Avi Melamed: So session number 9 today, Lebanon and Iraq identity and the struggle for sovereignty. In fact, as you probably know today, it's a little bit longer than regular. We are supposed to be done at 3 o'clock, and there is a good reason for that. The reason is because there is so many things to talk about, and so we'll try as much as possible to maximize the time. As I said, our guest today, Hussein Abdel Hussein shortly, will do a formal presentation.
Avi Melamed: You may recall that in in previous sessions I think it was the 1st session particularly, and to a certain extent. Also. In the second session we talked about some of the major power struggles that shaped the story of the region for centuries, and one of them, power struggle between 3 major civilizations in the region, the Arab civilizations that gave birth to Islam.
Avi Melamed: Persian civilization that
Avi Melamed: existed, of course, before Islam, and then, following the emerge of Islam, also became a Muslim, and then Turkish civilization that has been generated in the central part of of Asia. And we talked about this major power struggle between these 2 huge civilizations of your leadership and hegemony. Through the history.
Avi Melamed: You may recall that there was another major power struggle we talked about, and this is the power struggle within Islam.
Avi Melamed: between Sunnis and Shiites. You may remember we talked about in the 1st session.
Avi Melamed: We talked in details about how the growth of Islam Empire in the 7th century to conquering a military campaign and alliances with other tribes, how that process resulted in among other things, also a power struggle within Islam regarding the issue of the leadership of the the Caliphate.
Avi Melamed: and we talked about this very pivotal moment in the story of Islam.
Avi Melamed: where Hussein the the the son of the 4th Caliph Ali and his wife, Fatma, the
Avi Melamed: Muhammad's daughter, Muhammad's daughter, claiming the crown of leadership. How he was engaged in a power struggle with back. Then a major, powerful tribe originated in the Arab peninsula. The and and the leader of the tribe Muawiyah. That was the caliph. Basically, his son Yazid
Avi Melamed: was the one leading the army that in the year 680, in the place called Kerbela Iraq of our times, eliminate Hussein and his followers, and we talked about the major, one of the major narratives of the Shiites that moans that that
Avi Melamed: pivotal moment talking about every day is Ashua, the 10th day of the of the the Mount of Muharram, and and every place is Kerbela.
Avi Melamed: And then we talked about the creation of Sunnis and Shiites and the power struggle between the 2. You may remember also, we talked about the narrative of the Lord of Martyrs that has been very strongly embedded within Shiites belief.
Avi Melamed: And actually, this whole reminder that I'm doing now, the framing sort of speaking
Avi Melamed: is basically a preface to what we are going to talk about today and to elaborate about when we talk about not only Iraq and Lebanon, but also particularly on the story of the Mullah regime in Iran. You may remember, we had a
Avi Melamed: session with a journalist Nagar, when we talked about Iran from social and economic and cultural perspectives. And today we are going to talk about Iran to be more accurate, the mullah regime in Iran
Avi Melamed: from a geostrategic perspective. And we will see how that has to do a lot
Avi Melamed: with the issue of both Lebanon and and Iraq.
Avi Melamed: One of the interesting thing that we could note is that.
Avi Melamed: starting as of the last 3rd of the 20th century.
Avi Melamed: we will witness the emergence of a very significant
Avi Melamed: regional player, which is actually a non-state actor, or, to be more accurate, non-state actors that are going to come together and form a very significant axis across the region that is going to play a very significant role in the shaping of the Geo. Feature of particularly the area that is known by the name of the Levant.
Avi Melamed: namely, the area stretching from the Mediterranean all the way to Iran, including
Avi Melamed: Lebanon, including Syria, including Jordan, including Iraq, and also has a very significant impact in the context of among other things in the context of the Israeli Palestinian conflict.
Avi Melamed: One of the things that we have witnessed in starting, as of the roughly speaking, the last 3rd of the 20th century is that we see both
Avi Melamed: Sunnis and Shiites, semi-state actors or
Avi Melamed: semi state players, sort of speaking, are gaining more and more momentum on the ground and the pivotal moment of this whole story. And what is going to result in the pivotal moment is in 1979 in Iran, and we'll shortly go back to that.
Avi Melamed: The translation or the manifestation of that development on the ground was translated in recreation of an axis that became to be known in the region by the name of the Axis of Resistance.
Avi Melamed: Their axis has been playing a significant role in the shaping of the region. For the last at least 4 decades. As again I mentioned before, both in the context of states like Lebanon or Syria or Iraq, on the context of the Israeli-palestinian conflict, and beyond that.
Avi Melamed: So today in our session, we will try to understand
Avi Melamed: couple of things and aspects that relates to this big story that I was now right now, framing very generally.
Avi Melamed: and to that end we are going to be
Avi Melamed: help and assisted by educator, Guest, educator, Hussein Abdul Hussein.
Avi Melamed: So Hussein, welcome to Itme fellowship program. We are very honored to have you with us. Your permission I will shortly introduce
Avi Melamed: Hussein. Abdul Hussein is a research fellow at Fdd. He focuses on the Gulf region in Yemen, including on Gulf relationship with Iran and Gulf, peace with Israel.
Avi Melamed: born and raised in Beirut, Baghdad and Balbek, cities that have been the theater of major Middle Eastern events. Hussein earned a degree in history and archaeology from the American University of Beirut.
Avi Melamed: after which he worked as a reporter, and later a managing editor at Beirut's, The Daily Star.
Avi Melamed: He reported from war zones on the Lebanese border with Israel and from Iraq in Washington. Hussein helped set up and manage the Arabic satellite network, Al-hourah Iraq, after which he headed the Washington Bureau of Kuwaiti. Daily Arai
Avi Melamed: Hussein has worked as a visiting fellow with London's Chatham house, and has published in English in the New York Times and the Washington Post, and in Arabic. In various publications.
Avi Melamed: His analysis has been quoted by Vox, the Jerusalem Post and Newsweek.
Avi Melamed: Hussein has appeared on Cnn. And Mnsbc, and he's a frequent commentator on Major Arabic satellite networks.
Avi Melamed: Mr. Hossein Agil Hussein. Welcome to our program. We are very honored to have you with us.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Thank you. Avi. Always a pleasure
Avi Melamed: So I want to start with this pivotal moment of 1979 and the rise to power of the Mullah regime in Tehran.
Avi Melamed: What's the significance of that specific moment in the context of the story of the region
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: It. It has both significance and irony.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Because if you keep it in context, the year 1979 was also the year when Egypt.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Until then, the major anti-western anti-israel regional force
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: switch sides. And this, 1979 is when the Cam David accords were signed and Egypt,
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Started living in peace with Israel, and and abandoned the Soviet Union, and took besides.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: of the Us. Now had the Iranian regime survived for a few more years, maybe things would have been much different today.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But at the time I think,
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: what happened in 1979 was not thinking of what would happen for the region. It was totally within
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the thinking or the context of the Cold War. The Cold War, the Western camp being led by the United States and the Eastern camp, led by Russia, the Soviet Union.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And if you look up all the documents from the time of Jimmy Carter and his administration. You will see that the focus had nothing to do with Islamism or Israel, or anything connected to the region. The Us. Was focused on not allowing the Soviet Union to invade Iran or to get a Communist regime in Iran, thinking that this threatens
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: oil rich gulf. So the the the energy reservoir of the world in the Gulf would have been threatened if the Shah collapsed and the Soviet Union managed to to take his place, and the main perpetrators against the Shah. At the time the main agitators against the Shah were 2 main blocks, the Islamist and the Communists.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and of course we didn't take the side of the Communists because the Communists were were Pro-soviet Union.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: so we
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: turned a blind eye to Islamists. At the time we had not known what Islamism actually was. And
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and in 1979, if you look at how Khomeini went back to Iran, went back with
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: with a Us. Nod, and and after he went back we reached out to him, trying to
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: reconnect after the show.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And, mind you, after 1979, the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, and over the coming decade or so we were good friends with these Islamists, so it took us time to discover that these Islamists were bad. Now granted the difference between the Afghani Islamists and the Iranian Islamists was what you just explained Avi in Afghanistan. They were Sunni Islamists in Iran. They were Shia Islamists.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But I think we underestimated Islamism. That's a lesson that all of us learned.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: including governments in the region. By the way. So the Saudis were like us, they they were preaching Islamism as a way to block Communism. So we relied on Islamism to block Communism. When Communism collapsed we were left with Islamism and Islamism turns out to be as bad, even worse.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: There are many similarities between Communism and Islamism, number one being that both do not really recognize the nation State.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So both of them think in an international way, in cross national. So if you're Communist in Russia, and if you're communist in Jordan, then you're one and the same. Your loyalty is the Communist party. Your view is that the world is divided into socioeconomic classes. The same thing applies to Iran and to other Islamists. If you're a Shia Islamist, you pledge allegiance
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: to the supreme leader, whether the supreme leader lives in Tehran, or whether he lives in Greece.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But the same thing applies to the Sunnis. If you're pledging allegiance to the caliph, the caliph can live anywhere.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and he's your leader. So this is the threat that comes with Islamism, and both its varieties, Shia and Sunni is that they do not really recognize the nation state, and when they do that they do not respect the borderlines drawn by these States.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And this is why the map you just showed Avi this crescent. It's a Crescent only because the people who live in this crescent
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: do not perceive themselves as being Iraqi or Lebanese, or you know, and then I'll leave Yemen on the side for now, because they're not actually 12 or Shia, they're 7 or Shia, but that's that's a different story, for now we can assume that they're they're allies with Iran, and and that's as as good as it can get.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So if you are
Avi Melamed: So we'll we'll get to talk about this component of the Crescent later on. But I still want okay. So I think that now we understand what you mean by saying this is an irony, because
Avi Melamed: the West, in a way
Avi Melamed: out of preferring the new Mullah regime in Tehran, out of fear of the Communism actually find itself, as you said, in the end of the day, dealing with a regime which is much more.
