rawa Freiji, 9, cried uncontrollably in the back of a car alongside her brother and sister. "We live day by day," said their mother, Hayat Freiji, 40, who had no news of her 17-year-old son. He did not have his ID when he left home Tuesday and she worried he might have been arrested.

...

"I would have been better off had Palestine died altogether'' in 1948, said Ahmed Kanaan, 92, who fled Nazareth – now in northern Israel. "We are treated like dogs," he said as he smoked a cigarette. "They step on us and continue walking."

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Lebanon's worst internal violence for two decades is in danger of spreading throughout the country, politicians, diplomats and refugees warned yesterday, as anger grew at the tactics of the Lebanese army fighting Islamists in a northern refugee camp.

Officials representing the 400,000-strong Palestinian community in Lebanon said there was a risk of militant sympathisers in other Palestinian camps rising up, after days of clashes in and around the Nahr al-Bared camp left at least 22 militants and 32 soldiers dead, as well as a dozen civilians. Scores have been wounded.

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http://www.wsws.org/articles/2007/may2007/leba-m25.shtml

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Lebanon’s offensive is presumed to deal with an organisation of 150-200 fighters, including Saudis, Syrians, Yemenis and Moroccans, with no popular support in the Palestinian camps. Some residents of the camp put the group’s numbers at fewer than 50. The actual balance of forces involved is indicated by reports of Fatah al Islam militants attempting to flee the camp in inflatable dinghies being sunk by the Lebanese navy.

Yet, the massively disproportionate assault on the camp has been unconditionally endorsed by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. “The Siniora government is fighting against a very tough extremist foe,” Rice said. “But Lebanon is doing the right thing to try to protect its population, to assert its sovereignty and so we are very supportive of the Siniora government and what it is trying to do.”

Lebanon has used the police action against this tiny group to ask the US for $280 million in military assistance to help put down what it grandiosely calls an “uprising.” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the request for funds, $220 million of which would go to the Lebanese Armed Forces and another $60 million to security forces, was being considered by Washington. The US gave $40 million in military aid to Lebanon last year and an additional $5 million so far this year.

The United Nations Security Council on Wednesday echoed the US position, reiterating member states’ “unequivocal condemnation of any attempt to destabilise Lebanon” and underlining “their readiness to continue to act in support of the legitimate and democratically elected government of Lebanon.”

Many informed Middle East commentators have argued that the emergence of Fatah al Islam is in reality an example of “blowback”—similar to the growth of Al Qaeda as a result of US sponsorship of the Mujahedin in Afghanistan.

There is in fact no evidence linking Fatah al Islam to Syria. The group is Sunni and shares the Salafist (sometimes referred to as Wahabbist after its founder) ideology of Al Qaeda, which provides the ideological basis for the regime in Saudi Arabia.

The argument for Syrian involvement is that Fatah al Islam emerged from a split with Fatah Intifada in 2006, a group supported by Syria as a counterweight to the secular Fatah organisation, which played a part in driving Yasser Arafat out of Tripoli in 1983. But there is no reason for Syria to back such a group, when it supports the much more substantial Shiite Hezbollah. In addition, the group’s founder, Shaker al-Absi, spent three years in a Syrian prison before being released last year.

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Abukhalil: Fath al-Islam is clearly or at least predominantly a non-Palestinian organization. Based on interviews with their leaders that I have seen on television or in print in the last few months we can discern the ideological shape of the organization. They are extremist Sunni fundamentalists that have these general grandiose fundamentalist goals that only appeal to the margins of the margins of Islamic fundamentalist organizations. They denied links with al-Qaida yet they speak with the same rhetoric and they do not hide their sympathy if not affinity with al-Qaida.

...we know for a fact is that over the last several years, since 2000, and specifically since 2005 during the parliamentary elections, the Hariri family spent lavishly, especially in northern Lebanon to recruit among the extremist, fundamentalist Sunni organizations.

