December 11, 2024 • 19 mins
This is a teaser preview of one of our Radical Reads episodes, made exclusively for our supporters on patreon. You can listen to the full 91-minute episode without ads and support our work at https://www.patreon.com/posts/e97-radical-10-116392240
In this episode, we talk to Elia Ayoub, a Lebanese activist and scholar of Palestinian heritage, about his recent article, 'Hezbollah: 10 Things You Need To Know'. In this article, Elia gives a fantastic insight into Hezbollah's origins and its position within the various conflicts and connections that make up politics in the Middle East.
We discuss how Hezbollah came out of the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon, the social and class composition of the organisation, and its relationship to other regimes in the Middle East as well as the Lebanese left and social movements.
Listen to the full episode here:
More info:
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/working-class-history--5711490/support.
In this episode, we talk to Elia Ayoub, a Lebanese activist and scholar of Palestinian heritage, about his recent article, 'Hezbollah: 10 Things You Need To Know'. In this article, Elia gives a fantastic insight into Hezbollah's origins and its position within the various conflicts and connections that make up politics in the Middle East.
We discuss how Hezbollah came out of the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon, the social and class composition of the organisation, and its relationship to other regimes in the Middle East as well as the Lebanese left and social movements.
Listen to the full episode here:
More info:
- Read Elia's article: 'Hezbollah: 10 Things You Need To Know'
- Check out Elia's website: hauntalogies.net
- Listen to his fantastic podcast, The Fire These Times
- Full information and show notes at: https://www.patreon.com/posts/e97-radical-10-116392240
- Thanks to our patreon supporters for making this podcast possible. Special thanks to Jazz Hands, Jamison D. Saltsman, Fernando López Ojeda, Jeremy Cusimano, and Nick Williams.
- The episode image depicts Hezbollah fighters at a ceremony. Credit: Ali Khamenei website (with additional design by WCH). Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
- Edited by Jesse French
- Our theme tune is Montaigne’s version of the classic labour movement anthem, ‘Bread and Roses’, performed by Montaigne and Nick Harriott, and mixed by Wave Racer. Download the song here, with all proceeds going to Medical Aid for Palestinians. More from Montaigne: website, Instagram, YouTube.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/working-class-history--5711490/support.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi everyone. As you might know, we don't get any
sort of funding from any wealthy benefactors, academic institutions, governments,
or political parties. Our work is funded by you, our
listeners and readers on Patreon. In return, our supporters on
Patreon get access to exclusive content and benefits like ad
free episodes, bonus podcast episodes, and two exclusive Patreon only
(00:23):
podcast series, Fireside Chats and Radical Reads. So here's a
little preview of our latest Patreon only episode. You can
join us, help support our work and listen to the
full episode today at patreon dot com slash working class
History link in the show notes.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
As we come, Margin Martin and the Beauty of the Day,
A million dark in kitchens, one thousand mil last grade
are branden by the beauty, his sun Sun discloses, and
the paople here as bretten' roses bad Roses.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Hi everyone, and welcome to the second episode in our
Radical Reads series, a series in which we talk about
historical and political texts that we think are important for
workers and radicals to read, discuss, and inform our organizing.
A quick note that this episode contains discussion of war crimes,
sexual violence, and torture. Our Radical read for this episode
(01:25):
is Alia A. Yub's recent article hes Bolla Ten Things
You Need to Know. Elia would introduce himself properly in
a moment, but as a brief introduction to his introduction.
He's a Lebanese Palestinian activist and co founder of the
excellent Fire These Times podcast, which seeks to developed properly
internationalist perspectives on politics, not just in the Middle East,
(01:47):
but more generally in the Global South or what they
sometimes call, quite usefully in my opinion, the global Periphery.
So we invited Eleion to discuss his article on Hezbollah.
We felt that it was important to do so as
a year after beginning its genocidal campaign in Gaza, Israel
has now expanded its military actions into Lebanon, supposedly with
(02:09):
the aim of degrading Hesbela's military capability and allow and
evacuated Israelis to return to their homes in northern Israel
and the occupied Goden Heights. The reality of this is
that Israel has launched yet another monstrous invasion of Lebanon.
