That's Capital

More Thoughts on Hezbollah - from Mark Perry

Curious about the strategy behind Mark Perry's meetings with Hezbollah, I sent him some follow-up emails. My basic query was whether in talking to Hezbollah, they may want to include some Israelis in the process, precisely because the Lebanese Shiites' actual enemy is their neighbor, not the United States. It seems to me that until Lebanese political figures are not just willing, but interested in speaking to Israelis who consider themselves Zionists, they are simply doing the same thing Israelis did to Palestinian groups for far too long (and are still doing with Hamas) which is basically live by denial. Which leads not just nowhere, but to self-righteous and self-perpetuating violence upon each other, and everyone in the way.

Anyway, Perry took some time to respond thoughtfully. I'll wait to respond with similar thought next post. But what he offers seems important to me, not at all superficial, and something even Zionist-friendly thinkers like me need to take seriously in positive ways. Here it is:

From Mark Perry:

I very much appreciate your recent emails and your thoughts. I have been turning over what you have said in those emails. At the same moment, I have been thinking through a coherent response to a number of your points. I find your views reflective of the kind of language that we use: "simply trading ideas is not enough to lead to peace," " a great deal of latent resources sit waiting to be liberated by both sides," and " the inequitible sharing of resources comes from the stagnant dynamics that drive all bureaucracies." All of that is true, and is resonant with our views, but leaves undetermined what tactics should be adopted that constitutes doing more than "trading ideas," "liberating resources" or reinvigorating "stagnant bureaucracies."

Very recently we have been working diligently to codify our views on human conflict and political engagement. Our Asia Times pieces are an attempt at that codification. The process of articulating what we mean and what we do has been difficult but has its rewards. We are in the process, I believe, of articulating a better understanding of successful political engagement, a more accurate comprehension of recent history, and a more substantive knowledge of the causes, conduct and consequences of violence and conflict.

At the same moment, we are attempting to translate those views into a program that will successfully transfer human action from the military to the political sphere. I do not know that I would now be prepared to go beyond what we say on our website: we aim to identify and understand the different strands in political Islam, correct misperceptions about them, and create a better language that can pull this conflict between Islam and the West out of the military sphere and place it in the political sphere.

That said, it is easier to talk about what we are not, than to delineate exactly what we are. We are not peaceniks, we are not a group dedicated to reconciliation, we are not even a forum for an exchange of ideas on conflict resolution. Each of these semi-disciplines begin with a premise that violent conflict is immoral or counter-productive or can be subverted through "people-to-people" exchanges. We do not believe this. " Our goal is not to end violence, but to circumscribe it within well-defined limits," we noted in our Asia Times piece.

As I would not go beyond the description given on our website of who we are, so I wouldnot go beyond this simple explanation of our philosophy as contained in our Asia Times pieces: "Talking and listening are more than a metaphorical construct, a repetition of the Sermon on the Mount, or a faith-based reconciliation program by another name; it is, rather, an attempt to palliate fears, put the individual back at the center of history, and negate the intellectual apartheid that robs words of their content." In the current conflict, we seek to "deny the efficacy of those in the West who would refuse Islam the richness of its diversity at the same time that it rejects Islam's rhetoric of the West's collective guilt."

In your communications with me, you have asked specific questions, and so I would answer them. You may find them, in some instances, particularly dissatisfying.

You have noted: "Compared to Al-Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah are perhaps moderates. From your interaction that may be absolutely clear to  you, given that you have met with their leadership and heard more than the bulk of the world. But if you compare them to the PLO from even as far back as the 1970s, they strike me as fairly extreme. Or at least that which they repeatedly share with the foreign world, especially their primary enemy, Israel."

We believe the West has misread the political spectrum of the Muslim world. It is not simply that Hamas and Hezbollah are moderates compared to al-Qaeda, they are moderates compared to the almost all of the rulers of the Middle East. Hosni Mubarak, King Abdullah of Jordan, President Ben Ali of Tunisia -- and many others -- are not moderate. They are autocrats. They have gained their offices in service to the United States and they retain their offices through alliances with the police and security services trained, maintained and supported by the United States. We call these rulers moderates because they support our interests, we call their opponents terrorists because they oppose our interests.

We understand that this position is viewed as extreme -- our answer is that the critique of our position results from a superficial understanding of what constitutes "legitimacy." Legitimacy cannot be conferred, it must be earned. Democratically elected governments have legitimacy: the governments of Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia (and many others) were not elected. They have no legitimacy; that is to say, they do not have the support of their people. We believe that an accurate reading of history shows that governments that lack legitimacy are eventually and inevitably swept aside. Mubarak, Abdullah, Ben Ali (and many others) owe their position to our patronage and not to the support of their own people. They should pack their bags. They're finished.