Some of the people in Fath al-Islam who are fighting now were released in an unprecedented amnesty in 2005 insisted on by the Hariri family because they wanted to win favor among the Sunni fundamentalist organizations in Tripoli. So it is very likely that some of these people are beneficiaries of Hariri largesse in the area of northern Lebanon. But that doesn't mean that the Hariris knowingly financed Fath al-Islam, although we know that they funded fanatical Sunni groups some of whose members later joined Fath al-Islam.

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Abukhalil, the Angry Arab, points out that the members of Fath al-Islam entered these refugee camps ... that are completely surrounded by the Lebanese Army. So they would have had the approval of the Lebanese authorities. "We are not talking about infiltrations like those the American media talk about in Iraq. So they came to Lebanon with their passports, came through port entrances controlled by the Lebanese security forces and army and settled in those camps, and as you rightly indicated all these camps are under watch by the Lebanese army."

Abukhalil mentions the robbery in Tripoli (see further above in this thread - The Great Bank Heist of Tripoli) and how the capture of the robbers was botched by the paramilitaries of Hariri - who were looking for great glory in Lebanese public opinion. So they called in the Lebanese Army after they failed to make a spectacular "raid" on the bank robbers. What is very disturbing is that all the political groupings in Lebanon are in a chorus of supporting the Army in its current efforts. Perhaps, says the Angry Arab, the brutal Israeli assault of Lebanon last year has got people wanting to see the Army do somthing "useful". And, says Abukhalil, there are real racist attitudes towards the Palestinians. "In 1973, when I was thirteen years old, Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon were bombed from the air by the Lebanese army. There is a long record. This Lebanese army doesn't show muscle except against defenseless Palestinian refugees."

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Abukhalil: They used the same words uttered by the Israelis when they bombed the refugee camps in the West Bank and Gaza. It's the same language the US uses in Afghanistan and Iraq ...

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There is also a US role in all of this:

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Abukhalil: Certainly there is a heavy-handed American role in all this. A mere week ago the American Undersecretary of State for the Near East, David Welch, was visiting Lebanon. He met in an unprecedented manner with the commander-in-chief of the Lebanese army. This never happened in the past. We do not know what was discussed but the Lebanese press -- even the press loyal to the government -- indicated how unprecedented it was that Welch met with the commander-in-chief.

As far as the Americans are concerned, we also have to note that first, there was an American official announcement that the Lebanese government made a request for emergency military assistance. And yet the Lebanese government promptly denied that it made such a request. And later they are denying the denial. Why are there these confused signals? What is being cooked behind the scenes?

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He offers some considerations.

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You look at Gaza and you find that the American funded, financed and armed militias of Muhammad Dahlan and [Palestinian Authority President] Mahmoud Abbas were tasked with fighting and killing other Palestinians. You look at Lebanon today and you find a Lebanese government financed, funded and armed by the American government and they are doing the same. Palestine and Lebanon have become more important not so much because of any attention that the US administration is willing to pay to those places, but particularly because of the failure of the American project in Iraq. So with victory eluding Bush in Iraq there is a desperate attempt to make some progress -- to use that cliché -- somewhere other than Iraq. And the places favored are Palestine and Lebanon because in those places there are US-armed and financed puppet militias that the US can use against its enemies and the enemies of Israel.

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And there you have it. It all makes sense. But not to the Palestinians victims who are drowning in blood and seem to have no friends at all.

Shame on the whole world for doing nothing, shame on the Lebanese authorities for such indifference to Palestinian lives, shame on the medieval fundamentalist fighters of Fath al-Islam and shame on Israel most of all for driving the Palestinians from their land instead of living in peace with them.

