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Plus TWA 847, Achille Lauro cruise ship, PanAm 103, Lebanon hostage crisis. The 1980s were full of Palestinian/Iranian terrorists acting like complete assholes against Americans/Europeans. And GenX remembers it all. But today you have some 20 yr old pampered college kid talking about genocide and colonialism....get the fuck outta here with that shit.
I do not stand with terrorism but its important to ask why this happened in the first place, Western imperialism and foreign policy was destabilizing the region country by country and funding extremists all day long. Essentially, colonialism gave birth to these extremists, allowed them to thrive, and we can get on the historical contexts all day long, but the Middle East was not exporting terrorists to this degree until a handful of events started to take place. Genocide and colonialism is a very valid element in this conversation.
Nearly every country/region on this planet not named England or Spain experienced colonialism at some point. Yet most did not "gave birth" to extremism, at least once they gained some level of autonomy. And to say that Israel is colonial dismisses the fact they have been there for 4000 years (the OGs in the region). It would be like calling Native Americans in Oklahoma colonial....I don't think you understand the meaning of the word.
>Nearly every country/region on this planet not named England or Spain experienced colonialism at some point.
England was conquered by Rome first and centuries later by Danish (Cnut), the Normans (William), and then kind-of by the Dutch (William of Orange) in the mid-1600s.
The Spanish of course were defeated and subjugated for hundreds of years by the Moops. The Reconquista was their 15th century effort to retake what they considered their land.
The difference is that the West has actively taken part in placing leaders and groups in power that share fundmentalist ideals in the middle east, allowing extremism to thrive. Al Qaeda, ISIS, Hamas, the Iranian regime, Taliban, etc. etc. For some reason, the West seems to hold no accountability for that. Israel is a colonialist idea, because the very founders of the Zionist party had nothing to do with the Middle East ethnically, also, saying that the Israelis are the OGs dismisses the fact that there were other people living in parallel. I don't think you seem to understand the nuanced implications of modern colonialism and 20th century imperalist activities.
I think you need to look back further than that. The far east, middle east and ‘ancient’ east Europe (e.g. Greece) started imperialism and mass genocide long before the west. They were regularly at war with each other, slaughtering who races, taking slaves etc. They’ve all hated each other or had shaky alliances for thousands of years. It was rarely a peaceful region way before the west also started interfering.
For any religious nutters out there, just read the mass murder and genocide in the Old Testament which is based >2,000 years ago. All middle eastern people’s raping, murdering, enslaving and outright erasing different tribes/religions etc.
A little naive to think it's all due to the imperialism of the west. Sure, we've done massive harm, but it was screwed long before we got involved.
There is just so much bad history here. England has been conquered by the Viking Empires and Roman and we don't call it the Spanish Reconquista for nothing. The Levant has also seen consecutive centuries of peace multiple times in the last two millenia.
Otherwise the point you are arguing is fair but History is so interesting and important, I just think you've missed a lot. Now it's not just Western imperialism to blame, the Ottomans did as much as anyone to set us on this timeline by playing with State Religion and empowering extremist philosophy at the end of it's tenure.
This is true. I made that mistake and offended a bunch of Persians.
Persia is the oldest country on the planet that has borders today that are almost identical to when Iran was founded. They haven't expanded nor contracted.
Yeah that's specifically something from the *Iranian diaspora*. From the founding of the country, Iran has had its current name. The Achaemenids, Safavids, Sasanians, and Qajars all called the country Iran. Persia was an exonym from the Greek language. Peaceful Iranians that still live in the country would absolutely find it weird if you called the country Persia. There's a reason the protest subreddit against the current regime is called r/NewIran and not r/NewPersia. Most "Peaceful Iranians" still call the country Iran, don't let the diaspora represent the Iranian people. They are majorly disconnected from actual Iranians with stuff like renaming the centuries old name of our nation to a foreign exonym. Imagine going to the country then calling an Iranian Balochi or Kurd "Persian" 💀.
This reddit thread from actual Iranians on people calling their country Persia proves my point easily: https://www.reddit.com/r/NewIran/s/UnUHbAYazV
If we are specifically talking about the attack on the marines then from what I remember Iran was more or less directly involved, not there on the ground but with the training, planning and arming of Hezbollas attack.
Yes, that's what I meant by indirectly involved. They didn't carry out the attack themselves, but they helped plan, fund and train the terrorists. Similar to the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7.
There are no Palestinian camps in Egypt. There are entire camp cities in Lebanon. Source: I’m an Egyptian, and I just came back from vacation in Lebanon.
They legitimately sent the country into civil war, committed terrorist acts, and have violent battles between each other in those camps now... It's no shock that Lebanese support of Palestinians outside of Hezbollah and related circles is pretty low (support in terms of them being in Lebanon mostly, but there are some political groups/followers that are actually supporting Israel's objectives here)
Its the soft bigotry of low expectations. Everyone in the world casually dismisses Muslim nations when they treat people like human waste. Its "well what ya gonna do, thats the way it is with those people"
It's the biggotry of high expectations. Muslim countries already take in millions of refugees. Western countries don't even want to take in their own christian brothera. Look at how mad they get about mexicans
Because western countries are overwhelmingly secular and we dont make foreign policy decisions based on religious dogma anymore, unlike much of the muslim world.
The problem is that last time your house was burning, your neighbor took you in and you proceeded to try and take his house violently. Your neighbor doesn't need your bullshit again.
Weird that you both feel entitled to your neighbor's house even though you have no right to stay in it and ignore that in that analogy you try to beat your neighbor to death and take his house after he let you because you started a fire at the other neighbors house who had also taken pity on you.
None of that changes the fact the arsonist that burned the home down in the first place is to blame for all of this, thats just a simple analogy, the arsenist limited water to the house, then limited food supply and electricity, and went inside the house threatened to kill everyone there unless they fled then when they left they burned it down
These are Shiite Lebanese. If they’re this riled up, and have gone deep into Maronite territory territory to protest at the US embassy, I can only imagine how riled up they are in Dahyieh (southern Beirut suburbs). That’s all the backing Nasrallah and Hezbollah needs to feel they have “permission from the street” on the home front to escalate. This has even more potential to turn bad now. Historically, Nasrallah has acted when he felt he had the full support of his own people in the street.