Avi Melamed: not less, I would say, challenging from western perspective.
Avi Melamed: And you talked about the similarities between Communism and Islamism. And, for example, you mentioned this issue of like this perspective. That is globalist. You say they reject the concept of a national statehood. I think the other thing that you mentioned was that at least in the Socialist style, it's like the working class, which I think that in the Shiite perspectives there is this term of
Avi Melamed: could you say a few words about that specific term in the context of the outlook of this regime that came to power in 1979
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Well, you have to keep in mind that this revolution in Iran in 1979, it started percolating and started going a couple of years before then. So maybe 1976, 77. That's when things started boiling.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And when the shaft started shaking.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now keep in mind that this agitation was not the work of the Islamist mullahs alone. It was the work of so many Iranian factions.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: The most prominent of them were at least either the Communist or
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: left Wing Muslims. So someone like Ali Shariati.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: who was not really a Communist, and he was not really Islamist. He was a Western looking sort of secular, who was also a Shia believer, a believer in Shia Islam.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So Ali Shariati's thinking was was instrumental.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And and this means that whatever Islamism that Khomeini put out after 1979 had a lot of influences from Communism
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: in terms of you know, no Nation State in terms of what you just said. The Mustadafun Mustadafun is an Arabic word. That means the downtrodden, the people who are at the bottom. This is this is one way of Populism, whether for the Communists or or for the Islamists. After that. Now, mind you, in Islam.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Islam does not have an issue with social classes. So even in the Quran itself. It it says, we created you as social classes.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: so Islam doesn't mind people being wealthy and rich.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: The the story of Prophet Muhammad himself is that he was a merchant. He got married to a wealthy merchant lady. He took care of her caravans, trade caravans going north and south. This. This is the story of the prophet himself. So Islam has nothing against being rich.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and nothing against being people being poor, and it encourages the rich to be charitable to the poor, and and and and pay them money.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Islam does not say at all that people should be equal, and it does not say that the ones who are down are better than the ones who are up.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So when Khomeini came, the idea of Mustadafoun. This is completely Communism stuff, you know you're drawing a line between. And by the way, he said, Mustadafoul Island, which is the downtrodden of the world.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So, and and Mustaq Birun as opposed to Mustaq, it translates into the arrogant, but by that he meant all the rich and wealthy, whether in Iran or in the United States or in Europe. So he looked at the world in terms of classes
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: which is not an Islamic idea.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But then he mixed this so so these Mustadafun would be mainly the Shia Mustadafun. So he looked at Iraq, and he said, You know, listen! The Sunnis are in power in Iraq. So you are, Mustadafun like us.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And then he looked at the the Shia in Lebanon, and he told the Shia in Lebanon, look, the Maronites have been in power for forever. The Sunnis are the Prime Minister, so you have nothing. So you are Mosadafun like us. So this was a mix
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: of of Shia, Islam, and Communist impulses
Avi Melamed: And this is how he sold it.
Avi Melamed: It's fascinating. Because actually, what you're showing us. That was this mix of these ideologies
Avi Melamed: that result, this very unique outcome of this whole issue of the Mustada full. And and that brings me to speak about other interesting element of the Mullah regime in Iran in 1979, which I may be wrong, but I think at that point there is a difference between that and the Communism.
Avi Melamed: and I'm referring to the concept that is known by the name of Willa Til faki.
Avi Melamed: What is Relay Ulfaky? And and how and why is it different?
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So I as you just explained to everyone. Avi in the presentation.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Sunnis think that the Caliph now number one, you have to know that in Islam God is always represented on Earth.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So human beings cannot live with someone who's the shadow of God on earth.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: That's a basic concept in Islam. Now, the disagreement, as you, Avi explained, is that for the Sunnis it should be Shura, which you know they get together, and they just pick one of them. They pledge allegiance to this someone, and this someone becomes the caliph.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and the the one after them doesn't have to be a son or a you know, a bloodline. Now the Shia
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: have a similar concept that God has to have the shadow on earth, but that, as you explained, it has to go through the bloodline of Ali.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: What happened was that some, you know, along the lines long, long, long time ago in the 18 hundreds
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Shia said that the 12th Imam, and that's why they call them 12 Shia. They said that the 12th Imam, who was 5 years old, was running away from persecution of the Sunni Abbasids, and he he went into occultation. Occultation means that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you can't see him. He's alive, but you just can't see him.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this 12th Imam Muhammad Al-mahdi
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and Shia belief is still alive. He must be now 470, I mean 70 fraction. But that's you know. I mean he's he's over 400 years 1,400 years old.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and we can see him, and this is a Messiah of sorts. When he, when you can see him again when he shows up again. That'll be the end of times.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, since this Muhammad Mahdi disappeared in the year 874 in Southern Iraq.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: The Shia decided that no one could be the leader of Islam or of the world in his absence.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the Shia decided that okay in his absence. What we will do is that our clerics, our religious leaders, we will guide us on issues of religion.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: but they will not interfere with the issues of politics.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the Shia at that point started assimilating into the nations that they lived in. So if you're living in in India, you become, you know, an Indian. You pledge allegiance to the Government of India, but in terms of religion you consult with your own.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is the concept of Shiaism. Now Khomeini came in the 19 sixties, and he said, this system is bad. What we need is that we need to.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: You bring together a rank and file as Shia, and pick one of those clerics, so it can't be multi clerical system that the Shia system is multi-clerical. There's no one that's the equivalent of the Pope.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: so to speak. There's no one that's the
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: brand Rabbi, or the Mufti, or the Shia don't have such an office. So Khomeini came to them, and he said, Okay, we will have such an office and the top cleric we will call him the deputy of the 12th Imam.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is the office that Khomeini
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: created, he said, the deputy of the 12th Imam. And this is, by the way, the supreme leader in Iran. That's what he calls himself. Now he calls himself the deputy of 12th Imam Mahdi.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this deputy now ha! The the the description of this deputy, he must be
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: a senior cleric.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Okay. And this senior cleric is the person in charge. Wali. That's what it means. They put the 2 together. This Wali Faki
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: is in charge until the Mahdi comes back from occultation. So Khomeini designed an office
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: tailored along, you know his own size at the time, being a a grand Ayatollah. And he said, Okay, I'm the I'm the guy, you know. I'm I'm I'm your guy. I'm the deputy. I'm the leader of all the Shia. Now, mind you.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: all the grand ayatollahs, because, like I said, since the Shia didn't have you know someone on top, they had like a whole bunch of grand Ayatollahs. So all the grand grand Ayatollahs, especially the Iraqi ones, said, No, no, you know you can't do that. You can't just claim that you're you're number one, and then all of us are under you.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So you have hoi, and you have the late one in Najaf. Now you have Sistani, who's still alive, and you have Najafi, who's still alive. And then you have, like at least 4 senior clerics in Southern Iraq alive right now, who command huge following in the world of Shia Islam, but who do not pledge allegiance to the Iranian supreme leader, Tuchamnei.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is roughly what you have now, Khamenei and Khomeini
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Khomein, and after him Khamenei. They declared themselves as the sole leader of Shia.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and what helped is that they had behind them the state resources of a wealthy country like Iran, you know you sell oil, you get all the money, and you know you. You pay people and people pledge allegiance to you. But they started expanding in terms of militias in terms of resources. And of course, the other grand Ayatollahs
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: we're not a match, I mean. Sistani is respected and has a huge following. But Sistani can't really fund militias and kill people who oppose him and do all these shenanigans that the you know Hezbollah and Khomeini can do so. This is where it came from.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and now, if you're someone in Lebanon and you pledge pledge allegiance to the Walifaqi.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: it means, by the way, avi, it means it's a whole
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: What do you call it? It's a whole chain of command.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So anyone who's who's ahead of you in this chain of command. If they say you must do this, you must go and kill an Israeli guy.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and if you say this is Taklif Sharai. So this is, as you say in the in the military. That's an order.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and Taklif Shara is a is a religious, you know, is religious lingo.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the whole thing turned into a person who's on top, and this person gives commands, and and these commands cannot be disputed. This this guy represents the 12th Imam, therefore he represents God on earth.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So what you have in Iran now is that you have this guy who represents God on earth, and they go ahead, and they elect their president every 4 years.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the state in Iran is really, you know, nothing. I mean, they can try to do whatever they want to do. But anything that the supreme leader vetoes it's dead, it's killed.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is what you have now
Avi Melamed: So
Avi Melamed: so now we can take it from this place to the next phase. So you got this regime in Iran, 1979. This is a regime that combines interesting enough Communist and Islamic ideas, and basically creates something which is kind of like
Avi Melamed: new. Relatively speaking, in some aspects this is a regime that has this globalist outlook also positioning itself as the defender of those who are deprived and those that are in the bottom. The Mustadafun, as we said, all around the world, not only in Iran
Avi Melamed: and this regime
Avi Melamed: is proactively starting to push an expansion policy across the region under the title of exporting the Islamic revolution.
Avi Melamed: and creating what has been defined by the King of Jordan. Back, then, Abdullah Ii. I think already back in 2,004 or 2,005. He called it the Shiite Crescent.