Beyond the supposedly targeted pagro and radio attacks, which we
discuss in more detail later, thousands of Lebanese civilians have
(02:31):
already been killed and over a million displaced. Israeli attacks
have also not been limited to southern Lebanon, but also
the capital Beirute, where whole tower blocks have been leveled
by Israeli bombs, and even the North. Israeli attacks have
forced hospitals to close, and firefighters, emergency rescue and hospital
workers have all been killed while trying to save the
(02:52):
victims of Israeli aggression, with euromed human rights monitors suggesting
that the Israeli army is intentionally targeting rescue workers and
for those laboring under the impression that somehow Israel's invasion
is supposed to protect Lebanese Christians. Israel has also bombed
a church housing displaced people in southern Lebanon and a
Christian majority town in the north. If all of this
(03:16):
feels chillingly familiar, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanya who spelled
it out explicitly in a recent televised address. In it,
he threatened the Lebanese people with quote the abyss of
a long war that will lead to destruction and suffering
like we see in Gaza.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
End quote.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
Here we see the genocide that Israel claims not to
be carrying out in Gaza used as a threat against
Lebanon and indeed others in the region. Unsurprisingly, much of
this has even been left out of or de emphasized
in mainstream accounts of the conflict and of Hesbula itself. Furthermore,
much of the narrative talks about Lebanon as a monolith
(03:56):
and speaks about the conflict between Israel and Hesbola in
in a way that simplifies a much more complex reality
in Lebanon, not just in terms of religious and sectarian divisions,
but also in terms of the class struggle and social
antagonism in the country, some of which we discussed in
this episode. I've already gone on for far too long,
but before we start, it's important to say that in
(04:18):
our discussion me and Elijah sometimes mentioned some things that
we didn't get around to explaining who or what they are.
So here are some brief explanations of some of the
key terms and names that we mention. These are also
gathered together in a glossary that will put in the
show notes. So Sunni and Shia refer to the two
main branches of Islam, with Sunni Islam being the far
(04:39):
larger of the two. Sunni Islam is the official religion
of Saudi Arabia, while Shia Islam is the official religion
of Iran. Hassan Israla was the former General secretary of
Hezbollah until his assassination by Israel earlier this year. Bashar
al Asad is the current President of Syria, a position
that he's held since July two thousand and when he
(05:00):
took over from his dad, Hafez Alasad, who had himself
been president since nineteen seventy one. Within these fifty plus
years of dictatorship run by father and son, Syria occupied
Lebanon for almost thirty years, which Ala will speak more about.
The occupation spanned almost the entirety of Halfes' reign, starting
in nineteen seventy six and only ended when Bashah withdrew
(05:24):
in two thousand and five. The PLO refers to the
Palestine Liberation Organization. The PLO is made up of a
number of largely secular nationalist groups and is the official
representative of the Palestinian people recognized by the UN and Israel. However,
while in the past the PLO was called for the
dissolution of the State of Israel and took part in
(05:45):
armed action against it, and indeed some of its constituent
members still do. It is often seen as having been
co opted due to its official renunciation of political violence
and recognition of Israel in the nineties. Notably, Hamas is
not a member of the PLO. The Muslim Brotherhood is
a transnational conservative Sunni Muslim organization that originated in Egypt.
(06:10):
In Palestine, the Muslim Brotherhood was fundamental in creating the
institutional basis for what would become HAMAS. In Lebanon, the
Muslim Brotherhood is represented by a political party called the
Islamic Group, which has its own military wing. We mentioned
Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and Syria. In both cases, many
(06:31):
of these are individuals and their descendants who are expelled
from Palestine by Zionist paramilitaries during the nineteen forty eight war,
also known as the Nakba, which is the Arabic word
for catastrophe. We cover these events in more detail in
our podcast episodes eighty six and eighty seven. There are
around one hundred and seventy four thousand Palestinian refugees in
(06:52):
Lebanon and four hundred and thirty eight thousand in Syria,
all refuse the right to return home by Israel and
with diminishtriting in their host countries, and in the case
of Syria, victims to a number of massacres at the
hands of pro Sad forces during the Syrian Civil War,
such as the Armuk massacre in twenty fourteen. Finally, we
(07:13):
mentioned the Sabra and Shatila massacre, which was the nineteen
eighty two massacre at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps
in Beirut. Over a forty hour period between two thousand
and three thousand, five hundred Palestinians were killed by Lebanese
Christian forces. This was done with the full support of
the Israeli army, who had surrounded the camps to block
(07:34):
Palestinians from escaping and allowed the Christian Malicius to enter,
at which point they carried out acts of murder, rape
and torture against the civilian population, including children as young
as three or four. With that important and often harrowing context,
will now let Eliyah introduce himself.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
So my name is Idi, a yub from Lebanon.
Speaker 4 (07:57):
Acre up there also better in origins, which has informed
part of my politics, first within a Lebanese context, and
then let's say internationally or towards like having more nuanced
take on internationalism. Let's put it that way for now.