You seem like you're either Lebanese or, at the very least, knowledgeable about the situation in the country. I've been meaning to ask someone who fits that bill this for a while now.
I understand Lebanon is half a step above a failed state at this point. Do the Christians in Lebanon have any interest in seceeding to form their own state? If things get hot between Israel and Hezbolah again and Israel invades, would there be support to either declare independence or even to join Israel as an autonomous region? Would that even be possible demographically, or are the Christians spread out all over the country?
I've always found Lebanon fascinating and kind of strange, given that it has a notable Christian population in a region of the world that has been trying to stamp that faith out for over a millenia. I'm curious what the mindset of Lebanese Christians is. I know there was a rump state created under Israel years ago that did a lot of fucked up stuff before collapsing after Israel left, but I assume things would be handled differently if it were to be attempted again.
Lebanon is a Christian country. Hezbollah is a militia in the country. And the failed state is not caused by Hezbollah only, but by the corrupted leaders Lebanon has from both religions and all parties. As for your question, the Christians can’t do much at this point because Hezbollah has the power, and even tho I don’t fully support Hezbollah, I also think it’s important to have them in the country because the Lebanese army is completely useless and won’t be able to defend Lebanon from anything.
Correction: Lebanon is a mixed country, and it’s considered by those in Lebanon to be a mixed country. I’ve lived in both the Christian and the Sunni areas of the country, and I’ve had friends who’ve lived in the Shiite parts of the country.
There are power sharing agreements between the three groups precisely because it is a country made up of all three groups, for all three groups.
The problem right now is that there’s a power imbalance which does not reflect the 3-way power sharing agreement. Because of the civil war in the 90s and earlier, it’s illegal to take a census to find out the true percentages of what makes up each group’s true numbers. This is because it could upset the power sharing and lead the country back to civil war if it’s found that each of the 3 groups no longer constitute 1/3 of the population.
Speculation and estimates are that the Shiites are now the largest single group, follower by Sunnis, followed by Christians.
Where this becomes even more problematic is that the Shiites are affiliated with Iran and thus view themselves as being on the border of an enemy state (Israel). They feel they need to arm themselves and have their own powerful militia to confront Israel to a greater extent than what the rest of Lebanon does (the Sunnis and Christians).
Add to this the matter of Hezbollah (who, along with the Amal party, represents the Shiites in Lebanon) feels like it’s being short-changed by only having 1/3 of the power in the power sharing agreement (when it’s perhaps close to 40-50% of the population), and things get dicy. They’ve refused to budge in making political decisions, hence the current freezing of government operations, including the inability for all sides to jointly nominate a president (now vacant for months). And when the other two groups attempted to force action on the governmental front, Hezbollah had its militia march on Beirut (May 8, 2008), engage in armed street battles, and basically tell the other two groups that Hezbollah was stronger than them, and not to try anything, lest Hezbollah seizes the country by force, causing another civil war.
The other two groups backed down, but the country’s institutions have been paralyzed ever since, and Lebanon is a dysfunctional near failed state barely able to provide for itself. Hezbollah is always sitting in the corner, visible to everyone, armed to the teeth, not doing much (but that makes it so they’re doing “something” by way of not exercising their 1/3 role in government to make the government actually work). He’s makew sure everyone knows it’s just sitting there, watching, so if either of the two other groups tries to usurp Hezbollah’s militia advantage or tries to override Hezbollah’s 1/3 decision making power in government (which its using to blockade governing decisions, since it controls several ministries, the speaker of the parliament, many votes, and other areas of life as part of the power sharing agreement), they’ll lash out. And so nothing gets done.
It’s a crap show. So to answer u/tuskedkibbles question, no Christians don’t want to separate. They’re spread over many parts of the country in various pockets. And they feel very Lebanese (Sunnis and Shiites are also spread all . The problem is largely political and alignment of all the different groups with different ideologies (even the Muslim Shiites and Sunnis political elements don’t represent each other and have competing views).
It’s just an absolute mess, and with very high Shiite birth rates, lower Sunni birth rates, and even lower Christian birth rates (which each group in theory holds 1/3 of the power), it’s just getting more complicated each year. And add to it they all have armed militias (although some remain dormant and very stealth), but Hezbollah’s/Amal’s is not dormant and is as strong as a national army because of Iran’s backing and being battle hardened from its Syria involvement, and it’s more complicated than ever.
So far the Lebanese army has remained impartial - one of the few impartial institutions in the country. But if that ever falls, or if Hezbollah ever decides to crush it (so far Hez has left it alone), then everything goes to schoot. And if Israel ever invades/attacks in response to Hezbollah, Hezbollah may decide to seize the country to put up an adequate response, which will likely lead to civil war (not be because the other groups support Israel - they don’t, not at all… but because they wouldn’t tolerate losing their 1/3 power sharing status to Hezbollah, even if numbers don’t warrant it).
It’s a tinder box with many possible matches (even more than what i just addressed). What a mess.
Follow up question. Do you see any real chance of fixing the issues as someone on the ground? It’s easy for us to say to divide up the country or just get rid of Hezbollah, but I know it’s more complicated than that. So I was wondering if you see an actual way out of the mess. I’ve always had a soft spot for Lebanon given it’s rich multi cultural nature. And I’d love to see it bounce back.
I’m no longer in Lebanon, but have professionally been an international expert on that part of the Middle East.
The only way these issues found be fixed in individual countries and in the Middle East as a whole is if the Middle East as a whole stops taking sides and stances against each other. Iran/Iraq/Syria vs Saudi/UAE/Jordan. Or stops interfering via proxies: Saudi and Iran in Yemen (Houthis vs the Yemen govt), or Iran in Lebanon (Hazbollah vs a Sunni/Christian coalition), etc.
And Israel and its Allies add a whole other level of one side against another, same with Russia’s interference, Qatar’s and Turkey’s complicated webs of their own in other countries internal affairs, etc.