Nahr al-Bared Siege - interview with the Angry Arab on ZNet

[ 25 May 2007: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]

Who's Behind the Fighting in north Lebanon

An excerpt:

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It is not surprising that al-Qaeda sympathies, if not formal affiliations, are found in the 12 official camps as well as 7 unofficial ones. Groups with names such as Fateh al-Islam, Jund al-Shams (Soldier of Damascus), "Ibns al-Shaheed" (sons of the martyrs), Issbat al-Anssar, which morphed into Issbat al-Noor - "The Community of Illumination" - and many others. Given Bush administration debacles in Iraq and Afghanistan and its encouragement for Israel to continue its destruction of Lebanon this past summer, the situation in Lebanon mirrors, in some respects, the early 1980's when groups sprung up to resist the US green lighted Israeli invasion and occupation. But rather than being Shia and pro-Hezbollah, today's groups are largely Sunni and anti-Hezbollah. Hence they qualify for US aid, funneled by Sunni financial backers in league with the Bush administration which is committed to funding Islamist Sunni groups to weaken Hezbollah.

This project has become the White House obsession following Israel's July 2006 defeat.

To understand what is going on with Fatah al-Islam at Nahr el-Bared one would want a brief introduction to Lebanon's amazing, but shadowy 'Welch Club'.

The Club is named for its godfather, David Welch, assistant to Secretary of State Rice who is the point man for the Bush administration and is guided by Eliot Abrams. Key Lebanese members of the Welch Club (aka: the 'Club') include:

The Lebanese civil war veteran, warlord, feudalist and mercurial Walid Jumblatt of the Druze party (the Progressive Socialist Party or PSP)

Another civil war veteran, warlord, terrorist (served 11 years in prison for massacres committed against fellow Christians among others) Samir Geagea, leader of the extremist Phalange party and its Lebanese Forces (LF), the group that conducted the Israel organized massacre at Sabra-Shatilla (although led by Elie Hobeika, once Geagea's mentor; Geagea did not take part in the Sept. 1982 slaughter of 1,700 Palestinian and Lebanese).

The billionaire, Saudi Sheikh and Club president Saad Hariri, leader of the Sunni Future Movement (FM).

Over a year ago Hariri's Future Movement started setting up Sunni Islamist terrorist cells (the PSP and LF already had their own militia since the civil war and despite the Taif Accords requiring militia to disarm they are now rearmed and itching for action and trying hard to provoke Hezbollah).

The FM created Sunni Islamist 'terrorist' cells were to serve as a cover for (anti-Hezbollah) Welch Club projects. The plan was that actions of these cells, of which Fatah el-Islam is one, could be blamed on al Qaeda or Syria or anyone but the Club.

To staff the new militias, FM rounded up remnants of previous extremists in the Palestinian Refugee camps that had been subdued, marginalized and diminished during the Syrian occupation of Lebanon. Each fighter got $700 per month, not bad in today's Lebanon.

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Seymour Hersh:

U.S. Indirectly Backed Islamist
Militants Fighting Lebanese Army

Democracy Now

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/24/143208

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Islamist militants entrenched in a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon are facing an ultimatum to surrender or face further military action. The Lebanese government accuses Fatah al-Islam of having ties with al-Qaeda and the Syrian government. Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh joins us to talk about another theory of who is backing the militant group - the Lebanese government itself, along with the United States.


Seymour Hersh joins us now on the phone from his home in Washington, D.C. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Sy.

SEYMOUR HERSH: Good morning.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you explain what you learned?

SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, very simply -- this is over the winter -- the government made -- I think the article is called “The Redirection.” There was a major change of policy by the United States government, essentially, which was that we were going to -- the American government would join with the Brits and other Western allies and with what we call the moderate Sunni governments -- that is, the governments of Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt -- and join with them and with Israel to fight the Shia.

One of the major goals for America, of course, was the obsession the Bush White House has with Iran, and the other obsession they have is, of course -- is in fear -- is of Hezbollah, the Party of God, that is so dominant in -- the Shia Party of God that’s so dominant in southern Lebanon that once -- and whose leader Hassan Nasrallah wants to play a bigger political role and is doing quite a bit to get there and is in direct confrontation with Siniora.

