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Post by Teddy Bear on Dec 18, 2005 22:18:04 GMT
BBC Watch: Presence vs. Occupation
By Andrew L. Jaffee, netwmd.com
Again I ask, "What's wrong with this picture?" The BBC today described Syria's brutal occupation of Lebanon as a "29-year-old military presence" while it continually refers to Israel's security measures in the Palestinian territories as an "occupation."
A full text search of the BBC news site for the term "Syrian occupation Lebanon" yields 135 hits, while a search for "Israeli occupation" yields 847.
Besides Syria's complicity in Lebanon's de-Christianization, and its economic profiteering from its "presence" there, the Assad dynasty had:
...approximately 30,000 Syrian troops and 25,000 intelligence members ... deployed in Lebanon (that is 1 Syrian soldier for every 50 Lebanese).
The occupation brought many more Syrians into Lebanon than just "security" personnel -- indeed, it was a flood:
About 1.2 million untaxed and unregulated Syrian workers are employed in Lebanon generating over $3 billion for the ailing Syrian command-and-control economy. Lebanon also serves as a closed market for Syrian products, not widely desirable in other parts of the world.
Yet Syria's murder of thousands of Lebanese never inspired the leftist attention (anger) directed towards Israel. Nothing analogous to the Palestine Solidarity Movement was ever created for Lebanon. In fact, it was mostly Lebanese ex-patriots who tried in vain to bring attention to their homeland's plight. But Lebanon was ignored for about 30 years -- until the assassination of former prime minister Rafik Hariri. Then it was the Lebanese themselves who started the long process of liberation from Syrian domination.
The long arm of Syria keeps knocking off Lebanese activists. Today, tens of thousands of Lebanese protested Syrian involvement in its continued campaign of murder in Cedar Land.
If this is a "presence," then I've got angels flying out me ars (sorry, but I grew up with too many Irish).
Cross-posted at IsraPundit and netwmd.com
Posted by Andrew Jaffee at December 14, 2005 10:39 AM |
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