Avi Melamed: What what is that? Shiite crescent
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So in theory
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Shia, or or the expansion of the Revolution. The the exporting the revolution cannot be offensive
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: in in theory it has to be defensive. In theory these Shia were trying to reverse all these centuries of injustice that had befallen them.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And, unlike the Sunni Jihadi Islamists. These guys are supposed to be expanding.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: That's that's a different thing for the Shia. So they have. I mean, they have this nuance that they they're not supposed to be expanding.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But what you get is that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: they say, Okay, well, we're defending ourselves. And then they pick a spot, and they say this spot is, belongs to us, and and we're defending it.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And this brings us to the most interesting question, to my mind is that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: there's not a single Shia Palestinian in the history of of this part of the world.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and all of the shrines in in Israel, Palestine are
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Sunni shrines, nothing Shia about them. Even in Syria, you know, by the the Levant. With the exception of Lebanon, none of the Levant countries have have Shia in them.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So, for example, when the when the Syrian Civil War started
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and Iran wanted to support Assad, and Iran wanted to deploy Hezbollah fighters to support Assad.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Nasalah couldn't convince the Shia to go and fight in Syria, and he had to come up with the idea that this, this
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: shrine, this Shia shrine, the sister of Imam Hussein, who was who died when they brought them from after the battle of Karbala. When they brought them to Damascus, to the Caliph Yazid, she died there, and she was buried to the south of Damascus. This is Zainab, Seida Zainab.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and therefore, if we don't go there and and defend the shrine, then these Jihadi Takfiri Sunnis of Isis. Everybody else. They they'll come and they'll take it over.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So they have to come up with a
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: a defensive idea every time. And then, by the way, the same applies to to Israel and Lebanon, I mean, you know, the Lebanese after Israel withdrew in the year 2,000. The Shia didn't want to fight further, you know.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And then Hezbollah came up with the idea of the Sheba farms. You know they have to justify. They say, Okay, well, we still have a fraction a piece of the land that's occupied. We have to defend it there. Therefore we're engaging Israel in war.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: so they have to invent.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: You know things that are shia for them to defend.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, you know, you can't always invent these things. I mean, it's relatively easy, but you can't really claim, like, you know, like the Sunnis claim, for example, you can't claim that Istanbul is is yours.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So, for you know you can't claim that.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know, pick any country can't blame that Cyprus is Shia, and that we have to win back Cyprus. You know there's never been any Shia presence in Cyprus
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: this forever.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: they play this game where they're trying to expand. But at the same at the same time, the theology of the Shia does not allow you to expand.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, mind you, what they're trying to do. And I've seen this happening more with more intensity in North Africa, especially in Tunisia and in Algeria
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and, by the way, to an extent in in Gaza, with with the Islamic jihad which everyone thinks they're just another Hamas. But you know the the Islamic jihad is
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: technically a Shia organization, even though they have to hide it.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So they preach. They try to convert people to Shiism.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and once these people become Shia, then this would just. And by the way, they're doing it in Nigeria, too. You know, there's there's a lot of battles between
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: among the Muslims of Nigeria. A chunk of them is pro-isis, but the other part is being recruited by Iran being converted to Shiism. So conversion to Shiism is a starting point as an expansion. Now let me give you the most glaring example about this.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: To the south of Amman. There's a shrine, an unknown shrine for a person called Jaffar Tayyar. This is supposed to be the brother of Imam Ali.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: He's not really a famous character in in Shiism. The Shia wouldn't make a big deal out of it.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But now Iran discovered that. Okay, well, this is since this is the brother of our imam, and this is a shrine. Then maybe we can start sending our Shia pilgrims over there. So
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Shia pilgrims started going to this shrine.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and of course, you know, with with
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: with pilgrims, with religious pilgrims. You will get all sorts of money, and Jordan liked that issue for some time. You know you have what 50,000 Iranians coming to you with their dollars. That's welcome in Jordan.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But what they do is that once they start going to the shrine, and the 1st thing they do is they try to take the shrine over and point. Appoint an attendant. This attendant will be Shia. This attendant will start
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: constructing or expanding the shrine. So the shrine turns from us, you know a small nothing structure into something that's a huge shrine, you know, that resembles the ones in South Iraq and Najaf and Karbala, and these these spots, and once you have this shrine and people start coming.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: pilgrims start coming to it and and throwing vows vows at the shrine, then you can add a religious seminary to it, and once you have a religious seminary with young men studying religion, this would probably require protection. Protection requires. A militia militia means that you've now congratulations. You're now part of the Rgc.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is the sort of expansion that that the Islamist Iran does in, but it's it's slow, and it takes time, and it has to start with converting
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: people to Shia Islam. If you don't have Shia Muslims, it doesn't really work for them.
Avi Melamed: So you you just described an interesting method of expansion that that is kind of like a Salami sort of like process.
Avi Melamed: But at the same time. You say this is an offensive that is defensive in the way it's being presented.
Avi Melamed: There are 2 significant places in the region. 2 Arab States. One is called Lebanon, and the other one is called Iraq. In those 2 states the Mullah regime, in course of
Avi Melamed: couple of decades, has been able to. In the case of Lebanon, I would say, to turn Lebanon into a satellite.
Avi Melamed: and in the case of Iraq actually to
Avi Melamed: hijacked to a large extent the Inner Iraqi politics
Avi Melamed: and all that is being done by local factors, both in Lebanon and Iraq.
Avi Melamed: What's what has been the process? What enabled it
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So in the case of both countries it's been relatively easier than say Syria
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: or the way they're trying to penetrate Jordan.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And the reason why is that the population, the Shia population in both these countries have been considerable.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So when Lebanon was put together, the Shia were at least one quarter of the population.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and when Iraq was put together they were at least one half.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So these are significant Chia populations. Now, mind you.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: in the case of Iraq. It has been harder for the Iranian regime.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and there there are many reasons behind this number one, that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: there has been always competition between
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the leadership of the Shia, the Arabs of Southern Iraq, and the Iranians in Qom, in Iran.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the Shia are not okay. The Iraqis consider themselves to be
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the custodians, or the 1st believers in Imam Ali. So Imam Imam Ali is
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Imam Ali moved the capital from Medina in Saudi Arabia to Kufa, in Southern Iraq.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So to the Shia it means that the 1st Shia country is Iraq. This is where Shiism started.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and the shrine of Imam Ali and Imam Hussein among, and there are 4 other Imams in Iraq, but these 2 most important personal. Their shrines are in Najaf and Karbala respectively, so the Shia of Iraq, who are Arabs. They see themselves as the starting point of the Shia, and therefore they see themselves as the ultimate
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: commanders and custodians of Shia, Islam.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and then the Iranians come, and they say, you know we are the champions of Shia Islam, and I'm the supreme leader of Shia Islam. This doesn't go well with the Shia of Iraq.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is why, now we've been how many years, almost 20 years since the collapse of the Saddam Hussein regime.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Until now Iran has not made
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: genuine inroads into the Shia of Iraq. Now, it doesn't help that that the Government of Iraq makes more money than the government of Iraq. You know the Iraqis. They have oil, they sell it, they. They have a surplus of 6 billion dollars a month.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So they have more money than Iran has, so Iran can't really buy its way in Iraq like it does in Lebanon. Lebanon is a poor country doesn't have any oil.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So what what the Iranians do. They show up? They pay you money, you join their militia end of story
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: in Iraq it's been different. So you have the Iraqi pride of Shi'ism. You have more money than they have in Iran, and this has made the life of Iranians really harder in Iraq than it's Lebanon.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: for them to handle, that they've relied excessively on coercion and violence and assassination compared to Lebanon, including the Prime Minister himself. You know Prime Minister Mustafazimi. They sent him an explosive drone that targeted his residence when he was an incumbent Prime Minister. So imagine he was in the mansion of the Prime Minister of the official Prime Minister in the official mansion of the Prime Minister.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and an explosive drone struck his house. Now thankfully he survived.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But this is just to give you, and you know and and
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: idea of how much assassination they had to rely on in how many arms they had to twist in Iraq among Iraqi Shia to get their guys on top
Avi Melamed: I want to. I want to focus a little bit more on Iraq, because you bring something very interesting to the discussion. You're basically saying something like when you compare the Iranian infiltration growing influence in Iraq comparison to Lebanon. You're basically saying in Iraq.
Avi Melamed: It was more difficult for the Iranian regime to increase influence. But
Avi Melamed: today in Iraq you got a system.
Avi Melamed: We got the Iraqi Shiite militias, the Pmu or Hajd Al-shabi.
Avi Melamed: that have their own political power or representation in the government. They are part of the government
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Yes.
Avi Melamed: In Iraq, and some of those militias
Avi Melamed: are are actually very much affiliated with Iran.