And so, you have a situation where the Sunni government, pretty much in control now, the American-supported Sunni government headed by Fouad Siniora, who was a deputy or an aide to Rafik Hariri, the slain leader of Lebanon, that government has -- we know, the International Crisis Group reported a couple years ago that the son Saad Hariri, the son of Rafik Hariri, who’s now a major player in the parliament of Lebanon, he put up $40,000 bail to free four Sunni fundamentalists, Jihadist-Salafists -- which you will -- who were tied directly to -- you know, this word “al-Qaeda” is sort of ridiculous -- they were tied to jihadist groups. And God knows, al-Qaeda, in terms of Osama bin Laden, doesn’t have much to do with what we’re talking about. These are independently, more or less, you can call them, fanatical jihadists.

And so, the goal -- part of the goal in Lebanon, part of the way this policy played out, was, with Saudi help, Prince Bandar -- if you remember him -- we remember Prince Bandar, the Saudi prince, as a major player in Iran-Contra and also in the American effort two decades ago -- if you remember, we supported Osama bin Laden and other jihadists in Afghanistan against the Russians, and that didn’t work out so well. Well, we run right back to the well again, and we began supporting some of these jihadist groups, and particularly -- in the article, I did name Fatah al-Islam.

The idea was to provide them with some arms and some money and some basic equipment so -- these are small units, a couple hundred people. There were three or four around the country given the same help covertly, the goal being they would be potential enemies of Hezbollah in case of warfare; in case Nasrallah decided to do something physical, get kinetic, in Lebanon, the Sunni Siniora government would have some very tough guys on its side, period. That’s the policy.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, Sy Hersh, if that is true, then what has led to the current fighting now? If the Lebanese government had been backing the group, why is it now attacking it?

SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, first of all, the Lebanese army is very distinct. Let me begin by saying nobody really knows anything right now. I mean, there’s a lot -- one of the things about crises is you learn that you really get to play much later. But based on common sense and what I’m reading, the Lebanese army has maintained an amazing sort of neutrality, which is surprising. The army has not been a pawn of the Siniora government.

As you know, the American government -- the American position right now -- there’s a stand-off politically. You cannot discuss what’s going on without discussing the overall politics. There’s a stand-off politically right now, a very serious one, in Lebanon. The government is polarized. The government in power really has no legal basis to make any changes in cabinet positions, etc., because it’s not a constitutional government, because Hezbollah, which had five members of the parliament -- five members of the cabinet and a dozen or so members in the parliament, Hezbollah pulled out months ago. And there were street protests, protests against Siniora.

And right now, you have Hezbollah in league with a Christian leader named Aoun, a former chief of staff for the army. Aoun and Nasrallah are in an amazing partnership against the Siniora government. And where this breaks down and who’s going to win this stand-off -- it’s been going on since last December -- isn’t clear. America clearly supports Siniora. But there’s a big brutal fight going. And the Lebanese army stayed out of it and was pretty much, very much, independent, in the sense that when there were street demonstrations, they did not beat up on the Nasrallah people. They were very impartial.

So I think the story that we have is that there was a crime, and they were chasing people into one of the Palestinian camps, which are always hotbeds. God knows the Palestinians are the end of the stick, not only for the West, but also for the Arab world. Nobody pays much attention to them and those places. I’ve been to Tripoli and been into the camps, and they are seething, as they should be. You know, rational people don’t like being mistreated.

And in any case, so what you have is, what seems to me, just a series -- the word you could use is “unintended consequences.” I don’t think anybody in the Siniora government anticipated that the people they were covertly supporting to some degree -- I got an email the other day, and I have not checked this out, from somebody who was in the community, in the intelligence community and still consults with the community, he says, “Why don’t we ask more about the American arms that the fighters of Fatah al-Islam have, are brandishing?” I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I did get that email. And so, that could be true. Both Saudi money and American money, not directly, but indirectly, was fed into these groups.