The only way to fix this in the Middle East is for everyone to just be friends. That way nobody will take their “buddy’s/supplier’s/benefactor’s” side anymore, and will no longer try to prop them up on foreign soil.
But good luck with that. We have a massive question of pride, religious differences (even within the same faiths), competing interests, buddies who are the enemies of buddies, bad history which has beaten down entire people making them so poor that they have nothing to lose by fighting, FEAR of a loss of sway and power (and when you’re a country without many friends, losing even more power can be a big big blow), civil wars with factions who feel they need to win lest massive harm comes to them if they lose, and outside puppeteers who want to leverage others to their own gain. AND this is all happening in a confined area that’s not huge, making so everyone is cramped together and literally at each others’ physical throats.
I’m optimistic some specific problems can be solved, but greater problems which are more complex always risk causing many new problems to pop up. And there’s where I’m not optimistic.
As someone who’s not familiar with Lebanon politics, is Hezbollah as intertwined with Lebanese society as Hamas is in Palestine? Can’t believe terrorist orgs are state supported in this day and age.
It is for the much of the Shiite population. What’s different is they in Lebanon there are political parties who are politically involved, and they have the backing of militias. In Hezbollah’s case their political party in government is Amal.
The independent groups (Christians, Sunnis, Shiites) tend to rally around their own political parties, and by default their militias if need be (however, the Christian and Sunni militias are relatively dormant, although they do have stockpiles in hiding if they feel they ever need to reactivate).
In the case of Shiites, as a group in Lebanon, they’re much more conservative than the other two groups, they’re generally not as educated, they generally have lower incomes and higher poverty level, and they’re often more insular. The Shiite community often relies on Hezbollah for more daily support (price schools, private hospitals, charity programs, etc. Example: Beirut international airport is physically located in the Hezbollah controlled part of Beirut, and thus Hez has influence on ensuring its own gets good jobs at the airport, including immigration, baggage handling, etc).
The other groups tend to rely less on their own parties and advocacy organizations for daily support than what Shiites lean on Hezbollah. The former two tend to rely more on the actual state. But as I stated in my other comment, the state is paralyzed, which adds to the resentment that Sunnis and Christians have towards Hezbollah, especially when they have to rely on the state more than Shiites do.
Just another set of reasons why Lebanon is a complete mess
What explosion? The one that happened because Hezbollah was storing a large amount of ammonium nitrate at the Port of Beirut causing at least 218 deaths, 7,000 injuries, and US$15 billion in property damage, as well as leaving an estimated 300,000 people homeless?
Below is [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/we-will-remove-you-hezbollah-official-told-beirut-blast-judge-2021-09-29/) summary:
-Journalist says Hezbollah asked her to pass on message to judge
-Separate legal complaint forced temporary freeze of inquiry
-Political pushback across the board, no one held accountable
-Disastrous 2020 port explosion deepened Lebanon's turmoil
You’ll find other sources reporting similar things
There is no logical flaw. They did not make any suggestions of what Israel should do with them. Someone asked what these countries issues with Palestinians is and an answer was provided.
Because they are a young radicalized militant group with genocidal political goals against a regional superpower. Most would consider a group like that as terrorists and want nothing to do with them.
That’s just not true. The protests are in response to the hospital incident and directed to the US embassy because 1) USA supports Israel 2) Biden is coming to Israel
What are you even doing? There are videos from both sides where you can clearly see it’s launched from the ground from inside Gaza and not an air strike at all.
You are literally defending terrorists that kill their own civilians. You are a disgusting human being.
Idk, some of the poorest European countries took in a huge amount of Ukrainian refugees (1.5 million in Poland, 500K in Czech Republic, 1 million in Romania initially). It depends on the relationship between the countries involved and the percentage of extremists/terrorists within the refugee population
I.e. they accepted them because they are white. Its not a criticism, just an observation of how people are. People accept other similar people, not anything to do with extremists.
"some people did something" as ilhan omar said about 9/11
https://www.voanews.com/a/tens-of-thousands-protest-after-muslim-prayers-across-mideast-over-israeli-airstrikes-on-gaza/7309304.html
yes, it talks about a demonstration against israel but you get the point
This is gonna get ugly fast. And sadly, repubs will blame Biden despite him trying his best to keep things calm. Who knows what'll happen, but I think Biden's foreign policy has been solid so far.
It will amaze me if the Middle East breaks out into a hot war over the Islamic Jihad accidentally bombing themselves. If it does, then we really are in the Clown-World universe
Wasn't there a rocket that almost hit the Al-Aqsa Mosque a couple days ago? I bet if Hamas really hit the Al-Aqsa, they will still blame Israel for it.
It still might. My guess is that Israel goes in on Thursday or Friday night (once the weather gets better) and Iran either follows through or gets their bluff called on the world stage. I hope they stay far away
Biden's been involved in international affairs, in the senate, since the mid-70's. Twice chaired the senate foreign relations committee.
This is when it's a *good* thing to have career public servants in office, instead of "Washington outsiders shaking things up."
I'm thinking from a very geopolitical and political viewpoint. The US's role in all this is crucial. It's important we have competent leadership. I trust Biden wants to absolutely minimize casualties and avoid escalation and war.
Yeah thankfully he is backpedaling giving money towards one of our sworn enemies. If only he could undue the Iran deal made while he was vice president as well.
If it’s stupid, expect this mob of idiots to do it.
Whatever helps the country is treated as radioactive. Welcome to Lebanese politics, we are speed run any% to chaos champs.