Avi Melamed: So what was the mechanism that bring those? What was the mechanism that gave gave life to those militias, and how they became so powerful within the Iraqi current
Avi Melamed: government
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Well, the number one answer to this would be the United States.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the amount of mistakes Washington committed.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: especially Democratic administrations committed in Iraq allowed Iran to benefit.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Sometimes they were not really mistakes, sometimes we were trying to play nice with Iran during the time of Obama, you know, to get the Iranians to sign a nuclear deal. You tell them. Listen, you know we'll look the other way if you want to take Iraq.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: but just be nice and sign this deal.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the number one factor to me it has been
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: American complaisance in in the takeover, you know, it's takeover is a big word.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But let me say that Iraq will be electing its Parliament in October. This coming October
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: 2025. Parliament serves for 4 years. So the last election was in 2021,
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: when the Iraqis went to the polls in 2021,
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Iranian, the Pro-iran Shia block in Parliament, was 134, and in 2021 it shrank to 17,
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: just to give you, you know, an idea in terms of numbers.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and what the Iranians did after they lost the election. They didn't admit defeat. They said, No, this is you know. We demand a recount. There has been a lot of foul play. We do not recognize that this is, you know, the new Parliament or so. Anyway, there was a standstill in Parliament until the Major Shia leader, who is against Iran, who is crazy, too, but he's totally against Iran. His name is Muqtada Sadr
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Muqtada. Sadr won the biggest Shia block, 73 seats. Muqtada Sadr hates Iran like the plague, and Iran hates him back.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and he hates everybody else. But I mean, you know, just let's focus on Iran, for that matter.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and Muqtada Sadr all of a sudden decided that his bloc will resign.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So when his bloc resigned all the losers, because, you know, if you win, then the number 2 would be the loser. So all the number twos became lawmakers. So now we have, I mean, over the past 4 years you have a Parliament dominated by the pro Iran Shia.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Knowing that this block the majority block, we're all losers.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They they all lost the election. They don't represent actually, the Shia moods in Iraq.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So so this happened in 2021, I think what they're trying to do now is is to make it happen again in in 2025
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: because the Iranians control
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the majority in Parliament. They also control the Prime Minister, and when they control the Prime Minister. They control the budget.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So, as we speak now, from the official budget of the Iraqi Government.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: 3.3 billion dollars gets paid to hush the Shabi to the pro-iran militias.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And, mind you, some of these Iranian militias are on America's foreign terrorist organization list. So they are Ftos. They are actual terrorist organizations.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and we still look the other way when the Iraqi Government gives them the money.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, another thing about the hash, the shabby. That's a footnote hash. The shabby's budget, like, I said, is 3.3 billion now compared to the Jordanian military.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: which is a whole military with F. 16 s. And tanks, and and which which the hush Shavy doesn't really have.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: The budget of of of the Jordanian military is 1.2 or 1.4. So this is double the budget of the Jordanian army.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Where does all this money go? There's something in Iraq called the Phantom
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Civil Servants and the phantom soldiers.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So they're just, you know, non-existing names and of people.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So a huge chunk of money
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: that's supposed to go to actual fighters and attach the shabby just goes to Rgc officers.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So a lot of this 3.3 billion goes to Rgc officers, and a lot of this money is used as a slush funds for Hezbollah. So you probably guys recently watched Hezbollah hold the funeral of Nasalah in Beirut. Right? Have you remember the funeral? I think, 2 weeks ago.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and for this funeral. Now, mind you, Israel is keeping an eye on every aircraft that comes from Iran to Lebanon.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Israel doesn't let them land, and if they land, the Lebanese army has to certify that there's no cash on the airplane, and when there's cash they send them back, or the Lebanese Government takes the so
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Israel has been keeping an eye on this supply route of cash from from Iran to Lebanon.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, what what they did is that for the funeral of Nasala.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Shia in Iraq, or the Pro-iran Shia in Iraq, pretended that they wanted to come and attend the funeral.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the Iraqi airline, the official state, owned airline, started flying 2 extra flights a day from Baghdad to Beirut, so that makes them 3 flights. So 3 flights over the period of 7 days, shuttling back and forth.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: presumably shuttling, shuttling people to participate in Masola's funeral.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: All of these aircrafts were half human half cash.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So there was a huge infusion of cash that went from this Iraqi Slash fund 2
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Hezbollah's pockets. If you're following on the news today, Naim Qasem, the chief of Hezbollah said that. Oh, what we have now, or what we agreed on now the ceasefire with Israel and the enforcement mechanism of 17. 0, 1! 0, this doesn't! This doesn't cut it for us. If if this stays the case, we'll have to
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: maybe go back to fighting Israel. So this tells me that the money has found its way, that now Hezbollah and and I know
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: through connections as well as now, paying money to people who? Who lost their houses, people who had their glass shattered. So now this Iraqi money.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: through an Iranian command, found its way from Baghdad to Beirut to Hezbollah. This is how the Crescent works. See, so the money is Iraqi. The fighters are Lebanese. The orders are Iranian.
Avi Melamed: So
Avi Melamed: I want to. You mentioned here the question shortly. We will kind of like, or this access will shortly elaborate on that. But I still want to to clarify something about Iraq.
Avi Melamed: Majority of the Iraqis are Shiites
Avi Melamed: and but they are Shiites, Arabs.
Avi Melamed: and they are Iraq. There are Iraqis in their nationalities.
Avi Melamed: What is the explanation for the fact that you got Iraqi Shiites
Avi Melamed: that are assembled in this military frame? The Hajd Al-shadi, or these groups within the Hajd Al-shadi, that are affiliated with the Irgc, with Iran, with the Islamic revolutionary gate.
Avi Melamed: Why these Iraqi Shiites Arabs?
Avi Melamed: Oh, prioritizing the Iranian interest in orders.
Avi Melamed: Why is this
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is exactly where internationalism communism comes in.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: This is where you stop thinking of yourself as being a citizen of a nation, state, and you think of yourself as being member of a cross national nation.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And so these, these Iraqis, who support or who pledge allegiance to Khamenei.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: think that the Borders are a recent creation. That this is, you know, borders don't count.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: What counts is that we're both Shia, and this is since this is the supreme leader of our Shiism. Then we pledge allegiance to him.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, mind you, this is harder in Iraq like, I said, than in Lebanon, is because you still have
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: competing
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Shia grand Ayatollahs, who Iraqis pledge allegiance to in the South, and these are people who do not. you know, are not subdued by khamenei.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, mind you, the whole Pmu configuration. It came to exist. It was there, but it became legal, or the the government of Iraq recognized it
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: after the collapse of the Iraqi military in Mosul in 2014, so in the summer of 2014, Isis took over Mosul.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and Isis was expanding toward to toward Baghdad.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And what Grant Ayatollah Sistani, who was not pro-iran or anything. He issued a fatwa saying that you can
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: practice jihad to fight off Isis.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And what Iran did was that they took this fatwa from Sistani to start organizing what came to be known as the Hashdi Shabi Spn news. Now, after the after Isis was decimated.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Sistani said, there's no reason for us to keep arms anymore. So hash the Shabi split
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: split into 2 organizations. The bigger one is the pro Iran. Of course it's a smaller one that's still processing
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the the pro-iran factions now call themselves. So they pledge allegiance to Wali Faqi.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And these are the noisy, annoying, terrorist guys. Then you have another chunk of Hash Shabi that that they call themselves is a word that that means defensive.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And these guys pull themselves out
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and deployed around the shrines. The Shia shrines in South Iraq. So these guys
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: made it their task to protect the shrines like as is like. If if Isis shows up, there'll be a militia that protects these shrines.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: but they will not go on, you know, terrorizing the population of Baghdad for any political reason.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So even the how the Shabi is is to an extent
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: divided. But I'd say, I'd say the the sustaining faction is probably 15% of the whole has a shabby organization.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And then you have 85%. That's that's Walla. That's pro Iran. Now, this is the the troublesome part. You know. The the Shabi is the troublesome part in Iraq
Avi Melamed: And the most in that regard. Before we move to talk about Lebanon, I would say that just yesterday
Avi Melamed: the Iranian Ambassador to Iraq, he said, that
Avi Melamed: President Trump, in his letter to the Iranian leader.
Avi Melamed: among other things, demanded that those Iraqi militias Hajd Al-shabi, will be dismantled.
Avi Melamed: Is is that correct. You have additional knowledge on that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: I I think the the Emiratis, the President trump, sent this letter with the Emirati
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: assistant Foreign Minister Anwar Gargash, so he's the one who carried the message, and they put out a few parts of it on, on Arabic, on Emirati Arabic channels.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and it said that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the militias was part of the letter. So if this ambassador said this thing, I think it
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: it confirms what we see in the news.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, what I started saying or arguing after
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Israel started taking on Hezbollah like seriously taking on Hezbollah. After September 2024,
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: I started. I started predicting that the weight of the militias of the Iranian militias will shift from Lebanon and Syria to Iraq.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And this did happen, mind you, that Nasarllah and his leadership that Israel decimated.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: These were Hezbollah leaders, but these were really high up on the Rgc. Chain of command.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the people who trained the Houthis of Yemen on producing missiles and using them and producing explosive drones and using them. They're Hezbollah people, Lebanese.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Shia, Lebanese people who went from Lebanon to Yemen to train them. The same thing happened in Iraq when they were putting together these pro-iran militias. It was actually Hezbollah
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: officers who went physically to Iraq to put them together and train them so
Avi Melamed: And so that that kind of like makes the natural shift towards liber to talk about Lebanon, because now you've been talking about Hezbollah and Lebanon.
Avi Melamed: And so we saw the case of Iraq
Avi Melamed: and the interesting situation of Iraqi Shiite, that our allegiance is actually to an external rule. The mullah regime in Tehran, and you explain it very well, because they don't view this thing called borders, and their contract across the border.
Avi Melamed: So in Lebanon the Munna regime is establishing in the 1980
Avi Melamed: the the Hezbollah that is going to become his most substantial, you know, subcontractor proxy, whatever you want to use the term.