So too, governments and officials who are elected have legitimacy. The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Palestinian Authority, Hezb-a Tarir in the Gulf (and elsewhere), and Jamaat e-Islami in Pakistan are strong parties whose officials have stood for election and won. They have more legitimacy in their societies than the rulers of those societies. If there is one thing that we agree on with the neo-Conservative philosophy it is that democracy should be spread through the region. There should be elections in all of the nations of the region, today, now, and the United States should live with the results. The pain that will come with this transition will be severe. The parties that are elected will not always agree with us, many of them will cut relations between their nation and ours. It may well be that such elections will be attended by violence, by the defense of the old order by force of arms. Even so, the triumph of political Islam is assured whether or not these elections take place. The triumph and rootedness of Hezbollah in Lebanon is a case in point: their victory in the recent conflict happened because of their legitimacy in Lebanese society -- not in spite of it. It is a terrible and perhaps fatal mistake for the United States to work to undermine this legitimacy and to describe such parties as part of an al-Qaeda inspired global intifada against our "values" and "freedoms." These parties do not oppose our values and freedoms, they oppose our policies.

As you note: "So why aren't members of Hamas and Hezbollah, as similar parties within the PLO in the late 1970s did, talking to Israelis? The rhetoric emanating from Iran's leadership about Israelis heading out somewhere else like Alaska, just reinforces the sense of existential threat. Within the context that it comes from a nation that seems intent not just on building a nuclear weapon but training neighbors and supporting highly aggressive attitudes, if not actions, against Israel, obviously creates a huge climate of fear in Israel."

Large numbers of Americans are seemingly obsessed with the fate of Israel. I have never quite understood why. Israel is a vibrant and sophisticated modern society that is perfectly capable of defending itself. To say that we have a moral requirement to defend Israel is to deny its people their history: they fought for their country without our help. We lifted not one finger in 1947 or 1948 to help Israel. To claim that, as some have, that Israel is conpensation for the Holocaust is to do violence to the tragedy the Jewish people suffered in World War II. There can be no compensation -- and if Israel is that compensation it is not big enough. But then, the whole world is not big enough. In 1954, Menachem Begin opposed the acceptance of reparations payments from Germany for the Holocaust. He was right to do so.

I mention all of this because I have found we Americans often conflate the history of Christian anti-Semitism with the fate of Israel. I find it particularly hard to accept that Israeli Jews would argue vociferously (as I heard them do on a number of interview news programs recently) that they stand with us in a "defense of Western values." What values, exactly, are they talking about? Are we defending our century's old traditions of religious tolerance? We need to be clear on this: the civilization that gave us Bach and Brahms and Beethoven also gave us Auschwitz. The great Reformation of Christianity that provided a protest against Papal authority was attended by countless pogroms led by the followers of that great anti-Semite, Martin Luther. There is no doubt that there is anti-Semitism amongst Arab and Muslim leaders. Some of it is virulent. It must be opposed, rejected, expunged from Arab societies. It must not be tolerated. But it cannot be bombed out of existence. And, for the record, I have heard (as recently as last week -- in an interview with Israeli Ambassador to the UN, Dan Gillerman), the most virulent anti-Arabism ever express in public. It is common amongst rightwing parties in the Knesset.

That said, I believe that I can speak for all of those associated with Conflicts Forum: we do not seek, support and will not condone discussions with those who would advocate the destruction of Israel. We have, in fact, spoken many times and continue to maintain strong communications with Israel's political leaders and they understand full well who we are and what we are doing. Many of them are our most ardent critics. They certainly have that right -- as they believe the future of their country is at stake. We understand and appreciate their concern. Even so, our advice to them has been consistent: take a look at the map and then understand -- you should not view your nation as an American outpost but should conduct your foreign policy as if we did not exist. To do otherwise would be criminally negligent. The continued obsessive worries about Israel expressed by our leaders and people should not lull you into a sense of security. Our concern is focused on ourselves. We are fair weather friends. We have good friends in Israel, we visit them often, and we listen closely to their views. I am not at liberty to discuss those contacts, except to say that they are continuing, substantive, and quite hopeful. We would note, also, that members of the American Jewish community consult with us on our dialogues and serve on our board of advisors. Israel is capable of conducting talks with its enemies -- and have little need of our services for doing so.

I am an American, and more concerned with the future of my society and its relationship with political Islam than I am with Israel's. The founder of our organization, Alastair Crooke has the same feelings when it comes to Great Britain. We have found it far more useful for us to engage our own societies than to intrude, or advise, the leaders of Israel. In fact, we believe the most recent interplay between Israel and Hezbollah bespeaks the violence that American intrusion in Israeli politics can play: our neo-Conservatives believe that Israel is "the front line" in the global war on terrorism. But it is not their children in Haifa and I wonder whether the most conservative supporters of the Hezbollah war truly love Israel -- or simply hate Arabs. I will never forget the outrage of the American Jewish community when Yitzhak Rabin, with whom I had a personal relationship, signed the Oslo Accords with Yasser Arafat. And I will not forget his speech before a group of conservative Jews here in Washington (and I believe this quote is nearly verbatim) -- "if you want to criticise our policies then come in serve in our armies. Otherwise, shut up."