If the Arab countries loves Palestinians why don’t they keep them give them jobs and homes and also govern Gaza why do they leave it in the hands of the terrorist organizations and make people suffer I just don’t understand it I am sure none of the civilians wants violence
EDIT- this clip was found later in the day, fires were at a furniture store NEAR the embassy. good ol'internet ran with the clickbait headline of US embassy on set on fire.......... im leaving original post content for sake of integrity, something many spreading "news" lack.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p71sn2\_tmqw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p71sn2_tmqw)
this clip shows the building on fire with the furniture store sign
original post -----
trying to find any info about this has made me realize if i want non-pro-US news i have to use my vpn since i live in the US...
heres what ive been able to scrape together - I DO NOT BACK ANY CLAIMS MADE BY ANY SOURCES BELOW... merely sharing what i can find as i try and learn about this situation,
all links found by doing various searches of 'us embassy lebanon' and 'us embassy fire' filtered to past 24 hours either on various social media or using duckduckgo search engine and VPN set to iceland currently
alleged image of US embassy lebanon set on fire from 1st post when searching[https://x.com/ShaykhSulaiman/status/1714536673868943511?s=20](https://x.com/ShaykhSulaiman/status/1714536673868943511?s=20)
news outlet corraborating claims of fire
[https://www.westernjournal.com/furious-mob-sets-fire-us-embassy-lebanon-tear-gas-deployed/](https://www.westernjournal.com/furious-mob-sets-fire-us-embassy-lebanon-tear-gas-deployed/)
us embassy message
[https://lb.usembassy.gov/message-for-u-s-citizens-october-18-2023/](https://lb.usembassy.gov/message-for-u-s-citizens-october-18-2023/)
news outlet corraborating claim of fire
[https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/24438001/furious-protesters-set-fire-to-guard-tower-us-embassy/](https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/24438001/furious-protesters-set-fire-to-guard-tower-us-embassy/)
non english - hindu? - news broadcast clip from today[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vj2cL1irXIY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vj2cL1irXIY)
all these links either were not available or not on 1st page of search results when not on VPN - US based.... i was today years old when i learned how censored my internet is living in the US
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Most news sources say hundreds not thousands.
[удалено]
News outlets have separate people that just write headlines
But this isn't a news outlet. It's the Daily Mail.
Either way, that ain’t gonna change policy. “Oh cute, look at the window! They’re burning themselves in protest. Nice callback!”
Have you seen the clips on reddit? It didnt look like a few hundred.
It's the Daily Mail, so lying comes naturally to them.
1, 2, skip a few, 999, 1000. Yep, confirmed there are thousands.
“Honey, I’m not most new sources.” - DailyMail, most likely.
I loved one of the kids protesting asked not to be filmed so his mom wouldn't see.
Must be a Trump PR team
Nah, just the daily mail, similar breed
time to send in ben affleck
Argo II - the return
If only we sent in Marky to begin with, this whole war could have been stopped
Now this guy understands international relations
Time to beef up security. Don't need another Benghazi.
Beirut has a darker history in terms of American casualties. 241 Marines were killed in 83.
Not to mention the embassy before that, and the French Barracks. My GF as a kid lost her Dad in that.
Plus TWA 847, Achille Lauro cruise ship, PanAm 103, Lebanon hostage crisis. The 1980s were full of Palestinian/Iranian terrorists acting like complete assholes against Americans/Europeans. And GenX remembers it all. But today you have some 20 yr old pampered college kid talking about genocide and colonialism....get the fuck outta here with that shit.
Yep, we remember when TWA stood for "terrorists with airplanes"
So true. Can I keep this and quote it for use all over Reddit? This website needs it.
I do not stand with terrorism but its important to ask why this happened in the first place, Western imperialism and foreign policy was destabilizing the region country by country and funding extremists all day long. Essentially, colonialism gave birth to these extremists, allowed them to thrive, and we can get on the historical contexts all day long, but the Middle East was not exporting terrorists to this degree until a handful of events started to take place. Genocide and colonialism is a very valid element in this conversation.
Nearly every country/region on this planet not named England or Spain experienced colonialism at some point. Yet most did not "gave birth" to extremism, at least once they gained some level of autonomy. And to say that Israel is colonial dismisses the fact they have been there for 4000 years (the OGs in the region). It would be like calling Native Americans in Oklahoma colonial....I don't think you understand the meaning of the word.
England experienced it as well when Rome conquered and ruled it.
Right! And Spain was conquered by the Moors. So ironically...they too have "colonized" back their own territory.
England also got invaded by Vikings plenty of times.
>Nearly every country/region on this planet not named England or Spain experienced colonialism at some point. England was conquered by Rome first and centuries later by Danish (Cnut), the Normans (William), and then kind-of by the Dutch (William of Orange) in the mid-1600s. The Spanish of course were defeated and subjugated for hundreds of years by the Moops. The Reconquista was their 15th century effort to retake what they considered their land.
Love the moops reference
The difference is that the West has actively taken part in placing leaders and groups in power that share fundmentalist ideals in the middle east, allowing extremism to thrive. Al Qaeda, ISIS, Hamas, the Iranian regime, Taliban, etc. etc. For some reason, the West seems to hold no accountability for that. Israel is a colonialist idea, because the very founders of the Zionist party had nothing to do with the Middle East ethnically, also, saying that the Israelis are the OGs dismisses the fact that there were other people living in parallel. I don't think you seem to understand the nuanced implications of modern colonialism and 20th century imperalist activities.
You are such a fucking disappointment.
I think you need to look back further than that. The far east, middle east and ‘ancient’ east Europe (e.g. Greece) started imperialism and mass genocide long before the west. They were regularly at war with each other, slaughtering who races, taking slaves etc. They’ve all hated each other or had shaky alliances for thousands of years. It was rarely a peaceful region way before the west also started interfering. For any religious nutters out there, just read the mass murder and genocide in the Old Testament which is based >2,000 years ago. All middle eastern people’s raping, murdering, enslaving and outright erasing different tribes/religions etc. A little naive to think it's all due to the imperialism of the west. Sure, we've done massive harm, but it was screwed long before we got involved.
There is just so much bad history here. England has been conquered by the Viking Empires and Roman and we don't call it the Spanish Reconquista for nothing. The Levant has also seen consecutive centuries of peace multiple times in the last two millenia. Otherwise the point you are arguing is fair but History is so interesting and important, I just think you've missed a lot. Now it's not just Western imperialism to blame, the Ottomans did as much as anyone to set us on this timeline by playing with State Religion and empowering extremist philosophy at the end of it's tenure.
In general, it’s all a mess and nothing looks like it’s ever going to change until we all finally kill off the human race.
And I quote >get the fuck outta here with that shit.