Avi Melamed: And again, when we talk about Lebanon, I need again to understand what, in the Lebanese condition, enabled the situation that in the end of the day
Avi Melamed: a power was formed in Lebanon. That is, part of the Lebanese system, but actually at the same time also kidnapped Lebanon from within. As the Lebanese themselves said, we have been kidnapped by Hezbollah and by the Iranians. What in Lebanon enabled that thing to happen
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is a really interesting question, and let me say that Lebanon has a
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: special system, so to speak. It's 1 of the most diverse in the region.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Until very recently the Christians were half of the population. Now they're roughly 1 3.rd Then you have 1 3rd Sunni, and you have 1 3rd Shia.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: When the French put it together, they put the
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Christians and the Shia together. That's 2 thirds against the the Sunnis, which is 1 3.rd
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the Shia and the Christians were France's allies and Europe's allies
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: as when when Lebanon became independent in 1943,
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Maronites abandoned the Shia, and joined the Sunnis on the condition that, of course, the Sunnis wanted Lebanon to join a bigger Arab nation.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They were. They were against the sovereignty of Lebanon and defense of Lebanon, but they came to terms with the with the Christians and the Christians and the Sunnis. Listen, you know we we split the country, but this is our country. So we abandoned France. We abandoned the Arabs, and they agreed on that.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: When this happened the Shia felt that they were let down. So between 1943 and 1965, or something, the Shia felt that they were their share of the State was shrinking, small and shrinking, and they, you know, they thought that the Christians of the Sunnis were taking everything. So here comes a man who was originally from
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Lebanon, but who was living in Iran for a long time. Musa Sadr. He came from Iran to Lebanon in 1959, and he became the mufti of this small town that it's not the small town anymore, coastal town of Sur Tyre, and the very close to the Israeli border.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And and from there on he started organizing this cleric. He's a he's a religious person. He started organizing the Shia
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: as a component of Lebanon. So what Musa Sadr's line was that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: he organized the Shia to take a chunk of Lebanon, he said. We are as Lebanese as you guys are, and we want the share of the State.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And this became the politics of the Shia, starting 1959, all the way to 1969, and into the 19 seventies.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is the Shia line. You know we're Lebanese. We want part a a part of the State.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But then you had a small minority faction among the Shia who decided, no, we're not Lebanese, you know. We're part of the Muslim world and the and the Arab world. So this very tiny small faction joined Arafat. If you guys know history. Arafat.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Between 1969 and 1982. Arafat was in Lebanon with a Plo and all his military factions. He was dominant. He was ruling Lebanon, and that was one of the main reasons of the Lebanese civil war that the Lebanese said, You know. Listen, this is our country. They tried to take it back from Arafat.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and the clash between the 2 was what we called the Civil War.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this tiny faction of Shia that was with
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: With Arafat, you you guys probably heard of the most famous of them. His name was Ahmad Murni. He was with Arafat.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and these this this small, tiny faction
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: when Khomeini started agitating. And you know, the Iranian Revolution started training its people against the Shah. It was Arafat who took care of these Iranian defectors and opposition armed factions. So they started hanging out in Beirut and training in Beirut when Arafat was kicked out. This
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Shia faction was still there, and it it was training
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Khomeini people and the Khomeini people. The Revolution succeeded. So this link was created even before Khomeini took over in Iran, and shortly before Arafat was kicked out of Lebanon. When Israel came into Lebanon in 1982, and kicked out Arafat.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this link was there. It started as a small nucleus, but but then it it started expanding and it helped expanding, because in 1978, Musa Sadr vanished. He disappeared. He went on a trip to Libya, and no one ever heard of him. No one knows what happened to him. There are speculations, of course. When Musa Sadr
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: vanished, this small nucleus, pro-iran pro Irgc nucleus that was with Arafat that wanted to destroy Israel and and liberate Palestine and do all the cross-national things. This small group started expanding.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and with more arms and money. And so, for example, Nasrllah himself, he was with the Musa Sadr faction. He was with Amal. He was, you know he, Nasalah, studied in Najaf. So Nasalllah was with the Arab faction. Nasalllah was not the pro-iran Shia faction. He did not want to liberate
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Palestine. He did not. So Nasalah himself came, switched sides from the Arab Shia to the Pro-iran Shia.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is how it started growing in Lebanon
Avi Melamed: So.
Avi Melamed: yeah, I mean, that's that's a fascinating story in the context of the Shiite in Lebanon, and how those 2 factions emerged. You mentioned Amal. That was the political movement. That Musal Sadr established.
Avi Melamed: Amal is a word in Arabic which means hope.
Avi Melamed: but it also stood for initials. The initials it stood for Waslamia, Alubnania.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Lub, Nania.
Avi Melamed: And I want to focus on one word. And this is the world of El Muqalam.
Avi Melamed: Why is it so significant? What does it mean?
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Literally it means resistance, but it's often not it's not specified who you are resisting.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So in the case of Musa Saddam.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: his resistance at 1st started against the Plo in Southern Lebanon.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the Plo was armed. They were terrorizing the predominantly Shia population of South Lebanon.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and this was the reason why Ml. Was put together.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: The last interview that Musa Sadr put before he vanished in 1978 was that he said, we have no business in fighting with Israel. We want to revive the 1949 truce between the 2 of us.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and there's no reason why any attack should be launched from our territory to the Israeli territory.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And of course this is 1978. So yes, Arafat was was in Beirut. So this was said to Arafat to his face, that listen, you know I mean you want to liberate your country, leave us alone.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So resistance. When Amal was put together it meant resistance in this context and in the context of protecting Shia.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And mind you, in 1978 the Lebanese Civil war had been on for 3 years, so all of these other Lebanese factions were getting armed or getting trained, were getting their own militias so sadder reason that if each of these sects are getting their militias. Then we, the Shia, should get our own militia too. So this is. This is how Amal was born. Now, eventually, when Mosa Sadda
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: disappeared, and when the other Shia faction, the pro-iran Shia faction, started expanding.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Amal number one. Amal started relying more on half his asset as their main ally
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and number 2. They had to play the game of Hezbollah and Nasalah. They had to play the game that okay, we are resistance, but we are resistance to Israel, too. So they so their rhetoric switched
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: from generic resistance. That is self-defense, you know, in the South to resistance to Israel.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And I wouldn't say that they were really that mighty in fighting Israel. I mean, you know.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the bunch of Amal who caused Israel trouble after 1982 where either
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: half Amal, half Hezbollah, almost completely in his on Hezbollah side. So we had a lot of
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Amal leaders, military leaders who migrated from the Amal side to the Hezbollah side. And not only because of ideology in Israel, you know, most of them, because of
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Hezbollah, paid much higher salaries compared to Amal, doesn't really have a lot of resources. I mean, its speaker is just one big thief who embezzled the whole Lebanese state.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: but it as an organization it does not compare in terms of income and social services to Hezbollah.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So so Amal started as this faction. But I think by 19, I'd say 80 89 90. It was, it was largely gone. The the military prowess of the Shia and Lebanon had become totally in the hands of Hezbollah.
Avi Melamed: So
Avi Melamed: this is a fascinating process. Because and by the way, there was a there was an episode of a violent clash between Amal and Hezbollah. That was basically decisively won by the Hezbollah.
Avi Melamed: And but it's interesting, because what you're saying is that while Musa Sadda was actually saying, we are not acting against Israel, and we don't want to act against Israel, because he was clearly aware of the well-being of the Shiite population in the south part of Libanon.
Avi Melamed: Later on, Nasala, the leader of Hezbollah, is
Avi Melamed: dragging Lebanon, including the Shiites, which is his most significant political power base.
Avi Melamed: He's dragging them more than once to a war with Israel that is going to have disastrous outcomes, the most recent one in 2024, and he's doing that yet again, in the name of the resistance.
Avi Melamed: But still there are people in this region that are still
Avi Melamed: basically are subscribing to this issue of the resistance.
Avi Melamed: Why is that? What is this magic of this thing? Why is it so appealing yet to people in the region? And why are there other people that oppose it?
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So let me start with the people of the region for the people of the region, and I know that you know, for example, in Tunisia the majority support Nasala and resistance, or in Algeria, for example.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: it's really easy for you to be sitting on your couch under the A/C watching Al Jazeera, and thinking that you support Hezbollah.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But if you are the Shia who's living in Balbek or in South Lebanon
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and supporting Hezbollah, means that next missile might take out your household.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: or you know, or whatever you own, and that you have to flee somewhere and live in a tent for a year or so, then you have different calculus.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the Shia of Lebanon do not support this part of
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: this component of the Hezbollah rhetoric, and that's why
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: every statement that you will see coming out of Hezbollah and coming out of of Nasala.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They always have to call it the Israeli aggression.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They can never call it the liberation of Palestine? Or so you see. So this is this is not. This is unlike Sinwar and Hamas. When when Sinwar started
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: October 7, th he called it Tofan Al-aqsa.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: He didn't call it the defense. The self-defense of Gaza
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: into in terms of nasala. Nasala couldn't have gotten away with such a thing. So
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Hezbollah has an amazing tactic of how to control the Shia.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They control the Shia in terms of fear, mongering. They scare them of the Sunnis and the Maronites and the others, they say, listen, you know, if you don't have Hezbollah, the others will
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: will beat us and will take over our share, and you know, so we need Hezbollah.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: This is how they make their followers follow them, of course, in in addition to social services, and and you know handouts.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Hezbollah cannot drag the Shia of Lebanon to liberate Palestine. The Shia of Lebanon don't like Palestine. They think Palestine is a Sunni issue.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So it's the word. Resistance has always been murky. They say resistance. They don't exactly mean what resistance means, so they when they say resistance, they give the impression that they're resisting.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: or their own territory, whether it's South Lebanon or it's the Shaba farms, or you know, or if Israel starts a war on Lebanon, then that's legit right? I mean, that's that's actually self-defense resistance.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But they use the word resistance to cover the other part. So Nasrallah was really out of favor with the Shia when he dragged them into what he called Harbul Isnad the war of support for Gaza.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and he didn't really have that much support from Shia, and that's why.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: The day after he was killed, Hezbollah went back on the spot.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: You know, Nasalah refused to untie the war of Lebanon from the war of on Gaza until he was killed.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and the you know, the Lebanese were not supportive of this, and the Shia were not supportive of this, and the day he was killed they said, Okay, you know. Let's go to 17. 0, 1. We have nothing to do with Gaza. So what the point I'm trying to make here is that so many times they use the same phrase
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: to main to mean many things. So they hide one kind of resistance behind the other. Now, if the and this is one of the reasons, by the way, why they never like to demarcate the border with Israel, so imagine so, Hezbollah, over the past 25 years, has opposed demarcating the land border with Israel.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: The reason they oppose this is because if it's demarcated, and we know that the sea border is demarcated as well. Then there's there are no claims for you against Israel. Then then you can't call yourself resistance anymore.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: so they need to have something to claim that there's injustice befalling us. And we're we're resisting this injustice. Now, resistance can mean, you know, everything from fighting here to fighting all the way to from from Lebanon to South Africa.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is how they they play on words in terms of resistance.
Avi Melamed: So it's interesting and fascinating because you're describing a situation where a concept, a word, a slogan
Avi Melamed: and that is so appealing across the region is actually very flexible in the way that you use that.