Hamas, Hezbollah, Jamaat e-Islami, the Muslim Brotherhood and Hezb-a Tarir are not anti-Semitic organizations. While Hamas's charter calls for the destruction of Israel, Hamas leaders have made it clear that "our charter is not the Koran, it can be changed." The PLO Charter called for the destruction of Israel. Changing it was not a precondition for talks with Israel. There were no preconditions. Furthermore, the leadership of each of these organizations has made it clear to us that opposition to Israeli policies should not be confused with anti-Semitism. Khaled Meshal has said, publicly, on three separate occasions that "a recognition of fundamental Palestinian rights constitutes a necessary first step on the road to our organization's recognition of Israel." This message has been transmitted successively to the Israeli leadership. Their (Israel's) recognition that Palestinians have just grievances that derive from the establishment of their (the Israeli) state and their statement of that fact will move both parties into a dialogue that, given increased Hamas strength inside of Palestinian society, seems fated.

The position of Hezbollah is quite exact: they realize that they cannot throw Israel into the sea and they have been very careful to not conflate their political program with a program that undergirds anti-semitism. In my three years in speaking with these groups I have never heard, once, any anti-Semitic comment. I will note that the issue of Hezbollah as an anti-Semitic organization became an issue, most recently, when it was clear that the IDF was not doing well in its war. While we do not have contact with Iran, I would make the same claim: the anti-Semitism that seems apparent in the words of their leader does not reflect the view of their government. And if it does then we must ask ourselves whether conducting a military operation against them will shift their views, or reinforce them. Our problem with Iran is political, not religious. If we oppose their enrichment of uranium then we must renounce the NPT, if we are not willing to do that, then we must find a way to allow them to enrich uranium without its translation into a nuclear device. The only way to do that is to engage them diplomatically.

I would say this (and I do not speak here for all of Conflicts Forum): Israel's future is not only not my business, they're probably better off because of that. Israel's future is not our business either, and my bet is that they also realize that. The problem that we face is not Zionism, for that largely political and revolutionary movement (one of the first transnational movements in history) has run its course. Zionism produced a growing and viable society. The problem now, most especially for Israelis, is the growth of militant Judaism in the United States -- a political movement peculiar (that is to say, common) -- amongst diaspora communities. Many of the most conservative pro-Israel American Jews believe they know what is better for Israel than Israelis do. This is a great danger for Israel that, I have been told, is being wrestled with at the highest levels of the Israeli government. In light of recent events, I assume the wrestling match is not going well. I find it ironic, indeed, that American conservatives who are Jews are now evincing disappointment that Israel did not do well in the recent war. I have only one question for them:

Who the hell do you think you are?

As you note: "Also, it seems to me what has been missing from this whole 'peace dialogue' on all sides is the attention of economists and anthropologists who can untangle the weave of societal needs required to bring an enduring peace to these peoples. There is too much talk about politics which are a bit like the icing on a cake. The first thing people may discuss, but rarely the last thing. Deeper cultural and economic dynamics (that support culture) are simply too often missing from the table in thinking about this area."

Our experience is that economic, cultural, religious and social exchanges can never be successful without a substantive and parallel political process whose goal is the resolution of political problems. On the eve of Ariel Sharon's march on the Temple Mount, I was in Bethlehem . There was no room at the Inn -- every hotel room in the city was occupied. (I fortunately ran across a friend who rented me a room in his family quarters.) GDP growth was pegged at 14.5 percent. The West Bank and Gaza were booming. The next morning, as a result of the Sharon initiative, the intifada began. I have noted since that the Palestinian people have been quite willing to sacrifice their economic well-being to continue their resistance to the Israeli occupation. They have done so for fifty years -- and they will not stop just to fill their bellies. They are not alone in that view. Peoples who feel unjustly oppressed (whether justly oppressed or not) will cede their most basic way of life for the dream of nationhood. That is as true today in Palestine as it was in 1962 in Vietnam, or 1948 in China.

I hope that this helps you to understand some of our views. You should not thank me for expressing them, as writing our views out in forums like this helps us to document and perfect our thinking. Those who are a part of Conflicts Forum -- about one dozen people -- are like-minded in their views. We are not motivated by money, nor ideology, and certainly not by religion. We have few ideals and hold few views in common. But those that are held in common are axiomatic: we believe the grounding of political action comes in empathy for the suffering of others, an understanding of their culture, an abandonment of simple formulas and the adoption of engagement as a fit substitute for conflict. We are universally convinced, I believe, that the common notion that violence follows from the failure of diplomacy has, in our time, been sadly and tragically reversed: diplomacy today is the likely result of the failure of violence. Our goal is to set aright that formula. More specifically, Mr. Bush has said that sending young men and women into battle to give their lives for their country is the most difficult thing a leader can do. That's a lie. The most difficult thing a leader can do is to sit across a table from a person who disagrees with him for the avowed purpose of finding a means to forego violence.