And what is the laugh riot and the reason I’m actually talking to you guys about this -- I usually don’t like to do interviews unless I have a story in The New Yorker -- the reason I’m talking about it is because the American government keeps on putting out this story that Syria is behind the Fatah group, which is just beyond belief. There’s no way -- it may be possible, but the chances of it are very slight, simply because Syria is a very big supporter, obviously, of Nasrallah, and Bashar al-Assad has told me that he’s in awe of Nasrallah, that he worships at his feet and has great respect for him.

The idea that the Syrians would be sponsoring Sunni jihadist groups whose sole mission are to kill the apostates -- that is, anybody who doesn’t support their view, the Wahhabi or Salafist view of Sunni religion -- that includes the Shia -- anybody who doesn’t believe -- support these guys’ religions are apostates and are killable, that’s basically one of the crazy aspects of all this, and it’s just inconceivable.

Nothing can be ruled out, but that doesn’t make much case, and I noticed that in the papers today there’s fewer and fewer references to this. The newspapers in America are beginning to wise up, that this can’t be -- this isn’t very logical. The White House is putting it out hot and heavy as part of the anti-Syria campaign, but it’s not flying, because it doesn’t make sense. So there we are. It’s another mess.

You might think that one of the reasons -- I think I wrote about this in The New Yorker -- one of the things that the Saudi Bandar had promised us was that we can control the jihadists. We can control them, he assured us. Don’t worry about getting in bed with these bad guys, because, as we remember, the same kind of assurances were given to us in the late 1980s, when we supported, as I said, bin Laden and others in the war against Russia, the Mujahideen war, and that, of course, bit us on the ass. And this is, too. So there we are.

AMY GOODMAN: Seymour Hersh, what about the role of Vice President Dick Cheney, the Deputy National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams?

SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, you always -- any time you have violent anti-Iran policy and anti-Shia policy, you have to start looking there. Look, clearly this president is deeply involved in this, too, but what I hear from my people, of course, the players -- it’s always Cheney, Cheney. Cheney meets with Bush at least once a week. They have a lunch. They usually have a scheduled lunch. And out of that comes a lot of big decisions. We don’t know what’s ever said at that meeting. And this is -- talk about being opaque, this is a government that is so hidden from us.

So I can’t -- I can tell you that -- you know, the thing that’s amazing about this government, the thing that’s really spectacular, is even now how they can get their way mostly with a lot of the American press. For example, I do know -- and, you know, you have to take it on face value. If you’ve been reading me for a long time, you know a lot of the things I write are true or come out to be more or less true. [b]I do know that within the last month, maybe four, four-and-a-half weeks ago, they made a decision that because of the totally dwindling support for the war in Iraq, we go back to the al-Qaeda card, and we start talking about al-Qaeda.

And the next thing you know, right after that, Bush went to the Southern Command -- this was a month ago -- and talked, mentioned al-Qaeda twenty-seven times in his speech. He did so just the other day this week -- al-Qaeda this, al-Qaeda that.[b] All of a sudden, the poor Iraqi Sunnis, I mean, they can’t do anything without al-Qaeda. It’s only al-Qaeda that’s dropping the bombs and causing mayhem. It’s not the Sunni and Shia insurgents or militias.

And this policy just gets picked up, although there’s absolutely no empirical basis. Most of the pros will tell you the foreign fighters are a couple percent, and then they’re sort of leaderless in the sense that there’s no overall direction of the various foreign fighters.

You could call them al-Qaeda. You can also call them jihadists and Salafists that want to die fighting the Americans or the occupiers in Iraq and they come across the border. Whether this is -- there’s no attempt to suggest there’s any significant coordination of these groups by bin Laden or anybody else, and the press just goes gaga. And so, they went gaga a little bit over the Syrian connection to the activities in Tripoli. It’s just amazing to me, you guys.

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The USA has apparently created some puppets, pulled out an "Al-Qaeda" custom from its Trickle Trunk and dressed them up.