Chibli Mallat in Newsweek
The following interview with Chibli Mallat was published in Newsweek. What do you think?NEWSWEEK: What are the odds that Syria will remove Lahoud anytime soon?
Chibli Mallat: Considering that everyone in the National Dialogue accepts there is a crisis in the presidency that needs to be addressed and the only way to address it is with a new president, the likelihood is much higher today than it was two months ago. You could have a new president in a week or a month.
What makes you think Lahoud’s presidency may be in jeopardy?
The Syrians will hang on to him as much as they can, but eventually they will cut their losses because Arab leaders are pressuring them to do so. It’s because of Saad Hariri [Rafik’s son and a political leader]. He is saying “I want him out,” and the Saudis will not go against him on this, though the pressure is clandestine. The atmosphere has changed to the point where the Saudis are saying, “Let’s agree on [a Lahoud successor]” rather than “let’s not stir up change in Lebanon.”
Assuming Lahoud goes and an election is scheduled, how do you rate your chances?
The [candidate] that is least objectionable to everyone involved is probably me, because while I belong to this Cedar Revolution atmosphere, I am not directly associated with or against any one camp. The patriarch came out with specifications for a best-candidate’s profile—someone young, educated, middle of the road—which was read widely to be a reference to me. Since I announced my campaign, I’ve propelled my image from innocuous dreamer to one of the contenders on the public radar. We had a poll done this week between me and [Gen. Michel] Aoun and the result was 59 percent for Aoun and 40 percent for Mallat, which is significant [considering] when I started out.
Read the full interview here.
posted by Lazarus, 7:37 AM
5 Comments:
Mallat is a Fake Closet Neocon, friend of Woolfowitz claiming to be a Human rights activist of ALL things. Thumbs down.
By
Anonymous, at 9:01 AM
« What do you think? … »
I think the guy is just another Trotskyite turncoat à la Sam Kassir!
No wonder he’s a self-proclaimed admirer of convicted international conman Ahmad Chalabi and other notorious neocon fraudsters.
Closer to home, comrade Mallat the “leftist intellectual” has sided squarely with the fatso salafist profiteer of Koreytem and his medschool dropout fascist friend… Go figure… Maybe that’s “the irony of history” as Marx and Hegel used to say or something.
But the (moribund “bi izni’l’llah” as they say in Saudistan) March 14 movement is just a cynical alliance of circumstance, bringing together the “Ibn Shaheed bila Hikmah” and the “Hakeem bila Shahâdah”!
;))
I’m willing to bet a bucketful of petro-dinars that this unholy alliance won’t last much longer.
By
Dr Victorino de la Vega, at 9:29 AM
well for all the critics,based on resume,this guy is a dream candidate,plus he is a new face,which the lebanese desperately need,he could symbolise the change that lebanon is going through.
BTW if there was a blogger virus going around it would be called de la vega....man get a life.
By
Anonymous, at 12:12 AM
Naive little fellow. This dude is so out of touch with reality.
I want change , but i believe change has to rise from the ground up not parachute down from Mars.
For what it's worth, i think Aoun for president is a done deal, he seems to have the Arabs blessings.
By
Jamal, at 7:45 AM
As I had said earlier, Jamie is decidedly a Latter Days Voltairian genius of sorts!
And, to use a backwardly Bedouin Ayyrabzian metaphor I love, his refreshing voice is like a luminous oasis of wisdom in the arid desert of Lebanese blogs where Neocon hyenas and Trotskyite trolls howl hollowly in the dark or something...
By
Dr Victorino de la Vega, at 9:56 AM
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