I wish you well and appreciate your time.
Mark Perry

The Grand Guignol

If there's an artist who might understand how to capture the Israeli-Lebanon war it's French dramatist Antonin Artaud, known for his Theater of Cruelty, a company producing highly visual, wildly murderous stories, sometimes known as Grand Guignols. Dramas that were spectacularly bloody and horrific.

Artaud's work was rooted in the following ideas: most human beings are incapable of understanding the violence that drives us, but once we see it externalized, we can finally process it, then act with compassion and grace. Artaud viewed his Grand Guignols as a spiritual effort to bring the most horrific of our psychic fears to the surface.  Like ancient rituals of animal sacrifice, he thought such theater could reflect back to us our own vulnerabilities under a mysterious and sometimes terrifying God. 

I wonder if everyone involved with this war, from its civilian victims to willing soldiers to even those of us watching outside are all part of the actors in a piece of similarly bloody theater. Only instead of a God in the heavens, this theater piece seems to have us driven by absolutist bureaucracies in America, Israel and Iran, non-state terrorist actors and ideologies, and a general fear of a future that promised the erasing of more and more of the world's boundaries.

As an anthropologist told me when I talked to her about 9/11, the fear from terrorists weren’t started by that heinous act, only exacerbated. Rather our horror was growing organically with the rise of globalization. “People seem to like fences,” she said. “When they can’t see boundaries it is very frightening for many. Very frightening.”

That’s about the only story I can find that explains things. But then I’m probably as guilty as anyone of looking for easy narratives for a very complex story. Unfortunately, easy narratives are ruling the day, at a time when such stories are too often just inspiration to legitimate violence.

A few examples. This last Sunday (Aug. 05th) CNNs Media Matters host Howard Kurtz interviewed Thomas E. Ricks. One of America's most respected Pentagon journalists, Ricks is the author of Fiasco, a devastating account of the Bush Administration’s handling of the Iraq War.

Ricks claimed he’s heard two theories from American generals about Israel’s Lebanon campaign.

1. Israel's military is deliberately ignoring certain Hezbollah positions, allowing them to keep firing rockets. Why? So long as the rockets are flying into Israel, the IDF has an excuse to attack Lebanon.
2. Israel is targeting journalists, or giving them the sense they are, to frighten them.

Ricks has stature and seems like a no-nonsense guy. Is that reason enough that even though he offered no proof, names, or anything more substantial than a few sweeping accusations, the CNN host let them pass without an ounce of examination?  As the head of a program that explores media accuracy, Kurtz showed no capacity to embrace his responsibility.

At the least, he should have pointed out clearly, if accurate, Ricks’ statement would be enough to do what Hezbollah has failed to do, namely create mass hysteria in Israel. It would mean that this Israeli government isn't just lying to foreign journalists, but that it has asked its citizens to accept the possibility of its soldiers dying, as well as demanded that hundreds of thousands of Israelis spend the last month either in bomb shelters or leave their homes... all less motivated to protect its citizens than wage war.

When Ricks claims he heard this all from some anonymous generals, I doubt he's lying. I also think Ricks knows the difference between rumors, innuendo, and truth. Well, here he was spreading innuendo, with Kurtz playing uncritical facilitator. Given the gravitas of the situation, this makes both men as bad as liars, if not worse. Because without offering context or substance they were breezily tossing inflammatory charges towards an arena which is in a raging fire.

Listening to such careless accusations, Ricks and Kurtz seemed eager to group the Israeli citizenry and its government as a monolithic block. It reminded me of the miserably provincial Europeans who I’ve met overseas who lump Americans together as all enthusiastic followers of every single policy taken by our government. 

Sunday’s program made me think that we’re creeping to a similarly hyped-up period, one in which the media world is so lost in creating a clear narrative that they will grasp at anything, no matter how shallow, to come up with some analysis that momentarily sounds logical.

Earlier last week on NPR's To The Point, host Warren Olney interviewed political scientist Robert Pape. The interview followed an NYTime’s Op-Editorial Pape published that suggested that Israel can never defeat Hezbollah because it is a social movement akin, as he put it, to America's “Civil Rights movement.”

Pape’s inference was clear. Given the history of America’s Civil Rights movement, he was suggesting that if it’s a "social movement" it automatically has integrity, and thus certain success. Someone might want to remind Pape that the Klu Klux Klan was also a social movement. The fact that it had roots in a particular society did nothing to legitimate its existence or survival.