I'm a post doctor researcher. I have a PhD on
post to Elebanon from the University of Zurich, currently based
(08:20):
in the UK. And yeah, I have a podcast qualified
these Times, a newsletter called Ontologies. I do a bunch
of projects here and there. I contribute to a Jazeera
at ninety seven to two mag a bunch of other
places others. I'm an editor for Shadow mag. I do
different tasks here and there, mostly on the Middle East,
(08:41):
but not only Well, yeah, I know.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
You sound extremely busy. I'm very pleased that you've found
the time to come and chat to us.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
I guess, yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
I mean the first thing really would be to say,
you know, why do you feel the need to write
this article right now at this moment.
Speaker 4 (08:58):
Yeah. I wrote this piece on hesball Llah for my newsletter,
mostly to kind of get it out of my head,
to be honest with you, It did get much more
attention than I expected it, especially as I framed it
in the form of realistical, which is not I've never
done that, but I kind of felt that it was
important to do because I'm gonna say, eighty plus percent
(09:22):
of things I've read in at the very least the
English press, although honestly the French press has been more
or less the same.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
On hesbald Lah has been not.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Necessarily factually inaccurate all the time, although that has been
a big problem.
Speaker 3 (09:36):
But let's say, just missing the.
Speaker 4 (09:37):
Mark a lot of the time, or focusing on certain
things and not others as part of a wider narrative.
That is not surprising. It's not the first time that
this happens sot, not the first time that there's a
war between Hesball and Israel, but I think the stakes
have been so much higher now since the genocide Satin.
This is about twelve over a year ago now that yeah,
(09:59):
I felt like something to be said for whatever that's worth.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
Yeah, no, absolutely, I mean I think for me, I
think one of the starkest things was after the Israeli
kind of pager attacks and kind of the response from
a lot of the mainstream media being like, how could
you want an attack to be any more precise? You know,
It's like Hezbollah militants had these pages and how much
(10:26):
more precise do you want Israel to be? And it's
you feel like you're going mad because it's felt like
so many people were saying something so insanely wrong that
you don't even know where to start, you know. And
I guess we'll get onto that later about the page,
(10:46):
but sor, I don't know if you wanted to.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
Oh no, just that I think the very words targeted
and precise and all of these have been just kind
of meaningless been used in very different ways that and
also used in ways that like they can be literally
accurate and like for example, or this was the targeted
strike on the hospital, Yeah, it was still a targeted
strike on the hospital, right, like the fire.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
That was targeted doesn't.
Speaker 4 (11:11):
If anything, it makes your culpability higher because we also
have intent now. So I don't know, there have been
quite a lot of politics of language, which is actually
part of my background as well, so I've been a
bit obsessed on that.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
But we can get into that maybe.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely, I mean, I mean I guess
now would be a great time to go into kind
of what is his boola? And also, you know, can
you say a little bit about their origins. Where did
they come from?
Speaker 4 (11:37):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure, I've gone through this, the genesis
of the party. I think i've memorized it by now.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (11:44):
So they really came into the scene roughly a decade
into delib In in civil war. That's extremely important to understand.
There was an entire decade before they were of any
heat relevance. They didn't exist before eighty three, more or less,
but they officially formed in eighty five, and the Liliberines
Civil War, I should say, started in seventy five.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
Even Thelibanese Civil War as a term is a bit.
Speaker 4 (12:07):
Of a misnomer, just in the sense that there were
a bunch of different wars, a munch of different episodes,
a bunch of different actors, some not being there, you know,
not being around by the time it ended in nineteen
ninety and.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
So on and so forth.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
So that's important for number of reasons, because by the
time they came into the scene in Lebanon, there were
a bunch of different things already happening. There was they say,
in invasion in seventy six. There were multiple Israeli incursions,
including the Factor invasion that was short lasting, before eighty two,
and then obviously in nineteen eighty two the Israelis did
the fal Skin invasion and siege of Bayhood, which was
(12:42):
followed by the Sabuncatina massacre by their allies differentists, where
the israet Is quite literally preventing partestinants from leaving the
camps for three entire days. And then of course the
as I said the siege of Baywood and then they
would do and they occupied South Lebanon until two thousand,
so that's eighteen years of occupation. And it's in that
(13:03):
period that Hesbula came into the game. There was no Hasbala.
