Earlier Saturday, Lebanon’s President Michel Suleiman named Saad Hariri his country’s new prime minister. Hariri’s liberal democratic party won the elections for Parliament earlier this month: it occupies 71 of the 128 seats. The remaining seats went to extremist, nay terrorist, organization Hizbullah.

Although it is certainly bad news that Hizbullah has become so big in Lebanon, it could have been worse. Many feared that Hizbullah would win. Luckily, this was not the case.

Saad Hariri is the son of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, who was assassinated by Syria. He succeeds Fuad Siniora, his political ally.

Hariri’s party is (relatively) pro-Western, pro-peace, pro-human rights, and pro-freedom. Like his father before him, these are also Hariri’s main characteristics. (more…)

Today, elections will be held in Lebanon. It are exciting elections, alright. Moderates against Islamists. Pragmatic democrats against the Islamist Hezbollah group. Whomever wins, will determine the direction of the country for years to come.

We in the West can only hope that Hezbollah will not be victorious.| MORE ›

Adding to its much coveted resume as “Europe’s bridge to the Middle East”, Turkey has now been officially recognized as the facilitator of talks between Israel and Syria. Whether or not the Israeli media agrees with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s motivations for publicizing the existence of talks, Turkey can at least shine in the warm spotlight of international recognition for a few weeks. (more…)

King Abdullah of Jordan warned Israel and the United States that if Israel would not agree to a peace deal with the Palestinians, war between Arabs and the Jewish nation-state would inevitably follow 12-18 months from now.| MORE ›