Pape has spent the last year selling a theory based on quantitative research on suicide bombers, the results published in a book that concludes that suicide bombing and terrorism only grow out of situations where people are occupied by aggressive powers. Though his Op-Ed piece didn't categorically state it, he inferred that if Israel would quit its violence against Lebanon, Hezbollah would leave Israel alone. While highly suggestive of solutions, Pape's essay had offered nothing to substantiate it.

On NPR, both he and Olney had a chance to explore or, as anthropologists say, “unpack” the theory. Instead Olney approached Pape with a brush as wide as the Hudson River. Basically, "give us what you think." So Pape simply gave boilerplate, namely such startling insights as the following: Hezbollah grew out of Israel's 1982 Lebanese invasion. That Hezbollah runs schools and hospitals. And that every day of the fighting, more and more non-fundamentalist Lebanese will become members of Hezbollah.

No argument from me. But anyone who has listened to the news about this violence for more than three minutes would have heard it all before.  You'd think Olney and Pape might want to explore deeper issues motivating Hezbollah. Given the way they have never proved themselves big friends of Lebanon's own huge Palestinian refugee population, their  attack on Israel at this point deserves thorough examination.

Here are some things Olney and Pape might have examined: perhaps Hezbollah was simply driven by a momentary political gain within Lebanon. Perhaps beyond Shaba Farms they are after more territory that are is part of Israel but which were open to question in the 1948 armistice. Perhaps the return of "all the prisoners"  (the specificity of exactly who they are a wee little fact of which no media outlet seems willing to question, but a phrase Arab scholars like Fawaz Gerges seem to repeat without question) was really about smaller scale political interests.

But Olney or Pape didn't seem interested. In an exchange that reminded me of one of those late night infomercials that pose as talk shows, Olney turned to Joel Greenburg, reporting for the Chicago Tribune from Israel, and asked whether Israel understands Hezbollah's depth as a social force in Southern Lebanon. Greenburg answered a quick "too often it gets lost." It was as if the three men were unconsciously or consciously conspiring to sell one big idea: Israel is led by people with absolutely no idea of what they are doing, and with little morality to guide them.

That same week, on PBS Television's News Hour, host Margaret Warner interviewed two "experts" about the view of "who is winning?" The first guest was Mark Perry, part of a British-American based group called Conflicts Forum, which "promotes dialogue between the West and Islamist groups like Hezbollah." The other guest was Gal Luft, executive director of the "Institute for the Analysis of global Security," and a former lieutenant colonel in the IDF.

Luft was most convincing about his inability to do anything except toe a party line. At least Perry was animated, his pent-up posture giving him the look of an angry coach paralyzed on the sidelines by hapless referees. According to him, Hezbollah has “made it clear they're ready for a ceasefire, but they need a trade to pull that off, and they want diplomacy.” As he put it, “they made it very clear to me -- we met with the leadership of Hezbollah over the last two-and-a-half years -- that they're ready to talk, and they're ready to do a political negotiation. I don't see what's wrong with that."

At that point, I thought Warner would examine exactly of what Perry's sense of what Hezbollah's "political negotiation" consisted. She didn't. Why? Perry raised something that demanded answers. Like exactly what drives Hezbollah. Warner listened to Perry with a pained expression, as if frightened or embarrased to ask. I was hoping Luft might be inspired to inquire, himself. Instead the Israeli analyst sat there staring ahead like a man incapable of any discussion that didn't have a formulaic answer.

Honestly, if I sound upset only about Israel’s media image, it’s not just the image that worries me; it’s their entire military campaign. Honestly, Pape’s research strikes me as being about as “scientific” as a professional “Pepsi vs. Coke” marketing study; lots of data but, as the expression goes, “big whoop." Ricks seems smugly manipulative, as in, "I know what I know, and I don't have to tell you how I know but you have to believe me!" As for Perry, he seemed to have real information but, for whatever reason, not quite willing to share it. 

All that said, Israel’s air war against Lebanon strikes me as indefensible. Not only have they spent far too many weeks destroying the infrastructure and lives of their neighbors, but what the hell have they accomplished for themselves? The man designing the military strategy, Dan Halutz, is the same guy who once said, so long as Israel gets a “targeted terrorist” he slept soundly despite sending his men to drop bombs that kill innocent civilians. Watching him last year interviewed by Bob Simon on CBS 60 Minutes, I remember he laughed about the craziness of Palestinian suicide bombers. At the time, he came off to me as a very careless human being. Someone whose bigotry is sold as professional certainty.