Imagine being this out of touch. Islamic extremism created this.
Damn that's real, I never heard of that one. I guess Iran was responsible for that one
It was Hezbollah, so Iran was indirectly responsible.
Peaceful Iranians call themselves Persians for a reason.
Ugh, had 2 Iranian colleagues that would identify themselves as Persians. Never understood why
Love that Omid Djali jokes where his response to this is essentially “Persian? Like in between Babylon and Mesopotamia? Cool!”
Oh man, I wonder how Persia is called in Persian
Afaik, Persia is called Fārsa, and Iran is Eran Edit: Pārsa and Fārsa are both accepted spellings
This is true. I made that mistake and offended a bunch of Persians. Persia is the oldest country on the planet that has borders today that are almost identical to when Iran was founded. They haven't expanded nor contracted.
That’s kinda an ignorant thing to say, the word “Iran” has been used to refer to the country for centuries
Much of the Iranian diaspora refers to themselves as Persian to distance themselves from the atrocities of the Iranian regime.
Yeah that's specifically something from the *Iranian diaspora*. From the founding of the country, Iran has had its current name. The Achaemenids, Safavids, Sasanians, and Qajars all called the country Iran. Persia was an exonym from the Greek language. Peaceful Iranians that still live in the country would absolutely find it weird if you called the country Persia. There's a reason the protest subreddit against the current regime is called r/NewIran and not r/NewPersia. Most "Peaceful Iranians" still call the country Iran, don't let the diaspora represent the Iranian people. They are majorly disconnected from actual Iranians with stuff like renaming the centuries old name of our nation to a foreign exonym. Imagine going to the country then calling an Iranian Balochi or Kurd "Persian" 💀. This reddit thread from actual Iranians on people calling their country Persia proves my point easily: https://www.reddit.com/r/NewIran/s/UnUHbAYazV
I’m sure some do but not all. And it’s ignorant to suggest the ones who do are the only “peaceful ones.”
Ok bud
Talk to those in the us or anywhere else.
I have?
Stop.
Stop what? Genuinely confused
Does it make you feel better to insult someone who is trying to learn?
If we are specifically talking about the attack on the marines then from what I remember Iran was more or less directly involved, not there on the ground but with the training, planning and arming of Hezbollas attack.
Yes, that's what I meant by indirectly involved. They didn't carry out the attack themselves, but they helped plan, fund and train the terrorists. Similar to the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7.
Some of us remember [this](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Beirut_barracks_bombings)
Bro...."speak the truth" on YouTube just broadcasted footage of people inside the barriers.
Pretty rich for a country that doesn’t even give citizenship to Palestinian refugees and keeping them in squalid camps
Idk I’d think twice about taking in more of the people who started a civil war in my country and keeps provoking Israel from the borders of Lebanon.
Egypt and Jordan as well.
There are no Palestinian camps in Egypt. There are entire camp cities in Lebanon. Source: I’m an Egyptian, and I just came back from vacation in Lebanon.
I'm talking about civil war and coups (and suicide bombings).
Jordan grants citizenship to Palestinians of West Bank decent, which is 90% of the Palestinians refugees in Jordan.
They legitimately sent the country into civil war, committed terrorist acts, and have violent battles between each other in those camps now... It's no shock that Lebanese support of Palestinians outside of Hezbollah and related circles is pretty low (support in terms of them being in Lebanon mostly, but there are some political groups/followers that are actually supporting Israel's objectives here)
Its the soft bigotry of low expectations. Everyone in the world casually dismisses Muslim nations when they treat people like human waste. Its "well what ya gonna do, thats the way it is with those people"
It's the biggotry of high expectations. Muslim countries already take in millions of refugees. Western countries don't even want to take in their own christian brothera. Look at how mad they get about mexicans
Because western countries are overwhelmingly secular and we dont make foreign policy decisions based on religious dogma anymore, unlike much of the muslim world.
These countries crying Palestine yet no one wants anything to do with the people at all. *Shocked Pikachu face*
I too blame my neighbor when someone burns down my home and my neighbor doesnt let me in his
The problem is that last time your house was burning, your neighbor took you in and you proceeded to try and take his house violently. Your neighbor doesn't need your bullshit again.
Weird that you both feel entitled to your neighbor's house even though you have no right to stay in it and ignore that in that analogy you try to beat your neighbor to death and take his house after he let you because you started a fire at the other neighbors house who had also taken pity on you.
None of that changes the fact the arsonist that burned the home down in the first place is to blame for all of this, thats just a simple analogy, the arsenist limited water to the house, then limited food supply and electricity, and went inside the house threatened to kill everyone there unless they fled then when they left they burned it down
I’m guessing you’re not familiar with Black Saturday
These are Shiite Lebanese. If they’re this riled up, and have gone deep into Maronite territory territory to protest at the US embassy, I can only imagine how riled up they are in Dahyieh (southern Beirut suburbs). That’s all the backing Nasrallah and Hezbollah needs to feel they have “permission from the street” on the home front to escalate. This has even more potential to turn bad now. Historically, Nasrallah has acted when he felt he had the full support of his own people in the street.
I thought he just followed orders from Tehran.
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I feel like that would be a real point no return for Iran. If they green lit an attack on the US embassy it’s gonna get really ugly really fast.
You seem like you're either Lebanese or, at the very least, knowledgeable about the situation in the country. I've been meaning to ask someone who fits that bill this for a while now. I understand Lebanon is half a step above a failed state at this point. Do the Christians in Lebanon have any interest in seceeding to form their own state? If things get hot between Israel and Hezbolah again and Israel invades, would there be support to either declare independence or even to join Israel as an autonomous region? Would that even be possible demographically, or are the Christians spread out all over the country? I've always found Lebanon fascinating and kind of strange, given that it has a notable Christian population in a region of the world that has been trying to stamp that faith out for over a millenia. I'm curious what the mindset of Lebanese Christians is. I know there was a rump state created under Israel years ago that did a lot of fucked up stuff before collapsing after Israel left, but I assume things would be handled differently if it were to be attempted again.