Before there was a movement called Amal, which means hope
in Arabic. I'm gonna be genuinalistic about Amahe because they're
very messy. But it started off as a working class movement,
largely among Shias in the South, but not just. One
of their founders was a Greek Catholic Melchite bishop. It
(13:24):
was secular and orientation borderline nationalists at times, but because
it was mostly working class and most of the South
was working class, and most of the working class in
the South was Shias, it was mostly a Shia Muslim
Out of Amal came a number of different parties. Long
story short, Hesbela was one of them. Some of the
(13:44):
early members of Hesbadla, some of their founders were part
of Nosola himself. If however, briefly, they were disillusioned with
Amal for various reasons. One, Ammal did not have good
funding and good weaponry. They by that time were already
very corrupt because they had participated in the libyanes of
war for ten years by then moles and so there
(14:05):
was a lot of corruption, a lot of warlordism, all
of that stuff. Moktata Sudd, who was the founder of Amal,
was forcibly disappeared in Libya, very likely killed by Kadaffi.
That he hated the power vacum, which led to Nebhiberia, who
is still in power to this day, who is not
oliously curbed. Long story short, They were seen as complacent
(14:25):
at the very least, if not complicit, in this radioccupation
of South Lebanon.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
Amal was battling a bunch.
Speaker 4 (14:31):
Of Palestinian armed groups at the same time at that time,
and that he hated a bunch of resentment. If you want,
we're want to put it that way, that led to
the oas of Hesbadla, which unlike Amal, had.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
A very religious character.
Speaker 4 (14:45):
So Hesbela came out of the Iranian revolution in nineteen
seventy nine, the theocratic one that put the Iotola in power.
Now we're with the second Ayatola. Of course, doesn't mean
that they are an Iranian party. They are a Lebanese party,
but they were filmed with that ideology constructure in a
very specific context, which was South Lebanon. Their leaders, whether
it's Mussawi the first leader, obviously Noscula after him, whether
(15:10):
it's a made Mornillier who was actually the leader of
Islamic Jihad organization but then became the number two of Hesballlah,
and others that are Some have minor roles, some have political,
overtly political roles, other more like let's say, religious leaders.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Some both. Nozula was both a clerk and a wordlord
at the same time.
Speaker 4 (15:29):
They managed to kind of, let's say, impose discipline on
a nascent militia that then became a de facto army
to resist the Israelio occupation in South Lebanon, and for
many people this was the first time they see anything
remotely effective targeting the Israelis, which has helped has.
Speaker 3 (15:47):
Balalah go in power. Now.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Parallel to all of this, hasbal Llah launched a campaign
of assassinations against prominent leftists who were also from the
same community, so she has This was two prominent names
that are usually mentioned, or there were more than that.
Seen Rue who was in his Ibeti seventies or eighties,
even better than I think, suffering from cancer or something
(16:11):
like that, and was assassinated in the middle of the
night like gunshot, and about three months later I believe
this was in nineteen eighty seven, Mehdia Amel, who was
by then already in hiding because he knew that Hesballa
was coming for him, and he wrote about it at
the time. They found him after three or four months
and they killed him as well. This served the same
(16:31):
purpose kind of. I described it as kind of the
Iranian playbook. For those who know the Iranian Revolution had
a pretty sizable participation of communists in the early days
until the toppling of the show, and then once that happened.
Even if I'm not missing, I don't know Irani history
as well. But if I'm not mistaken, even before that
that really happened. They cracked down started against them by
(16:53):
the nascent aetol Cotola movement effectively, which would become the
the theocratic regym, which.
Speaker 3 (17:00):
Which continues to this day.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
So Hesbeula kind of did more or less the same thing, really,
but in the Lebanese context, and this did not really
stop or most recent assassination was twenty twenty one against
the Lacom and Slim in early days in early twenty
twenty one.
Speaker 3 (17:12):
Sorry, so this is the eighties.
Speaker 4 (17:15):
By the time the Libinies of war officially ended in
nineteen ninety, all of the militias were expected or were
supposed to hand their weapons to the army or be
absorbed into the Libine's army. There was an exception that
was imposed by halves Lessad, Serian dictator at the time
Basha's father, of course, that the exception would be to
Hasbela because of Hesballa's role and resisting. Is again the
(17:38):
quick background to that is that Hesbella and Ammal were
actually at war. They called it the harbel Ekue the
War of brothers in the late eighties.
Speaker 3 (17:47):
They later called it that.
Speaker 4 (17:48):
At the time, they did not call it that, and
The long story shoot again is that Ammal was backed
by the Syrians and Hesbella was backed by the Iranians.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
They fought each other, they killed each other.
Speaker 4 (17:57):
Hesbala I that battle or battle, and part of that
compromises that Hesbella would take care of weapons stuff, military stuff,
resistant stuff, and Amal would get into government. Hence why
and Nebhibberia became the leader of Amal became a Speaker
of parliament in nineteen ninety three, three years after the
end of the civil war and the Toifik came in
which officially ended it, and remains speaker of Parliament basically
(18:19):
my entire life to this day.