As someone who cares about Israel, their  “strategy” seems to me to have a basis in nothing tangible, outside of a small country with an over-supply of air-power and human will showing how frightened it is of getting extinguished. All just seems like blind wrath.  From Hezbollah I expect nothing but the worst. As Israelis find Iranian Revolutionary Guards fighting next to them, Pape may prove correct about them as social movement. What he ignorantly fails to acknowledge is it’s a social movement with deeply violent and imperialistic ambitions.  A movement whose rhetoric, and  history, seem to make them willing to exterminate any rivals, regardless of whether they’re Israeli, Druze or even Shiite.

Regardless, the Israeli air war seems totally blind to Lebanese suffering. There will be an awful lot their leadership must answer in coming weeks and months. I would hope there was a professional press out there doing a better job of making them accountable.  Not by taking strident positions but by the slow, difficult work of looking at whatever is found to give clarity. The agonizing detail work that define the value of real world detectives. 

For now, in the urge “to get the story,” the media is too eager for seamless narratives to the detriment of creating any accuracy. While there’s been great coverage of the human costs of this war to both sides, on the military and political front, our media leadership is looking to put away the suspects before they even know what they have for evidence. Worse that they’re operating according to a paradigm that demands the most superficial aspect of “clarity.” Namely creating clear bumper sticker type thinking for sides to root for.

Talking with my That’s Capital colleague, Titus Levi, he pointed out the way pressures to “fill up a news hour” leads to frantic and shallow news-gathering. It’s a process that has a similarly uncontrollable momentum as a heroin addict addicted as much to ingesting himself with drugs as the effect. No longer feeling any real high, he is still willing to stick himself with infected needles, simply to maintain a psychic routine. Ultimately such folks don’t just hurt themselves. Their carelessness helps spread plagues. Like AIDS.

Finally, Israeli editors have done an awful lot of complaining about bias from the foreign press, but given that they keep their complaining hermetically sealed by restricting it to their own papers, it all sounds like whining. If they're monitoring the foreign media and have a problem with it, they should request air time. For me, the only trustworthy voice exploring what drives Hezbollah comes from Lebanon’s Daily Star, namely editor Michael Young. For some interesting viewpoints, read the links below.
Jonathan Field
August 9, 2006

Michael Young's piece in the Times - excellent

Matthias Küntzel - about Iran's Ahmadinejad, who apparently was interviewed by CBS' Michael Wallace who in publicity cheerfully reports that he "found him very intelligent." He may well be, but Kuntzel finds his type of intelligence suicidal on a massive scale.

Meron Benvenisti - an Israeli geographer and former deputy mayor of Jerusalem, scathing about modern Zionism

Amotz Asa-El - an examination of this war from a Jerusalem Post writer who seems honest and accurate

Avi Sagi and Yedidya Stern - a long but excellent portrait of why Israelis may travel the world, but they are rooted where they live... someone should send to leadership in Iran, Hezbollah, and the too often-myopic so-called supporters of Palestinian rights who so often view Israel's Jewish population as some temporary visitors to a foreign land.

Imad Shaku - a remarkable piece by a member of the Fatah Revolutionary Council

Robert Fulford - a more biting review of media coverage from a Canadian journalist. 

Muneer Karram - from an Israeli Arab who is a doctoral student in history

Riad Ali - from an Israeli Arab news commentator

Danny Rubenstein - another remarkable piece from a terrific Israeli reporter who here writes about better times between Zionists and Lebanese Shiites

Yitzhak Laor - Israeli analyst critical of what it sees as his country's over-reliance to military solutions to political problems

Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff - a piece showing a particular Israeli take on Nasrallah

The Thinking Lebanese - a Lebanese blog co-written by Faysal Itani who may be the bravest and disciplined man who ever showed up on a New Republic message board.

Annia Ciezadlo - a Beriut writer who shows up in The New Republic and may be the bravest reporter in Lebanon. Excellent piece about Nasrallah.

Radio Open Source - while a previous post of mine criticized some of their shows, they've been refreshingly open to exploring all sides. This program featured two novelists, one Israeli and another Palestinian. It was about the only media I've heard that has offered long term hope about co-existance.

Ari Shavit - another Israeli Radio Open Source has interviewed, someone worth reading

Bitter Lemons - a dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians. One of the producers, Yossi Alpher, is particularly good at examining Israeli politics.

Anything by Amir Oren and Aluf Benn in Haarutz or Barry Rubin in Jerusalem Post.

Commitment

by Jonathan Field

My office is a room in the back of a boxing gym. I rent there because it’s affordable. It's also never boring. While the gym is noisy at times, I can always tune out any bedlam by closing my door. And if I’m momentarily frustrated or need a break, there’s always a lot of life to follow amid the doings of the gym.

This past week I let myself get distracted watching two guys spar. One of them was Amadou, a young guy originally from Senegal whose most noticeable feature is a bright smile. The sport frequently attracts a person of mixed disposition, on the one hand usually friendly, even gentle, on the other touched by an aggression which finds its fulfillment physically, within the confines of a boxing ring. That’s certainly true with Amadou.