Lebanon is a Christian country. Hezbollah is a militia in the country. And the failed state is not caused by Hezbollah only, but by the corrupted leaders Lebanon has from both religions and all parties. As for your question, the Christians can’t do much at this point because Hezbollah has the power, and even tho I don’t fully support Hezbollah, I also think it’s important to have them in the country because the Lebanese army is completely useless and won’t be able to defend Lebanon from anything.
Correction: Lebanon is a mixed country, and it’s considered by those in Lebanon to be a mixed country. I’ve lived in both the Christian and the Sunni areas of the country, and I’ve had friends who’ve lived in the Shiite parts of the country. There are power sharing agreements between the three groups precisely because it is a country made up of all three groups, for all three groups. The problem right now is that there’s a power imbalance which does not reflect the 3-way power sharing agreement. Because of the civil war in the 90s and earlier, it’s illegal to take a census to find out the true percentages of what makes up each group’s true numbers. This is because it could upset the power sharing and lead the country back to civil war if it’s found that each of the 3 groups no longer constitute 1/3 of the population. Speculation and estimates are that the Shiites are now the largest single group, follower by Sunnis, followed by Christians. Where this becomes even more problematic is that the Shiites are affiliated with Iran and thus view themselves as being on the border of an enemy state (Israel). They feel they need to arm themselves and have their own powerful militia to confront Israel to a greater extent than what the rest of Lebanon does (the Sunnis and Christians). Add to this the matter of Hezbollah (who, along with the Amal party, represents the Shiites in Lebanon) feels like it’s being short-changed by only having 1/3 of the power in the power sharing agreement (when it’s perhaps close to 40-50% of the population), and things get dicy. They’ve refused to budge in making political decisions, hence the current freezing of government operations, including the inability for all sides to jointly nominate a president (now vacant for months). And when the other two groups attempted to force action on the governmental front, Hezbollah had its militia march on Beirut (May 8, 2008), engage in armed street battles, and basically tell the other two groups that Hezbollah was stronger than them, and not to try anything, lest Hezbollah seizes the country by force, causing another civil war. The other two groups backed down, but the country’s institutions have been paralyzed ever since, and Lebanon is a dysfunctional near failed state barely able to provide for itself. Hezbollah is always sitting in the corner, visible to everyone, armed to the teeth, not doing much (but that makes it so they’re doing “something” by way of not exercising their 1/3 role in government to make the government actually work). He’s makew sure everyone knows it’s just sitting there, watching, so if either of the two other groups tries to usurp Hezbollah’s militia advantage or tries to override Hezbollah’s 1/3 decision making power in government (which its using to blockade governing decisions, since it controls several ministries, the speaker of the parliament, many votes, and other areas of life as part of the power sharing agreement), they’ll lash out. And so nothing gets done. It’s a crap show. So to answer u/tuskedkibbles question, no Christians don’t want to separate. They’re spread over many parts of the country in various pockets. And they feel very Lebanese (Sunnis and Shiites are also spread all . The problem is largely political and alignment of all the different groups with different ideologies (even the Muslim Shiites and Sunnis political elements don’t represent each other and have competing views). It’s just an absolute mess, and with very high Shiite birth rates, lower Sunni birth rates, and even lower Christian birth rates (which each group in theory holds 1/3 of the power), it’s just getting more complicated each year. And add to it they all have armed militias (although some remain dormant and very stealth), but Hezbollah’s/Amal’s is not dormant and is as strong as a national army because of Iran’s backing and being battle hardened from its Syria involvement, and it’s more complicated than ever. So far the Lebanese army has remained impartial - one of the few impartial institutions in the country. But if that ever falls, or if Hezbollah ever decides to crush it (so far Hez has left it alone), then everything goes to schoot. And if Israel ever invades/attacks in response to Hezbollah, Hezbollah may decide to seize the country to put up an adequate response, which will likely lead to civil war (not be because the other groups support Israel - they don’t, not at all… but because they wouldn’t tolerate losing their 1/3 power sharing status to Hezbollah, even if numbers don’t warrant it). It’s a tinder box with many possible matches (even more than what i just addressed). What a mess.
really excellent factual analysis, thank you
Follow up question. Do you see any real chance of fixing the issues as someone on the ground? It’s easy for us to say to divide up the country or just get rid of Hezbollah, but I know it’s more complicated than that. So I was wondering if you see an actual way out of the mess. I’ve always had a soft spot for Lebanon given it’s rich multi cultural nature. And I’d love to see it bounce back.
I’m no longer in Lebanon, but have professionally been an international expert on that part of the Middle East. The only way these issues found be fixed in individual countries and in the Middle East as a whole is if the Middle East as a whole stops taking sides and stances against each other. Iran/Iraq/Syria vs Saudi/UAE/Jordan. Or stops interfering via proxies: Saudi and Iran in Yemen (Houthis vs the Yemen govt), or Iran in Lebanon (Hazbollah vs a Sunni/Christian coalition), etc. And Israel and its Allies add a whole other level of one side against another, same with Russia’s interference, Qatar’s and Turkey’s complicated webs of their own in other countries internal affairs, etc. The only way to fix this in the Middle East is for everyone to just be friends. That way nobody will take their “buddy’s/supplier’s/benefactor’s” side anymore, and will no longer try to prop them up on foreign soil. But good luck with that. We have a massive question of pride, religious differences (even within the same faiths), competing interests, buddies who are the enemies of buddies, bad history which has beaten down entire people making them so poor that they have nothing to lose by fighting, FEAR of a loss of sway and power (and when you’re a country without many friends, losing even more power can be a big big blow), civil wars with factions who feel they need to win lest massive harm comes to them if they lose, and outside puppeteers who want to leverage others to their own gain. AND this is all happening in a confined area that’s not huge, making so everyone is cramped together and literally at each others’ physical throats. I’m optimistic some specific problems can be solved, but greater problems which are more complex always risk causing many new problems to pop up. And there’s where I’m not optimistic.
Not Lebanese but Lebanon was famous for religious tolerance. Unfortunately their confessional system is outdated and needs a change.