Avi Melamed: But when you look at the structure that we you refer to that earlier, and now this is the time to elaborate a little bit on that. The structure of this axis of resistance.
Avi Melamed: this network of this Iranian backed
Avi Melamed: factors, like the Hezbollah in Lebanon, or the Hajd Al-shabi in Iraq, that we mentioned before, and by the way, they they kind of like also kind of like under the name of the Islamic Resistance brigades. Once again the same, the same use of.
Avi Melamed: So
Avi Melamed: we understand that the Hezbollah was packing, that in the context of defensive. We are defensing the border. We are aiming to liberate Lebanese that are imprisoned in Israel and stuff like that. What's the Iraqi
Avi Melamed: argument in the context of defense, because Israel did not take Iraqi land
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Yes, this is very interesting number one. Let me just point out this doesn't translate in English, but you probably you'll understand it. Avi
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Resistance in Arabic is muqam
Avi Melamed: That's what Hezbollah calls itself Muqama Al Muqama
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But the axis is not called Mahwar Al muqamah. The axis is called Mahwad Al-mumanah.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and momenta would translate closest to abstention. You know the
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the the axis that abstains from peace with Israel, that abstains from befriending America, that abstains from doing things. So it's not exactly resistance. They understand. Resistance is actually military engagement.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But in English, you know, it's it's often translated into the same thing resistance, access, or the resistance a lot.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, one funny thing about the Iraqis. As you know, the Iraqis started throwing explosive drones on Israel.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and many of these drones hit either in Jordanian territory or Syrian territory. I mean these guys. They have no idea where they're throwing the
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the drones. But if you look up the statements that the pro-iran militias put out when they did this, and you compare them to the statements of the more seasoned hezbollah. So Hezbollah would say, today we struck
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: so and so Nahariyah and Palestine Al Mahtallah in occupied Palestine.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Iraqis, because, you know, they they have no experience. What they're dealing with, they say, oh, today we hit our land. You know we're so. They called every
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: inch of Israel, Aradin Al-mutalah, as in our own land.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, thankfully in Iraq, no one focuses, because in Iraq the whole fighting with Israel is not as pressing as in Lebanon, because, you know, apparently
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: is, is not really striking. Iraq.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So you can get away with throwing, throwing a drone. Lebanon is different, you know. I mean, you have whole towns being raised down so in Iraq you can tell that the language was was misinformed, more childish and and of no effect. So they were not really.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: I mean, the audience was limited. The audience of the Iraqi militias was not the Iraqi population. It was their masters in Tehran and their Co. Militia people in Lebanon and elsewhere.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: but in Lebanon the statements, the audience of the statements were the Lebanese themselves.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So there's a there's a big difference in the
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: in the target audience between the 2, and there's a huge difference between the language of the 2. So the Iraqis were not only copying what the Lebanese were saying, they're coming up with their own.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know. Ideas of why they're fighting, and they're calling it our land, which no Iraqi in the world would ever call it our land. I mean the history of Iraq, you know.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: I mean, unless you go back to
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Nebuchad Nasser and his, you know, invasion of Jerusalem. But I mean, that's that's different. But no one calls it our land.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So so it's interesting. The Iraqis. By the way, one thing about the Iraqis, I I usually go on and listen. Radio discussions like, you know, people just call and discuss things, or even on on X these days you go on these chats.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and you'd be amazed how clueless the Iraqis are about the whole story of Israel and the Palestinians.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They don't know what's West Bank. What's Gaza? What's Israel proper? What's who are the Israelis who are the Palestinians? They have no idea that Arab Israelis exist.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They have no idea that I mean none of this is, whereas in Lebanon everyone knows this story.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know. So again we go back to the different audiences. The Iraqis are really not informed about this
Avi Melamed: So
Avi Melamed: towards the end of our discussion. And again I do apologize that we have to cut our discussion, to leave time for Q. And a obviously we could talk about it for the next couple of hours. But we are now the beginning of 2025,
Avi Melamed: and we have witnessed following October 7, th a very dramatic development in the context of Lebanon and Iraq.
Avi Melamed: In the context of Lebanon we have witnessed what I could say right now, a significant weakening of Hezbollah
Avi Melamed: and and I would like to understand from you, how do you envision? How do you see? Current situation of both Hezbollah and Lebanon and the Iraqi affiliated Iranian Shiite militias in Iraq. And what do you see? The trajectory ahead
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So let's start with Lebanon.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Israel did crush Hezbollah. This is probably one of the best Israeli performances.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: To my mind. I mean, I was not alive in 1967, but if 1967 was the best Israeli battle, then this is probably right there. Next to it.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: however, the downside is that while Hezbollah is not a threat to Israel and the other parts of the region anymore.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Hezbollah is still way too stronger than the Lebanese.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and it can still kill any Lebanese would go after its arms, or what's what remains of its arms
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: so domestically, it's still the strongest bunch of thugs.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, the point here is that what you? What we do here in Washington, is that we try to get
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the Us. And Europe and the Gulf to support these voices that stand up to Hezbollah, you know we tell them. Okay. Look if you want to disarm Hezbollah. If you speak against Hezbollah, if you come out against Hezbollah, you will have our support in terms of financial support, financial assistance, you know diplomatics. Whatever we can do to support you
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: now, the jury is still out. I'm not sure how which way this whole thing will go. We have good days, and we have bad days. We have days when President of Lebanon says.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: or the Prime Minister of Lebanon, says, the page of Hezbollah has been turned, and then we have other days when he says that Israel is the problem.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So it's it's anybody's guess. Everything is still in limbo. I think we have a short period of time
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: might not be as as big as 2 years.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: When we get to midterm elections here in Washington.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: If the problem, if the if the Republicans lose the House, that's half or more of the foreign policy steam that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: President Trump currently has. I'm talking in a nonpartisan manner here, I'm just describing how things go as someone who seen this over
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: 5 or 6 successive administrations.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So and Israel can't really be just focused on Lebanon until forever. There will come a time when Israel will have to dial back its focus and interest. I mean, currently, Israel is still policing every movement of every Hezbollah terrorist
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and drone, and and taking them out.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, how far and how long can Israel go with this? I'm gonna I'm gonna say, a year or 2.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the point here is that we have a maximum of one or 2 years as the window to get this thing done to get the Lebanese State to go on top and suppress Hezbollah.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now Hezbollah knows this.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and what Hezbollah and Iran are doing for the time being is that they're laying low, hunkering down and waiting it out. They're waiting trump out, they're waiting Israeli patients out. This is the game. This is the game that these people play. They just wait until the other side gives up.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and if they still have pulse they will come back.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and unfortunately, in the case of Hezbollah they still have pulse. So, even though they're beaten.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: they will come back.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Iraq is a totally different game. It's not connected to to what Israel is doing. It's not connected to what President trump his his his influence, his global influence, and his domestic influence.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: It is connected to what happens with Iran
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and as we speak, I think this week last week, and and this coming week
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: they've been trying to encode the Hashdi Shabi. They're trying to make them to legislate a law in Parliament that makes their perks permanent. So this 3.3 billion will be forever. So all these Hashdi, Shabi Thugs.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the ones who are not phantom, the one, the existing ones. They will have all the social security benefits that the Iraqi Government extends to its employees.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this tells me that these guys are not sure that they will be in charge forever.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They're trying to make sure that before the election the election is in October, and now we're what almost April. So the election is in 6 months. So they're trying to make sure in these last 6 months of the Parliament that they control, that they enshrine
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Pmus, the enshrine them as an institution. That's that pledges allegiance to Khamenei. But at the at the same time, that's part of the Iraqi Government, and you know, like in every government. Whenever you legislate for something, it becomes a sacred cow, and taking it out, becomes.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know, a huge disaster. So you have all these people who are latching on it, and benefiting from all the money and revenue and income, and killing it becomes a secret cow that you can't kill.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is roughly what what you have going forward in in both countries. Lebanon and Iraq
Avi Melamed: So if I try to sum up your analysis of the current, and possibly situation down the road of Lebanon in Iraq, in the context of what I call trying to restore the kidnapped sovereignty in a way.
Avi Melamed: You are kind of like, in a way more optimistic about Iraq's ability to restore its sovereignty in comparison to Lebanon.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Yeah, yeah, I've never compared them. But I'd say that I'm cautiously optimistic on both fronts.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: I think what Israel has done over the past year, year and a half
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: has shaken things so much that building something new is possible.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, while we try to build something new.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Iran, and what remains of Hezbollah are trying to derail us from building this new thing.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is roughly, what's going on now? Can we build before they derail us?
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Yeah, I mean, I can't tell. It's it's anybody's. Guess
Avi Melamed: Got it.
Avi Melamed: Well, I want to thank you for this amazing discussion, as always. Thank you so much, so many things to take in, and we also. We only just scraped the sofa sort of speaking, talking about it. But this was been fascinating, and at this point I'm opening this session to the questions of the fellows.
Avi Melamed: Okay, Matt.
Matthew Zivian: Hi, 1st of all, thank you so much for this discussion. I wanted to ask. You made one mention to Al Jazeera.
Matthew Zivian: Personally, I'm in a class, you know, titled journalism and government with a focus on Middle East and Africa. But for the Middle East my professor uses Al Jazeera a lot doesn't give a lot of background and context. He made one mention to, you know, being funded by Qatar being a state media resource, but has sort of downplayed it, and now hails them as very noble, independent journalism.