Once he climbs through the rope on to the canvas, his sunniness disappears. Indeed, his entire presence changes. Not that Amadou is a great fighter. He’s a bit too eager. At times he trips over his own feet. He takes five shots to land one. And yet to anyone who steps in the ring with him, he’s dangerous. On the canvas, as Mike Tyson would put it, Amadou becomes a man “with bad intentions.”

The other day he sparred with a guy at least a foot taller, 30 pounds heavier, and with at least six more years experience.  It didn't’t matter. The novice young Senegalese fighter intimidated his bigger opponent from the first bell to the last.

The key thing to watch was Amadou’s jab. In a sense, it was the punch of an amateur. He’d telegraph it slightly and then, his legs and arms somewhat disconnected in their search for ground from which to get momentum, he’d throw. As the boxing expression goes, you could see his punches coming a mile off. Regardless, his bigger and more experienced opponent kept finding Amadou’s jab knocking him back.

Looking at it happen, his trainer said something to the effect that "the kid's power is in his eyes as much as in his hands." When Amadou goes out to whack you, he has the face of a man totally committed to your undoing. You may see Amadou coming at you, but in those moments, speed is irrelevant. Chances are that even if you get out of his way, the sum total of his presence is somehow going to impact you.

Perhaps it’s an overstatement, but in a sense, Amadou moves with an intention that ends up defying metrics. It’s as if the power of his commitment allows him to stop time. What interests me is less the expression of that commitment (boxing), than its power. His presence outside of the ring (a sunny smile and easy charm) is proof that joy is as powerful as rage in radiating its lights on the world. But watching Amadou box reminded me of something more important.

Human beings who can commit to something are clearly more effective than those who don’t. Okay,
that assertion is a no-brainer. But it’s also too easy to forget. Especially when a “good idea” inspires people to start something like an organization or a business. Watching intention in the confines of a boxing ring reminds you that smarts, imagination, and even bursts of passion are not enough to translate into something that endures.

The truth is that Amadou may or may not evolve into a great fighter. But for now, the gym's more experienced trainers are impressed. As long as he maintains that level of intention, the kid’s physical limitations won’t stop him from transforming into someone who warrants athletic respect.

All to say that generating traction takes commitment. It’s a core ingredient around which structure and process are formed. Without the commitment underlying structure and process, initial enthusiasm dissipates like the sweaty regret of a beaten fighter wishing he’d never put on his gloves. At that point, the business or organization either falls into malaise, or simply dies.

Boxing may not offer a perfect corollary for parable. Fighter and audiences are not the same as brands, institutions, and markets. Unlike the three-minute rounds of a sport, businesses and organizations have cycles that are less predictable. But watching Amadou led me to think about benchmarks for success or failure in various projects in which I’ve participated through the years.

In my last post, I wrote about a group that Titus and myself once formed to produce a new mythology of peace for Israeli-Palestinian existence. I also mentioned that we did not succeed. For all our well-meant intentions, we could not manifest corresponding commitment from other people.

It wasn't that we lacked desire for things to work out. It was we didn't have enough. Putting it all together required gathering a nuanced weave of components: from participants to processes that could leverage their efforts in satisfying ways. Had we a greater reservoirs of time, partners and money, perhaps our positive intentions would have proved resonant. But the inability to summon the requisite time, partners or money may have reflected the inadequate depth of our desire.

Which is to point out the following - however great the excitement that good ideas generate, there is probably a mathematical formula that proves how much greater the need for commitment. Have an ambitious idea? You better have even more ambition to execute. Without it, even brilliant ideas are doomed.

Whatever “thing” a person seeks to develop, public or private, challenges always emerge. The greater the number of components (as in the parts and participants), the greater the chance of things falling apart.

To paraphrase playwright Arthur Miller talking about life in the theater, a world composed of many parts and many egos, success requires having “a mouth and stomach capable of chewing bicycles, alligators, and whatever comes at you.” That description is actually apt for more than theater, apropos to anything from raising a healthy child to creating a business.

In economic and cultural terms, global and digital tool-sets liberate the creative abilities among many sectors of human beings: artists, business people, activists or entrepreneurs. Sites like That’s Capital emerge on the backs of software code that is out there for the public, nearly free. That code exists as a component of a larger infrastructure suddenly made accessible for the mass. But such liberation has a cost.

The digital process, itself, has its own rules for framing creativity. For instance, within the physics of molecules and gravity, digging holes takes sweat. Tools like Typepad, Photoshop, and Final Cut require their own expenditures of energy and focus, but compared to working with earth, it is easier to tweak the latter’s byte-based products.

An open-source world leads to an always-on attitude. A sense of living in environments that are always capable of being morphed. Creativity is unbound. Don't like something? Edit a new iteration, or even delete it. Just walk away.