Speaker 3 (18:21):
That was the nineties, so the nineties has Bla grew.
Speaker 4 (18:24):
By then, the communists, secular nationalist pro Palestinians, including Palestinian
militias and armed groups, had been, if not entirely crushed
by the various invasions, first the Syrion one Houfves Lesserds
and then the Israeli one, who were both invading Lebanon
with the stated intention of crushing the Palestinian resistance against
(18:44):
is Raeli occupation, including Hufs Lessered, which people don't like
to think about too much, and then yeah, so they
were kind of weakened by the nineties and Hesbala was
basically the only game in town.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
That brings us to the end of this episode. Preview
To listen to the full thing and help support our
work researching and promoting people's history, join us on Patreon
at patreon dot com slash working class history link in
the show notes.
Hi everyone. As you might know, we don't get any
sort of funding from any wealthy benefactors, academic institutions, governments,
or political parties. Our work is funded by you, our
listeners and readers on Patreon. In return, our supporters on
Patreon get access to exclusive content and benefits like ad
free episodes, bonus podcast episodes, and two exclusive Patreon only
(00:23):
podcast series, Fireside Chats and Radical Reads. So here's a
little preview of our latest Patreon only episode. You can
join us, help support our work and listen to the
full episode today at patreon dot com slash working class
History link in the show notes.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
As we come, Margin Martin and the Beauty of the Day,
A million dark in kitchens, one thousand mil last grade
are branden by the beauty, his sun Sun discloses, and
the paople here as bretten' roses bad Roses.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Hi everyone, and welcome to the second episode in our
Radical Reads series, a series in which we talk about
historical and political texts that we think are important for
workers and radicals to read, discuss, and inform our organizing.
A quick note that this episode contains discussion of war crimes,
sexual violence, and torture. Our Radical read for this episode
(01:25):
is Alia A. Yub's recent article hes Bolla Ten Things
You Need to Know. Elia would introduce himself properly in
a moment, but as a brief introduction to his introduction.
He's a Lebanese Palestinian activist and co founder of the
excellent Fire These Times podcast, which seeks to developed properly
internationalist perspectives on politics, not just in the Middle East,
(01:47):
but more generally in the Global South or what they
sometimes call, quite usefully in my opinion, the global Periphery.
So we invited Eleion to discuss his article on Hezbollah.
We felt that it was important to do so as
a year after beginning its genocidal campaign in Gaza, Israel
has now expanded its military actions into Lebanon, supposedly with
(02:09):
the aim of degrading Hesbela's military capability and allow and
evacuated Israelis to return to their homes in northern Israel
and the occupied Goden Heights. The reality of this is
that Israel has launched yet another monstrous invasion of Lebanon.
Beyond the supposedly targeted pagro and radio attacks, which we
discuss in more detail later, thousands of Lebanese civilians have
(02:31):
already been killed and over a million displaced. Israeli attacks
have also not been limited to southern Lebanon, but also
the capital Beirute, where whole tower blocks have been leveled
by Israeli bombs, and even the North. Israeli attacks have
forced hospitals to close, and firefighters, emergency rescue and hospital
workers have all been killed while trying to save the
(02:52):
victims of Israeli aggression, with euromed human rights monitors suggesting
that the Israeli army is intentionally targeting rescue workers and
for those laboring under the impression that somehow Israel's invasion
is supposed to protect Lebanese Christians. Israel has also bombed
a church housing displaced people in southern Lebanon and a
Christian majority town in the north. If all of this
(03:16):
feels chillingly familiar, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanya who spelled
it out explicitly in a recent televised address. In it,
he threatened the Lebanese people with quote the abyss of
a long war that will lead to destruction and suffering
like we see in Gaza.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
End quote.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
Here we see the genocide that Israel claims not to
be carrying out in Gaza used as a threat against
Lebanon and indeed others in the region. Unsurprisingly, much of
this has even been left out of or de emphasized
in mainstream accounts of the conflict and of Hesbula itself. Furthermore,
much of the narrative talks about Lebanon as a monolith
(03:56):
and speaks about the conflict between Israel and Hesbola in
in a way that simplifies a much more complex reality
in Lebanon, not just in terms of religious and sectarian divisions,
but also in terms of the class struggle and social
antagonism in the country, some of which we discussed in
this episode. I've already gone on for far too long,
but before we start, it's important to say that in
(04:18):
our discussion me and Elijah sometimes mentioned some things that
we didn't get around to explaining who or what they are.