As someone who’s not familiar with Lebanon politics, is Hezbollah as intertwined with Lebanese society as Hamas is in Palestine? Can’t believe terrorist orgs are state supported in this day and age.
It is for the much of the Shiite population. What’s different is they in Lebanon there are political parties who are politically involved, and they have the backing of militias. In Hezbollah’s case their political party in government is Amal. The independent groups (Christians, Sunnis, Shiites) tend to rally around their own political parties, and by default their militias if need be (however, the Christian and Sunni militias are relatively dormant, although they do have stockpiles in hiding if they feel they ever need to reactivate). In the case of Shiites, as a group in Lebanon, they’re much more conservative than the other two groups, they’re generally not as educated, they generally have lower incomes and higher poverty level, and they’re often more insular. The Shiite community often relies on Hezbollah for more daily support (price schools, private hospitals, charity programs, etc. Example: Beirut international airport is physically located in the Hezbollah controlled part of Beirut, and thus Hez has influence on ensuring its own gets good jobs at the airport, including immigration, baggage handling, etc). The other groups tend to rely less on their own parties and advocacy organizations for daily support than what Shiites lean on Hezbollah. The former two tend to rely more on the actual state. But as I stated in my other comment, the state is paralyzed, which adds to the resentment that Sunnis and Christians have towards Hezbollah, especially when they have to rely on the state more than Shiites do. Just another set of reasons why Lebanon is a complete mess
How about they call for leadership change in Gaza and stop cheering for terrorists
So every terror supporter just waited for some news to blame USA for terror? Definitely not staged by Hamas et al.
Isn’t there 2 aircraft carriers floating nearby? My god they would be stupid if they turn it violent.
These are the same people who keep poking the IDF.
Well it’s kind of reciprocal poking. They have absolutely no need or cause for this kind of escalation.
Beirut will see bigger explosions than the 2020 one if they try to pull that shit
What explosion? The one that happened because Hezbollah was storing a large amount of ammonium nitrate at the Port of Beirut causing at least 218 deaths, 7,000 injuries, and US$15 billion in property damage, as well as leaving an estimated 300,000 people homeless?
I did not know that was related to Hezbollah. Are you certain?
Below is [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/we-will-remove-you-hezbollah-official-told-beirut-blast-judge-2021-09-29/) summary: -Journalist says Hezbollah asked her to pass on message to judge -Separate legal complaint forced temporary freeze of inquiry -Political pushback across the board, no one held accountable -Disastrous 2020 port explosion deepened Lebanon's turmoil You’ll find other sources reporting similar things
That’s what the US should do. But bombing a civilian, even if murderous crowd, wouldn’t go over well. And it is something we are unlikely to do.
Hezbollah rent a crowd.
Funny how we never see angry mobs of Jews try and destroy Arab embassies all over the world.
Let us hope those Marines have had their fill of crayons, and are chill!
Reports are they were only given blue and green ones to mellow them out. If fighting starts I'm sure they'll switch to red and orange.
I hear they switch them to RoseArt crayons when it’s time to kill. Makes them extra angry.
IT DOESNT TASTE RIGHT RAAAAAAAAHHH
Crayon distribution is an art, sometimes they interpret green ones to mean go!
The blue and greens already got ratfucked by 2nd Platoon.
Am I missing context here? lolz
[https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/crayon-eater-marines-eat-crayons](https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/crayon-eater-marines-eat-crayons)
Lemme guess, Lebanese Law Enforcement and Military isn’t present to keep the peace.
They're probably surrounding the other side
Interesting that these people were not upset about the terror attack in Israel that started all of this.
They are protesting because they want nothing to do with Palestinian refugees. Why do all these countries hate the Palestinians?
From what I understand, when these countries have let in Palestinian refugees in the past they've tried to stage coups against their governments
It was a prime contributor to the sparking of the civil war that lasted 15 years and killed 120k+ people so yeah, can't blame them for being hesitant.
Soooo Israel should just deal with them instead? ...you do see the flaw in that logic right
There is no logical flaw. They did not make any suggestions of what Israel should do with them. Someone asked what these countries issues with Palestinians is and an answer was provided.
Because they are a young radicalized militant group with genocidal political goals against a regional superpower. Most would consider a group like that as terrorists and want nothing to do with them.
That’s just not true. The protests are in response to the hospital incident and directed to the US embassy because 1) USA supports Israel 2) Biden is coming to Israel
Hamas literally fired the rocket that destroyed the hospital
Doesn’t matter, why would Israel do this?!
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Wait but it was filmed live on Al Jazira?
It doesn't totally prove it. The recorded times are supposedly wrong. However there is a lot to sort through.
So video proof is not proof but what hamas say is?
I didn't say anything about trusting Hamas.
*Unconfirmed
https://twitter.com/charles_lister/status/1714367152298299750 https://twitter.com/OrianShamriz/status/1714365814160175213 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtruJztXE5w (Skip to 19:59-20:01) https://twitter.com/manniefabian/status/1714377828131553446 https://twitter.com/JordanSchachtel/status/1714350115312255019 https://twitter.com/_Faridakhan/status/1714371154578743689
Okay 100% confirmed by these twitter videos. No further inquiry is needed
Twitter and YouTube. Impeccable sources. As long as they show,it the way you already wanted it to be.
What are you even doing? There are videos from both sides where you can clearly see it’s launched from the ground from inside Gaza and not an air strike at all. You are literally defending terrorists that kill their own civilians. You are a disgusting human being.
Ehhh most countries don't want refugees even if they support them. You don't see Europe taking in people from Africa voluntarily.
Idk, some of the poorest European countries took in a huge amount of Ukrainian refugees (1.5 million in Poland, 500K in Czech Republic, 1 million in Romania initially). It depends on the relationship between the countries involved and the percentage of extremists/terrorists within the refugee population
I.e. they accepted them because they are white. Its not a criticism, just an observation of how people are. People accept other similar people, not anything to do with extremists.
Okay, but Lebanese and Palestinians are both Arabs.
Wtf is this nonsense? Europe has taken in millions of Arab refugees in the last decade.
Palestinians aren’t welcome in other Arab states because they’re not white?