Matthew Zivian: It's left me in a gray area. I noticed your mention to it, and I see a lot of criticisms of Al Jazeera, you know, elsewhere. So I was just wondering if I can get a more expanded take on Al Jazeera and their their role and everything going on now
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So 1st thing comes first.st If you're if we're talking academically, if your professor is comparing Al Jazeera because what that's what they do.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Al Jazeera compare themselves when you tell them that the that you get Government's money they compare themselves to the BBC.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And and we told them, listen, guys, you want to be like the BBC fine be our guest.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But the BBC. Publishes all of its
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: budget annually to the last sense. Every employee at BBC. At the BBC. We know their salary, every income we know where the money comes from.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: If you're willing to do that for Al Jazeera, where the money comes from, and where it goes we'll treat you as as a government, as a, as an independent government recipient of a recipient of government money right? I mean, there are a bunch of news organizations like this.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Franz Van Kat, the French one you have the BBC. Franz Van Kat. You have the Dutch, the German service, I mean, there's a bunch of media organizations. They're they're decent. They receive money from the government.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But the point here is that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: all these governments have firewalls set between the government and the money, so the government grants the money, but does not interfere in the editorial line, doesn't have anything of this sort.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Al Jazeera just says whatever the Government wants them to say. So. For example, this past week you probably heard there have been protests in 2 spots in the Middle East Turkey. A lot of protests in Turkey against the arrest of the Mayor of Istanbul, and protests in Gaza against Hamas. These are 2 enormous headlines. I worked for a journalist before I became a think tanker.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, good luck finding any of this on Al Jazeera, and when you find any of it on Al Jazeera, the the way that they report on this was that their correspondent in Gaza showed the people protesting, and said they were protesting, Israel and the war and the Israeli war.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And these guys were clearly saying, You know, Hamas, get out of Gaza, and and you know, Al Jazeera, get out of Gaza.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So their lies are evident. I mean, it's it's like like you. You have to do something special to discover that these guys are putting misinformation. I mean, if this happens to
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: any other organization, whether it's Fox News or Cnn. Or Msnbc, you know, you call them out, you say. Listen! You reported on this, but the actual footage shows something else that'd be the end of them.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Al Jazeera doesn't care, you know. They get the money? And because they're in Arabic, so they get away with stuff like death to the Jews.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: not Israelis. By the way, not Zionists, not, I mean Jews, Jews like, you know, as yehud in Arabic or in Hebrew.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So so they get away with stuff all the time, and the irony here is that if you look up their English service they state in a different way.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know. So so there are things that they say in Arabic that they won't say in English and vice versa, so that they're definitely not
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: a standard journalistic organization that that any professor should teach at any class
Avi Melamed: Thank you, Brooklyn
Brooklyn Tory (she/her): Hi! Thank you for joining us. I had a question specifically regarding the reconstruction of Lebanon. I was wondering so in early March, when we 1st had Trump's proposal in Gaza. The Arab States joined together and supported Egypt's sort of secondary proposal that refused to
Brooklyn Tory (she/her): actively try to disarm Hamas, even though most Arab States do consider Hamas a threat to security. Do we see it? Do you expect to see a similar issue in Lebanon as well, where Arab States might be unwilling to really put forward their resources to try to disarm Hezbollah
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's this exact same way.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know the sovereigns or the the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia and the president of the Uae, who are supposed to be the biggest donors
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: to reconstruction in Gaza. They didn't show up to the march for Emergency Arab League summit.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They skipped it, and that was their way of saying we're not interested. And the reason why they were not interested. 2 things you mentioned the disarming of Hamas that was not mentioned in the in the final statement.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And then there's another point that the Emiratis wanted to see in the statement. They wanted to see a transitional governing body to take over and manage the strip, not not Hamas or or the Palestinian authority.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: What the Egyptians did was that they
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: had this transitional body mentioned, but they gave it a fixed mandate of 6 months. What can anybody do in 6 months, I mean. So that's another reason why it didn't show up. They're doing the same in Lebanon today. The Prime Minister of Lebanon, Nawaf Salam was flown to Saudi Arabia, and he prayed. Today is aid. So the Muslims have a special aid prayer. He prayed next to Mbs.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and they you know, they had a stakeout with the Media and Saudi Arabia is saying exactly what should be said. Hezbollah must be disarmed.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and implicitly saying, if Hezbollah is not disarmed, there'll be not a single cent that the Saudis are willing to give to Lebanon. So we know this is, you know, this is happening. This is perhaps this is one of the reasons why Hezbollah is rebounding earlier than I thought they would rebound
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: is that they? They now they now know that pretend disarmament is will not cut it with with the Gulf capitals, and that there'll be no money coming unless they disarm completely. So I think they gave up on this part. And now I think they're rebounding.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Unlike the few past weeks since November 27, th
Avi Melamed: Thank you, Tomal. Did you want to ask question?
Tamar Sarah Weiss: Yeah, I did have a question. It kind of comes from like a lack of knowledge. So if
Tamar Sarah Weiss: there's just too many missing pieces. That's okay.
Tamar Sarah Weiss: You were talking about how the the countries around Israel.
Tamar Sarah Weiss: like Lebanon, have to convince the Shiites to like have a reason to defend them, because otherwise they're not allowed to expand.
Tamar Sarah Weiss: Would that mean that like? Otherwise they wouldn't get involved in like, what's their mission? If not for
Tamar Sarah Weiss: cause i 1 week we discussed how Israel is like a target. Just because that brings like all the Arab nations together. So like they could create like one Islamic Caliphate. But
Tamar Sarah Weiss: if not, for I guess the Lebanese like trying to convince initiates to get involved and use them as a defense. Then what's
Tamar Sarah Weiss: the Shiite involvement in that territory and like around Israel.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Also, you're right. That Islamic States try to use Israel as a unifying battle cry for them. But in this case, Islamic is not, as cannot be, as used as sweepingly as we're using it
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: in the case of the Shia of Lebanon. I mean, they are Muslims, but but they're Muslims that are different from the Palestinians. The Palestinians are Sunnis, and these Shia do not see a reason why should be fighting and dying for
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: other Muslims, I mean Muslims that are not them.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this has been a sensitive issue for the Shia, and that's why I said all these battles that they had to fight.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: They have to always depict them as defensive battles, even in 2,006, when there was no war in Gaza. When Hezbollah started a war with Israel that lasted for 33 days.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Nasrllah came on TV after the war, he said, this is a preemptive. This was a preemptive war against Israel. We had information that Israel was going to attack us. So they have to say this all the time, because the Lebanese have no interest, including the Shia. They have no interest in. You know, in Palestine, I mean what's in it for them. The people who constructed
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know. You know what the dome of the rock is the most famous yellow top mosque. This is the most famous symbol for the Muslims. This was built by the Umayyad, Caliph Abdul Malik bin Marwan. In 691. The Umayyads killed Imam Hussein in Karballah. So the Shia, hey? The Umayyads like the plague
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and now you want them to go and liberate a mosque that the Umayyads built. So even in the DNA of the Shia, even in the religious mythology of the Shia. This doesn't add up, so they have to always come up with the idea that if we don't go after the Israelis eventually they're going to come after us. Otherwise the Shia wouldn't fight this fight
Avi Melamed: Thank you.
Tamar Sarah Weiss: I just ask a follow up on
Avi Melamed: I'm sorry, Tamar, did you have a
Tamar Sarah Weiss: And a follow up, yeah,
Tamar Sarah Weiss: So if it's coming from Iran and Khomeini like, what's his specific interest in targeting Israel? Just that he doesn't
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Whose specific interest
Tamar Sarah Weiss: Even though he's a that the Iranians have to like, keep convincing them to
Tamar Sarah Weiss: come up with a defense, to continue to attack Israel
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So number one, it gives them an excuse to keep and maintain their militias. So Hezbollah has no reason to exist. If it's not fighting Israel. Who would it fight the Sunni, the Christians of Lebanon, the Syrians. So this is one reason, the other reason, which is for the Iranians more is that when you
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: pretend that you'll be the liberator of Palestine, then you have a claim for the leadership you have to claim to be the, you know the King of all the Muslims as opposed to saying, we have nothing to do with Palestine. So the Shia there the 20% of the total
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Muslim population. So for them to speak their language that mean that minimizes their leadership for them to aspire for global Muslim leadership. They have to speak the global message, which is, you know, let's go after Israel.
Tamar Sarah Weiss: Thank you.
Avi Melamed: Thank you. Carl.
Carl J. Chiappa: Thank you, avi, thank you, Mr. Hussein. You were wonderful. As usual. I have 2 questions which go in completely different directions. The 1st question. I have sort of has to do with the issue that we hear all the time in the legacy media in the Us.
Carl J. Chiappa: Hamas and Hezbollah cannot be defeated.
Carl J. Chiappa: And I've heard American National security experts say, well.
Carl J. Chiappa: one could have said the same thing about the Nazis or about the Japanese militarists, and there aren't very many Nazis, even if we allow for the worst interpretation of the Afd. And there aren't many militaristic imperialists in Japan anymore. So the idea that you cannot defeat Hamas and Hezbollah is just nonsense.
Carl J. Chiappa: and the more I thought about it I've wondered whether there's really a difference, which is that in the case of Japan and Germany, we were defeating state operators, state legitimate State entities, whereas here we have these kind of
Carl J. Chiappa: semi autonomous militias.