So here are some brief explanations of some of the
key terms and names that we mention. These are also
gathered together in a glossary that will put in the
show notes. So Sunni and Shia refer to the two
main branches of Islam, with Sunni Islam being the far
(04:39):
larger of the two. Sunni Islam is the official religion
of Saudi Arabia, while Shia Islam is the official religion
of Iran. Hassan Israla was the former General secretary of
Hezbollah until his assassination by Israel earlier this year. Bashar
al Asad is the current President of Syria, a position
that he's held since July two thousand and when he
(05:00):
took over from his dad, Hafez Alasad, who had himself
been president since nineteen seventy one. Within these fifty plus
years of dictatorship run by father and son, Syria occupied
Lebanon for almost thirty years, which Ala will speak more about.
The occupation spanned almost the entirety of Halfes' reign, starting
in nineteen seventy six and only ended when Bashah withdrew
(05:24):
in two thousand and five. The PLO refers to the
Palestine Liberation Organization. The PLO is made up of a
number of largely secular nationalist groups and is the official
representative of the Palestinian people recognized by the UN and Israel. However,
while in the past the PLO was called for the
dissolution of the State of Israel and took part in
(05:45):
armed action against it, and indeed some of its constituent
members still do. It is often seen as having been
co opted due to its official renunciation of political violence
and recognition of Israel in the nineties. Notably, Hamas is
not a member of the PLO. The Muslim Brotherhood is
a transnational conservative Sunni Muslim organization that originated in Egypt.
(06:10):
In Palestine, the Muslim Brotherhood was fundamental in creating the
institutional basis for what would become HAMAS. In Lebanon, the
Muslim Brotherhood is represented by a political party called the
Islamic Group, which has its own military wing. We mentioned
Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and Syria. In both cases, many
(06:31):
of these are individuals and their descendants who are expelled
from Palestine by Zionist paramilitaries during the nineteen forty eight war,
also known as the Nakba, which is the Arabic word
for catastrophe. We cover these events in more detail in
our podcast episodes eighty six and eighty seven. There are
around one hundred and seventy four thousand Palestinian refugees in
(06:52):
Lebanon and four hundred and thirty eight thousand in Syria,
all refuse the right to return home by Israel and
with diminishtriting in their host countries, and in the case
of Syria, victims to a number of massacres at the
hands of pro Sad forces during the Syrian Civil War,
such as the Armuk massacre in twenty fourteen. Finally, we
(07:13):
mentioned the Sabra and Shatila massacre, which was the nineteen
eighty two massacre at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps
in Beirut. Over a forty hour period between two thousand
and three thousand, five hundred Palestinians were killed by Lebanese
Christian forces. This was done with the full support of
the Israeli army, who had surrounded the camps to block
(07:34):
Palestinians from escaping and allowed the Christian Malicius to enter,
at which point they carried out acts of murder, rape
and torture against the civilian population, including children as young
as three or four. With that important and often harrowing context,
will now let Eliyah introduce himself.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
So my name is Idi, a yub from Lebanon.
Speaker 4 (07:57):
Acre up there also better in origins, which has informed
part of my politics, first within a Lebanese context, and
then let's say internationally or towards like having more nuanced
take on internationalism. Let's put it that way for now.
I'm a post doctor researcher. I have a PhD on
post to Elebanon from the University of Zurich, currently based
(08:20):
in the UK. And yeah, I have a podcast qualified
these Times, a newsletter called Ontologies. I do a bunch
of projects here and there. I contribute to a Jazeera
at ninety seven to two mag a bunch of other
places others. I'm an editor for Shadow mag. I do
different tasks here and there, mostly on the Middle East,
(08:41):
but not only Well, yeah, I know.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
You sound extremely busy. I'm very pleased that you've found
the time to come and chat to us.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
I guess, yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
I mean the first thing really would be to say,
you know, why do you feel the need to write
this article right now at this moment.
Speaker 4 (08:58):
Yeah. I wrote this piece on hesball Llah for my newsletter,
mostly to kind of get it out of my head,
to be honest with you, It did get much more
attention than I expected it, especially as I framed it
in the form of realistical, which is not I've never
done that, but I kind of felt that it was
important to do because I'm gonna say, eighty plus percent
(09:22):
of things I've read in at the very least the
English press, although honestly the French press has been more
or less the same.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
On hesbald Lah has been not.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Necessarily factually inaccurate all the time, although that has been
a big problem.
Speaker 3 (09:36):
But let's say, just missing the.
Speaker 4 (09:37):
Mark a lot of the time, or focusing on certain
things and not others as part of a wider narrative.
That is not surprising. It's not the first time that
this happens sot, not the first time that there's a
war between Hesball and Israel, but I think the stakes
have been so much higher now since the genocide Satin.
