We used to hear a lot about Saad al-Hariri being the heir of his father, the late Premier Rafiq al-Hariri, but that he was not like his father. He is young (39 years old) and was born rich; he inherited a role that he was not ready to play.

The issue is whether or not a Palestinian state will be established. Benjamin Netanyahu has turned the issue into a question of settlements, i.e. whether to build new ones, freeze construction, or allow their “natural” growth.

Israeli minister of defense Ehud Barak is working in Washington these days to market an exit for the American demand for a complete cessation of Jewish settlement activity in the West Bank.

To know the misery of the Lebanese, one must examine the ways in which they celebrate. The leader of the sect appearing on television is reason enough for heavy gunfire, and the same applies to such a leader being elected or appointed to a state position.

I returned from a three-day vacation around my birthday, when I was cut off from the world and encountered the same news, from Iraq and Afghanistan to Iran, and Palestine, and Barack Obama, etc.

The people are divided. The government is divided. The religious establishment is divided. Ahmadinejad is faking silence while waiting for the “justification for salvation” from the Guide of the Islamic Republic Ali Khamenei.

I do not ask politicians to respect the ordinary Lebanese citizen. He neither entrusted me with this nor have I volunteered to do it. Asking this would be insolent. The game implies keeping this citizen on some level of tension. Peace of mind calms down his fanaticism. It makes summoning him tiring and mobilizing him difficult. He must be ready, since the situation is unstable.

The crisis brought by the results of the Iranian elections, with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad remaining in power, and the religious authority in Qom being challenged, will all serve the interests of the Arab countries in and outside the Gulf.

In the final years of his term, which was extended by force, the role of then-Lebanese President Emile Lahoud became diminished to the utmost, then disappeared for all practical purposes following the Syrian withdrawal. This was also after the parties to Lebanon’s political conflict engaged in a political and on-the-ground confrontation directly, with no proxies.

On the occasion of what French President Nicolas Sarkozy said about women wearing the burqa in his country, many in the Arab world have flared up with rage. They began yelling, on satellite television and in articles, denouncing the conspiracy against Muslims and the assault on their liberties.