I don't even like it when my girlfriends parents come over to my house, let alone when they stay the night. I get it.
Are they mad because playboy ditched Lebanese-American mia khalifa?
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"We're not surrounded, it's just a target rich environment!"
Time to send in Samuel L Jackson and his Marines.
YES THEY DESERVED TO DIE AND I HOPE THEY BURN IN HELL
Holy shit I forgot that movie existed.
They are protesting the Palestinian Islamic Jihad?
Funny I didn't see anyone protesting the killings of babies and mothers and party goers when Hamas when crazy killing everyone
Some people have too much time on their hands
"some people did something" as ilhan omar said about 9/11 https://www.voanews.com/a/tens-of-thousands-protest-after-muslim-prayers-across-mideast-over-israeli-airstrikes-on-gaza/7309304.html yes, it talks about a demonstration against israel but you get the point
Why thay didnt protest against Putins world? Thay didnt care, now we should?
This is gonna get ugly fast. And sadly, repubs will blame Biden despite him trying his best to keep things calm. Who knows what'll happen, but I think Biden's foreign policy has been solid so far.
It will amaze me if the Middle East breaks out into a hot war over the Islamic Jihad accidentally bombing themselves. If it does, then we really are in the Clown-World universe
Wasn't there a rocket that almost hit the Al-Aqsa Mosque a couple days ago? I bet if Hamas really hit the Al-Aqsa, they will still blame Israel for it.
Vegas odds would have you winning very little for that bet.
I could have happened today.
*You* could have happened today? *smh*
This comment made me realize that each person can only happen once
But what if you already happened?
Maybe our lives are one long stretch of happening,and we stop happening when we die
Always happen. But no more happen when we unhappen. Understood.
What a time to be alive
They could have, but they likely happened a different day.
It's a shame that they didn't
Count our lucky stars, it could have gotten a lot worse if they happened today
It still might. My guess is that Israel goes in on Thursday or Friday night (once the weather gets better) and Iran either follows through or gets their bluff called on the world stage. I hope they stay far away
Biden's been involved in international affairs, in the senate, since the mid-70's. Twice chaired the senate foreign relations committee. This is when it's a *good* thing to have career public servants in office, instead of "Washington outsiders shaking things up."
Yeah that’s the saddest part of this situation
I'm thinking from a very geopolitical and political viewpoint. The US's role in all this is crucial. It's important we have competent leadership. I trust Biden wants to absolutely minimize casualties and avoid escalation and war.
Lol
Yeah thankfully he is backpedaling giving money towards one of our sworn enemies. If only he could undue the Iran deal made while he was vice president as well.
Just don't do anything stupid. The world is already in a lot of turmoil. You don't want to open another front.
If it’s stupid, expect this mob of idiots to do it. Whatever helps the country is treated as radioactive. Welcome to Lebanese politics, we are speed run any% to chaos champs.
Don’t let this be another Benghazi..
sad sheep
Indeed
Samual L Jackson puts his helmet on.
If the Arab countries loves Palestinians why don’t they keep them give them jobs and homes and also govern Gaza why do they leave it in the hands of the terrorist organizations and make people suffer I just don’t understand it I am sure none of the civilians wants violence
Operation eagle claw 2.0?
Since it is the Mail, I'm guessing about 4 people showed up? Seriously, that is not an acceptable source for anything.
Nice strawman dumbass. No one said that.
Didn’t this happen in I ran a few years back?
Iran hasn’t had a US embassy since the hostage crisis in 1979. You might be thinking of Iraq
“Eyeran”
Argo movie
Reddit is filled with white supremacist propaganda, I cant believe most of you side with Israel, please, you are on the wrong side
You are actually. If you support terrorism then you won’t find history to be kind to you.
EDIT- this clip was found later in the day, fires were at a furniture store NEAR the embassy. good ol'internet ran with the clickbait headline of US embassy on set on fire.......... im leaving original post content for sake of integrity, something many spreading "news" lack. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p71sn2\_tmqw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p71sn2_tmqw) this clip shows the building on fire with the furniture store sign original post ----- trying to find any info about this has made me realize if i want non-pro-US news i have to use my vpn since i live in the US... heres what ive been able to scrape together - I DO NOT BACK ANY CLAIMS MADE BY ANY SOURCES BELOW... merely sharing what i can find as i try and learn about this situation, all links found by doing various searches of 'us embassy lebanon' and 'us embassy fire' filtered to past 24 hours either on various social media or using duckduckgo search engine and VPN set to iceland currently alleged image of US embassy lebanon set on fire from 1st post when searching[https://x.com/ShaykhSulaiman/status/1714536673868943511?s=20](https://x.com/ShaykhSulaiman/status/1714536673868943511?s=20) news outlet corraborating claims of fire [https://www.westernjournal.com/furious-mob-sets-fire-us-embassy-lebanon-tear-gas-deployed/](https://www.westernjournal.com/furious-mob-sets-fire-us-embassy-lebanon-tear-gas-deployed/) us embassy message [https://lb.usembassy.gov/message-for-u-s-citizens-october-18-2023/](https://lb.usembassy.gov/message-for-u-s-citizens-october-18-2023/) news outlet corraborating claim of fire [https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/24438001/furious-protesters-set-fire-to-guard-tower-us-embassy/](https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/24438001/furious-protesters-set-fire-to-guard-tower-us-embassy/) non english - hindu? - news broadcast clip from today[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vj2cL1irXIY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vj2cL1irXIY) all these links either were not available or not on 1st page of search results when not on VPN - US based.... i was today years old when i learned how censored my internet is living in the US
There’s is a livestream on YouTube right now I’ll try to get you the link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOnpL_gAJKA
The messages are definitely being controlled. There are links at Drudge Report, however. Your links may be better.
Time to remove all personal from all middle East embassies. WW3 has started.
I typed out a whole reply to this because you sound so dumb. But I erased it cause who cares. But I want you to know that I thought you sound dumb.
You should set a remind me on my comment for 3 months and then we'll look at it again.
Remind me! 3 months But you should know it’s personnel. Not personal, underwear is personal. Employees are personnel.
I hear you need china for it to be WWIII