This is about twelve over a year ago now that yeah,
(09:59):
I felt like something to be said for whatever that's worth.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
Yeah, no, absolutely, I mean I think for me, I
think one of the starkest things was after the Israeli
kind of pager attacks and kind of the response from
a lot of the mainstream media being like, how could
you want an attack to be any more precise? You know,
It's like Hezbollah militants had these pages and how much
(10:26):
more precise do you want Israel to be? And it's
you feel like you're going mad because it's felt like
so many people were saying something so insanely wrong that
you don't even know where to start, you know. And
I guess we'll get onto that later about the page,
(10:46):
but sor, I don't know if you wanted to.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
Oh no, just that I think the very words targeted
and precise and all of these have been just kind
of meaningless been used in very different ways that and
also used in ways that like they can be literally
accurate and like for example, or this was the targeted
strike on the hospital, Yeah, it was still a targeted
strike on the hospital, right, like the fire.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
That was targeted doesn't.
Speaker 4 (11:11):
If anything, it makes your culpability higher because we also
have intent now. So I don't know, there have been
quite a lot of politics of language, which is actually
part of my background as well, so I've been a
bit obsessed on that.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
But we can get into that maybe.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely, I mean, I mean I guess
now would be a great time to go into kind
of what is his boola? And also, you know, can
you say a little bit about their origins. Where did
they come from?
Speaker 4 (11:37):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure, I've gone through this, the genesis
of the party. I think i've memorized it by now.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (11:44):
So they really came into the scene roughly a decade
into delib In in civil war. That's extremely important to understand.
There was an entire decade before they were of any
heat relevance. They didn't exist before eighty three, more or less,
but they officially formed in eighty five, and the Liliberines
Civil War, I should say, started in seventy five.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
Even Thelibanese Civil War as a term is a bit.
Speaker 4 (12:07):
Of a misnomer, just in the sense that there were
a bunch of different wars, a munch of different episodes,
a bunch of different actors, some not being there, you know,
not being around by the time it ended in nineteen
ninety and.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
So on and so forth.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
So that's important for number of reasons, because by the
time they came into the scene in Lebanon, there were
a bunch of different things already happening. There was they say,
in invasion in seventy six. There were multiple Israeli incursions,
including the Factor invasion that was short lasting, before eighty two,
and then obviously in nineteen eighty two the Israelis did
the fal Skin invasion and siege of Bayhood, which was
(12:42):
followed by the Sabuncatina massacre by their allies differentists, where
the israet Is quite literally preventing partestinants from leaving the
camps for three entire days. And then of course the
as I said the siege of Baywood and then they
would do and they occupied South Lebanon until two thousand,
so that's eighteen years of occupation. And it's in that
(13:03):
period that Hesbula came into the game. There was no Hasbala.
Before there was a movement called Amal, which means hope
in Arabic. I'm gonna be genuinalistic about Amahe because they're
very messy. But it started off as a working class movement,
largely among Shias in the South, but not just. One
of their founders was a Greek Catholic Melchite bishop. It
(13:24):
was secular and orientation borderline nationalists at times, but because
it was mostly working class and most of the South
was working class, and most of the working class in
the South was Shias, it was mostly a Shia Muslim
Out of Amal came a number of different parties. Long
story short, Hesbela was one of them. Some of the
(13:44):
early members of Hesbadla, some of their founders were part
of Nosola himself. If however, briefly, they were disillusioned with
Amal for various reasons. One, Ammal did not have good
funding and good weaponry. They by that time were already
very corrupt because they had participated in the libyanes of
war for ten years by then moles and so there
(14:05):
was a lot of corruption, a lot of warlordism, all
of that stuff. Moktata Sudd, who was the founder of Amal,
was forcibly disappeared in Libya, very likely killed by Kadaffi.
That he hated the power vacum, which led to Nebhiberia, who
is still in power to this day, who is not
oliously curbed. Long story short, They were seen as complacent
(14:25):
at the very least, if not complicit, in this radioccupation
of South Lebanon.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
Amal was battling a bunch.
Speaker 4 (14:31):
Of Palestinian armed groups at the same time at that time,
and that he hated a bunch of resentment. If you want,
we're want to put it that way, that led to
the oas of Hesbadla, which unlike Amal, had.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
A very religious character.
Speaker 4 (14:45):
So Hesbela came out of the Iranian revolution in nineteen
seventy nine, the theocratic one that put the Iotola in power.