That translates to a paradox. In that environment, it’s easier to start something. It is also easier to never finish.  Among people who work with digital technology, everything is malleable. And that probably effects our perceptions in the offline as well as the online world. 

As a friend told me recently, after spending many hours playing Nintendo’s Tetris he’d find himself driving in Los Angeles wondering if he could push a button and fly. Obviously he knew better, but periodic lapses into an pixilated-consciousness can impact how we operate.

Take this post. I have edited it at least 11 times, first publishing it on the net last Sunday. I took it off the site the next day, realizing that the post was pretentious and, worse, impossible to read.

Was it smart to publish before it was perfect? In deleting it, have I lost face? Did I create any confusion by pinging it out to the world wide web, tapping into an internet distribution system by alerting RSS feeds or tagging sites upon my multiple postings, nevermind the post's deletion? Or is this process just part of my own internal wiki?

I don't know. I do know that reading it gave me a headache. I had started off wanting to explore ways that the public vests authority within institutions and brands. How the seamless presence of those brands and institutions (their symbols and process in life) inspire a collective sense that trust is warranted. 

In an attempt to be thorough, I found myself moving the post into knotty territory. At some point I chopped the post in half, and starting writing about the way money acts as a sign of institutional authority. Then I took a casual swing to explore barter among friends of mine who avoid using traditional currencies (dollars) precisely so that they don't need to answer to traditional sources of authority - like "the law." I ultimately made my way back via a bumpy path toward the connections between infrastructure and interface and trust.

The core of the post looked at how globalization and digital technology opens our eyes to the complexity of various infrastructures, in the process creating broad levels of anxiety. My argument was that in an open source universe, the guts of the machine make all seamlessness less easy to maintain. Given that a seamless interface serves as a fundamental organizational symbol to earn collective trust, that dynamic leaves people unsettled.

Simultaneously, it leads brand and organizational management to over-rely on less-useful aspects of packaging, which turns out to be as ineffective as employing chewing gum to patch a leak. The effort to appear seamless or authoritative  becomes transparently empty. Ahhh....let me explain all that next post.

Here's the important thing for now: my attempt to explore all these issues led to a composition whose substance and shape mirrored what I was writing about: the difficulty of producing something seamless, nevermind logical. Framing all those pieces in an essay, well, let's just say I lacked the ability to create my own infrastructure from all the components.

I ended up spending the next few days on other projects, periodically attempting new drafts, or just watching guys pug it out in the ring. This post is, admittedly, just a new iteration.

Soon I will be taking another stab at my original focus: exploring the connection between the difficulty of generating trust, authority, and consistency amid complex environments. And linking it to the fragmentation seen everywhere from brands like G.M. to something that is both a brand and an institution: a nation state like Iraq, or as my smart friend Martin Anderson pointed out, the actual Iraq War.

In the journey to finish that piece, I ended up thinking about commitment. And now I end up calling attention to how this post is composed. I do that in the belief that identifying the elements and act of composition can tease out a glimpse of my larger interest: the symbiotic relationships between infrastructure, interface, and areas of trust and authority. And how difficult those relationships have become to sustain.

Just as a boxer feints at times not to confuse opponents but to find the best angle from which to maximize impact, this post serves as my ground for starting a larger proposition. Namely that because we produce and create from a digital mindset but live within a molecular bound world, commitment and intention become more scarce and valued, as they provide the first step to earning the authority that inspire commitment from a collective.

The digital tools that give us power to act on a particular vision simultaneously obscure how difficult a vision is to actually fulfill. In allowing us to consider morphing directions and desire (change directions, careers, partners, etc.), digital technology tempts us with possibilities. Ultimately, that abundance of choice can tempt us to avoid taking action.

Within the complexity of modern culture and markets, then, individual commitment and intention become correspondingly more complex and valuable. Especially in creating an infrastructure for a brand or an organization. And critical to galvanize participants with the trust that joining a process is worth it.

Note: all that may explain the success today of fundamentalists of every stripe (right to left). Their commitments are either to returning to some idealized glorious past or building a utopian future. Because their visions are idealized, they are easy to express. The force of their commitment can be enormously impressive and win converts. Give them leadership positions, though, they're faced with the same infrastructure problems as any of us. In general, they're better at destroying or impeding than advancing anything that a mass public views as useful.

Thinking about all these issues is close to home for That’s Capital. Building an audience means facing our own infrastructure and interface issues. We need to generate compelling content (audio and text-based conversations) and design a structure that enrolls access, interest and participation among a larger public via search engines, other blogs or podcasts, and conversation as much offline as on it.

Hopefully, we’ll maintain the gutsy spirit of guys like Amadou, not in our aggression as much as our commitment to knocking ‘em out. Here rather than jabs, we'll be looking to generate posts, ideas of consequence, and thoughts about the good things and bad things who deserve our lefts as well as rights.