Carl J. Chiappa: Leaving aside what's happening at the moment with this
Carl J. Chiappa: a slight resurgence, maybe, of Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Carl J. Chiappa: do you think is a as just as a practical matter? Never mind
Carl J. Chiappa: by what means that that Hezbollah and Hamas can be defeated
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Well, thank you, Carl. Good to see you last time.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: See you.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: We partially discussed this at the synagogue. But yeah, I hear you.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: That's a great question. And
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: listen. Even in Germany, after we defeated the Nazis there remained pockets of of Nazism. There there remained some clashes. I mean it. It was not, I mean. Now it looks as if you know we defeated them in one day
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: after the Hitler burnt himself. Whatever he committed suicide. But now we know that this took some time.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So in the case of these, Hezbollah and and Hamas.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: defeat comes in in many shapes and and colors. So number one. At this point they're defeated as a threat to
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: regional parties, so as as a threat to Israel, they're defeated.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: If Israel now decides to take out the Iranian nuclear. Israel will not be fearing the 150,000 rockets and missiles that Hezbollah had right. So this part has been achieved. The same thing applies to Gaza.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Israel is not scared of of Gazan rockets anymore, or of Hamas rockets anymore.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: but this does not mean that they've vanished, you know they they still have pulse. And now it depends on how we treat this pulse.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: If we treat it in such a way that you know. Let our guard down, and you know, let things go as they are, so that's as if offering them the way to come back.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But if we stay focused. If we keep our eye on the ball, then I think we have a great chance of totally eliminating them in terms of organization. Now, mind you, anyone can jump
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: from anywhere and say, I'm Hezbollah. I love Nasala, and this is the Hezbollah flag. Right? I mean, you can buy the hezbollah flag off of Amazon and and wave it on your, you know, over here in your backyard.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But that's I mean, the point is that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: will they have muscle to do things. I mean, I know a few dozen militias from the days of Lebanese civil war that were really muscular during the Lebanese Civil War, and now you see, 1015, 20 guys of them who are insignificant.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know, who just still carry the name, preach the ideas, but they're inconsequential in terms of political life, and you know, whatever happens in Lebanon. So this can happen to Hezbollah. It has happened to other militias in the past and parties.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: The question here is that.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: do we have to have an end date? This is where I disagree with these. You know the New York Times and all these mainstream media. They want an end date. And mind you, the end date that they want is not
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: one where war ends and we go. We go to peace.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: It's 1 where war ends and we go to a ceasefire.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And you know this is something that has been getting under my skin over the past 2 years that everyone is calling for ceasefire but not peace, you know. So what they're saying technically is, let's give them time to regroup
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and and rebound.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And I think this is this is what at this point, this is what we're fighting with these guys over. We're not fighting over actual military engagements like we used to do, like, you know, a year or a year, half or 2 years back.
Carl J. Chiappa: Not surprisingly, your answer, extremely informative, leads exactly to my my second question, which focuses instead on on America.
Carl J. Chiappa: whether we're talking about the mistakes America made, or
Carl J. Chiappa: the misguided policies that America has pursued.
Carl J. Chiappa: Do you attribute that principally, let us say, to our
Carl J. Chiappa: rather limited understanding of the complexity of the Middle East, of their of the players of the worldviews, the mindsets? Is it partially ignorance of the languages which, of course, would help all of that. Is it naivete, or is it the American tendency
Carl J. Chiappa: to lose interest in things and go to the next problem, or whatever happens to interest America next. What's your diagnosis of? Why we get it wrong so often
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So first, st it's certainly not shortage of know how
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: you know myself and a dozen other people like me. We know the region inside out
Carl J. Chiappa: Of course.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: We are in touch with the administrations, regardless of which party is in power. We brief them all the time they debrief, I mean, we're talking all the time to these guys.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Now, with some we disagree with others. We I mean, you know, everyone will have their opinion
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: at the end of the day.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: But the reason, to my mind, there are 2 main reasons behind America's
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: subpar performance on the Middle East. Number one is impatience, you know we expect things to bear fruit within the lifetime, not even the lifetime within the election cycle. So before Midterm, we have, you probably heard me say, if trump loses.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: things will look different in 2 years from now. So the election cycle and the new cycle is one thing that kills us, and that prevents us from having strategy. Strategy is long term. What we have is
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: social media. And you know, talking points and sound bites. So this is this is number one. This hurts number one hurts our policy, and our state should number one
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: number 2 partisan partisanship and spite.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: This is, I mean, I've been in in Washington for 21 years, doing this thing
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: over all these years. My lesson is that these people, sometimes they oppose one another only for partisanship and spite. If if Biden says it's true, it has to be wrong, and if Trump says it's true, it has to be wrong. And you're thinking, guys, just let's argue the merit of each and every one of these ideas.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: It, you know, separate who says it from what is being said.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So partisanship, I think
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: I I mean the people older than me used to tell me that everything was partisan in in in Washington. Except for foreign policy, it used to be always bipartisan, like during the days of Reagan and Bush senior.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and even Clinton. You know, both parties used to to think together on foreign policy. Unfortunately this is not the case. Now, you know, if Democrats, like Egypt, Republicans, have to hate it, and vice versa.
Carl J. Chiappa: Fascinating. Hopefully. We'll see each other in in Washington, in in May or before then, because I'll be I'll be down there. But thank you very, very much for the
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Please look, we'll be
Carl J. Chiappa: Presentation. Thank you, sir.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Any anytime you're in Washington. Just let me know, Carl
Carl J. Chiappa: Thank you so much. It would be my great pleasure
Avi Melamed: More questions from the fellows
Ben Monroe: I've I've got a question
Avi Melamed: Go ahead!
Ben Monroe: You mentioned. You mentioned a lot of the impacts, and we, Carl, just asked a question on it. I'm curious what your reaction has been to the few months of this last administration, and specifically when it when it comes to what we just learned about the Signal group chat and the activities in Yemen. Do you? Do you see real real consequences for that? I'm curious about your opinion.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Look on foreign policy.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: This administration was until they left in 2022, and is now much better than the biden administration on foreign policy.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and I'm not. I'm not saying this on a partisan in a partisan way, you know. I'm just assessing foreign policy, and the reason why, I say that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: is that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: for some reason the Democrats got into the cycle of being ashamed of being the most powerful country on earth. I mean, this is something that seems to be a source of shame for the Democrats, and they think that we should
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: apologize for this
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: all the time. So we're shielding our swords all the time. We're we're not fighting. We go to the Iranians. We say, if you do this you'll get a carrot
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: if you don't do it, you'll get a smaller carrot.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: This is not foreign policy. Foreign policy is is carrot and stick. You have to. You don't do this. We'll beat you.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: You want us. You don't want us to beat you. Do that.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So the trump Administration is not ashamed of American power. Now the downside of the trump administration is that
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: sometimes we are, or his foreign policy is incumbent on the swings of his moods.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: so no one knows which which direction he's going, you know. Some might say, this is good, that our enemies will will stay on their toes, yes, and our allies too, and ourselves. So not only the enemies are on to. We are on our toes, too, I mean God knows what he'll say tomorrow.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So this is the downside in terms of the signal thing. Look, I mean.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: yeah, I think this is this is us news cycle thing, I mean as a foreign policy practitioner. It does. It's irrelevant to us. It doesn't hurt us. It doesn't improve our position. It's it's just. It's it's just a nothing, Burger, I mean. I know Jeff Goldberg.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: You know. He's he's in the same line of work that that I used to be. He's a decent guy, and he knew that if he's if he says it out loud. He's going to get a
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: his. His sales will surge by, you know, multi factor.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: And, by the way, by doing so he cut himself out of information.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So I don't think he'll be hearing from the administration until a new one comes. So it's it's a balancing act that takes into consideration, sales and access to information and stuff.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: but it has no bearings whatsoever on whether the houthis I don't think the Houthis were reading the Atlantic, and you know, and waiting for Jeff Goldberg to to know what will happen to them.
Avi Melamed: Thank you. More questions.
Avi Melamed: Yeah. Okay.
Avi Melamed: Well, if there are no Hussein is there something you want to add in Brooklyn? You want to ask something
Brooklyn Tory (she/her): Yeah, I was curious, because you did just mention, and I believe it was Ben just mentioned the group chat issue with the Houthi attack. Do you see that as a genuine mistake, could you elaborate a bit more on how you see that issue even happened, and what that means for the administration and just general security measures in the Us.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Look it, it affects.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: It erodes the trust and confidence that Americans might have in their own administration that their administration knows what they're doing, and that they observe security protocols that keep
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: them the officials safe, and you know, by extension keeps America safe.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: So that's the only point that I can think of in terms of foreign policy. Like, I said, it is irrelevant to foreign policy.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: It's not like, you know, if you read the messages, both these will know our secrets or our
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: tactics, or you know, so it's it. It does not harm our foreign policy or change anything, or gives it does not give
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: the enemy's advantage over us, but, like I said it.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: it shakes confidence. It shakes American confidence in their own administration.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: and of course you have to add to that the factor of spinning. You know.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Democrats are in the opposition. They'll spin it. They'll blow it out of proportion.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Republicans are in office. They'll cover it up out of proportion, and they try to make it as if it's a nothing issue. And it doesn't exist. This is partisanship. And like I said, you know I'm a person who who talks about policy, not politics, but I mean, since you asked, I'll just give you my opinion. I don't think it affects policy, you know. It's just politics and
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: give it a week or so. It'll just, you know, blow over. People will forget that it ever exist, I mean, unless you're running against the other guys, you'll probably try to use it for the next election, but otherwise I don't see any relevance to foreign policy
Brooklyn Tory (she/her): Thank you.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: You're welcome.
Avi Melamed: So if there are no more questions. Hosan, is there something else you want to add, or some kind of like final comments, or something
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Nothing really.
Avi Melamed: Okay.
Avi Melamed: so if that's the case. We are about to conclude this session. First, st I want to thank Mr. Hosan Abdel Hussein for his significant and valuable insights and perspectives. I would mention that Hussein will be joining us on the meeting on May 19th
Avi Melamed: in DC.
Avi Melamed: Again. Who knows by then what's going to be in the region? Because every day is a new story, as we all know, lots of dynamics. Next week we have a session focusing on another very significant
Avi Melamed: and arena in this region. Jordan. We will be talking about Jordan next week with our next upcoming educator, guest, educator. And so until then, once again, Hosan, thank you so much.
Avi Melamed: Thank you for participating. Thank you for
Avi Melamed: patients and her happy Edel Fitter, until I won't
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Okay.
Avi Melamed: Stay with, take care, be fine! Bye-bye.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Thank you. Bye-bye.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain: Thank you.
Ori Josell: Thank you.