Now we're with the second Ayatola. Of course, doesn't mean
that they are an Iranian party. They are a Lebanese party,
but they were filmed with that ideology constructure in a
very specific context, which was South Lebanon. Their leaders, whether
it's Mussawi the first leader, obviously Noscula after him, whether
(15:10):
it's a made Mornillier who was actually the leader of
Islamic Jihad organization but then became the number two of Hesballlah,
and others that are Some have minor roles, some have political,
overtly political roles, other more like let's say, religious leaders.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Some both. Nozula was both a clerk and a wordlord
at the same time.
Speaker 4 (15:29):
They managed to kind of, let's say, impose discipline on
a nascent militia that then became a de facto army
to resist the Israelio occupation in South Lebanon, and for
many people this was the first time they see anything
remotely effective targeting the Israelis, which has helped has.
Speaker 3 (15:47):
Balalah go in power. Now.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Parallel to all of this, hasbal Llah launched a campaign
of assassinations against prominent leftists who were also from the
same community, so she has This was two prominent names
that are usually mentioned, or there were more than that.
Seen Rue who was in his Ibeti seventies or eighties,
even better than I think, suffering from cancer or something
(16:11):
like that, and was assassinated in the middle of the
night like gunshot, and about three months later I believe
this was in nineteen eighty seven, Mehdia Amel, who was
by then already in hiding because he knew that Hesballa
was coming for him, and he wrote about it at
the time. They found him after three or four months
and they killed him as well. This served the same
(16:31):
purpose kind of. I described it as kind of the
Iranian playbook. For those who know the Iranian Revolution had
a pretty sizable participation of communists in the early days
until the toppling of the show, and then once that happened.
Even if I'm not missing, I don't know Irani history
as well. But if I'm not mistaken, even before that
that really happened. They cracked down started against them by
(16:53):
the nascent aetol Cotola movement effectively, which would become the
the theocratic regym, which.
Speaker 3 (17:00):
Which continues to this day.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
So Hesbeula kind of did more or less the same thing, really,
but in the Lebanese context, and this did not really
stop or most recent assassination was twenty twenty one against
the Lacom and Slim in early days in early twenty
twenty one.
Speaker 3 (17:12):
Sorry, so this is the eighties.
Speaker 4 (17:15):
By the time the Libinies of war officially ended in
nineteen ninety, all of the militias were expected or were
supposed to hand their weapons to the army or be
absorbed into the Libine's army. There was an exception that
was imposed by halves Lessad, Serian dictator at the time
Basha's father, of course, that the exception would be to
Hasbela because of Hesballa's role and resisting. Is again the
(17:38):
quick background to that is that Hesbella and Ammal were
actually at war. They called it the harbel Ekue the
War of brothers in the late eighties.
Speaker 3 (17:47):
They later called it that.
Speaker 4 (17:48):
At the time, they did not call it that, and
The long story shoot again is that Ammal was backed
by the Syrians and Hesbella was backed by the Iranians.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
They fought each other, they killed each other.
Speaker 4 (17:57):
Hesbala I that battle or battle, and part of that
compromises that Hesbella would take care of weapons stuff, military stuff,
resistant stuff, and Amal would get into government. Hence why
and Nebhibberia became the leader of Amal became a Speaker
of parliament in nineteen ninety three, three years after the
end of the civil war and the Toifik came in
which officially ended it, and remains speaker of Parliament basically
(18:19):
my entire life to this day.
Speaker 3 (18:21):
That was the nineties, so the nineties has Bla grew.
Speaker 4 (18:24):
By then, the communists, secular nationalist pro Palestinians, including Palestinian
militias and armed groups, had been, if not entirely crushed
by the various invasions, first the Syrion one Houfves Lesserds
and then the Israeli one, who were both invading Lebanon
with the stated intention of crushing the Palestinian resistance against
(18:44):
is Raeli occupation, including Hufs Lessered, which people don't like
to think about too much, and then yeah, so they
were kind of weakened by the nineties and Hesbala was
basically the only game in town.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
That brings us to the end of this episode. Preview
To listen to the full thing and help support our
work researching and promoting people's history, join us on Patreon
at patreon dot com slash working class history link in
the show notes.
Popular Podcasts
New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce
Football’s funniest family duo — Jason Kelce of the Philadelphia Eagles and Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs — team up to provide next-level access to life in the league as it unfolds. The two brothers and Super Bowl champions drop weekly insights about the weekly slate of games and share their INSIDE perspectives on trending NFL news and sports headlines. They also endlessly rag on each other as brothers do, chat the latest in pop culture and welcome some very popular and well-known friends to chat with them. Check out new episodes every Wednesday. Follow New Heights on the Wondery App, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes early and ad-free, and get exclusive content on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And join our new membership for a unique fan experience by going to the New Heights YouTube channel now!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!