Lebanon Ranked #1 Most Fascinating Country the US Doesn’t Want You To Visit

DailyFinance has released its top 10 list of countries on the US State Department’s travel warning database that should be visited. The countries are ranked according to how much tourism contributes to the GDP of the country. Therefore, no surprises, Lebanon ranks first:

1. Lebanon – 37.6% of GDP
2. Mexico – 12.7%
3. Saudi Arabia – 9.5%
4. Kenya – 9%
5. Iran – 8.4%
6. Nepal – 7.4%
7. The Philippines – 6.9%
8. Israel, the West Bank and Gaza – 6.4%
9. Russia – 6%
10. Colombia – 5.3%

The last advisory update from the State Department is dated March 29, 2010 and reads:

The Department of State continues to urge U.S. citizens to avoid all travel to Lebanon due to current safety and security concerns. U.S. citizens living and working in Lebanon should understand that they accept risks in remaining and should carefully consider those risks.

In total, 31 countries appear on the list.

The US hopes to avoid the 2006 scene above by advising nationals to avoid Lebanon - Photo from US Department of Defense

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Israel Details War Plans to Lebanon

I guess I must have missed that memo but the go-to blog on wars (past, present and future) has issued what it describes as Israel’s attack plan in its next war with Lebanon in a post titled Israel Tells Lebanon How It Will Be Destroyed.

…Israel plans to use a larger force (4-5 combat divisions, versus three in 2006, and more than twice as many aircraft and many more commandos.) The next war would involve doing a lot more damage to Hezbollah, in a shorter period of time. The earlier war lasted 34 days. Since 2006, Hezbollah has acquired more power (via its control of about a third of the voters) in the Lebanese government. Thus the new plan involves doing a lot more damage to the rest of Lebanon, and the Lebanese armed forces. Israel wants all Lebanese to know that they are partly responsible for Hezbollah continuing to exist.

Anyone shaking in their sandals? Didn’t think so. The blog goes on to give a warped history lesson about Lebanon and Hezbollah, and how we fear Israel but are afraid of taking on Hezbollah for fear of the repercussions and therefore we must die.

I honestly love how the site simplifies everything; as if the whole thing is going to be a walk in the park for the Israelis. Quite naive in my opinion kind of like the objectives the Israelis set in the 2006 war. Just as the post rightly acknowledges that Israel has learned a lot from 2006, if fails to reciprocate that so have we. My personal opinion is that unless there is a balance of terror on both sides (i.e. we can match Israel’s firepower) then war is inevitable, but to pretend that you can dictate actions on the battlefield and predict their outcomes shows not more than pure gullibility and failure to fully understand events on the ground.

War a failure: Israeli soldiers walk back into Israel from south Lebanon in August 2006 (AFP: Gali Tibbon)

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Getting a Little Too Close to Your Work

Japanese filmmaker, Koji Wakamatsu, got a little more than he expected when he and his film crew approached Roumieh prison, north of Beirut:

Filmmaker Koji Wakamatsu was briefly detained by police with two cameramen during a recent visit to Lebanon to attend a film festival, apparently for entering a place where photography is prohibited, sources familiar with the incident said Sunday.
The three were shooting footage near a prison in suburban Beirut around 11 a.m. last Thursday when they were asked by police to show their passports. They were taken inside the prison, handcuffed and moved to a police station and then released after roughly seven hours.

This is, of course, the same prison where Japanese Red Army Member, Kozo Okamoto, was kept for visa violations and later granted political asylum by the Lebanese government. And what exactly was Koji doing in Lebanon?

Wakamatsu, 74, was on a weeklong trip to Beirut after receiving an invitation to the festival, which featured his movie on Japanese Red Army activists…

Clearly he got a little over his head.

Filmmaker Koji Wakamatsu

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Israel Assisted in Capsized Ship Rescue

Remember the Danny F II, the ship carrying livestock form the Ukraine to Tartous in Syria that sank off the coast of Tripoli in December? Well apparently, other than UNFIL, the Lebanese Navy and the British Army (stationed in Cyprus), Israel also took part in the rescue mission:

Ukraine’s ambassador to Israel and its military attache thanked Israel this week for the December 12th rescue of sailors from a merchant ship that sank off the coast of Lebanon.

Well, the Israel National News website got it wrong. The ship went down on December 17th and not on the 12th. Don’t worry, its not the first time the INN errs. February last year, they had an article on Lebanon’s former president, Emile Lahore.

Danny F II: The crew was rescued by UNFIl, Lebanese and UK forces, and apparently, Israel.

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US Plans for Anti-Hezbollah Force

In what I thought was a mundane article from UPI titled U.S. ‘to give Lebanon light attack planes’ it actually had some interesting, yet disturbing news towards the end:

…the U.S. security consultancy Stratfor says the Pentagon wants to establish [a special group] as an elite [Lebanese] army unit. Its main function will be countering Hezbollah. That could lead to a potentially explosive political confrontation that many Lebanese want to avoid. At present, the army remains weak — kept that way by Lebanese political barons who do not want their power threatened — and fractious, heavily penetrated by Hezbollah sympathizers.
“The new unit is expected to selectively recruit and its leadership will consist almost entirely of Maronite Christians and Sunni from Akkar in northern Lebanon, among which Hezbollah has little sway,” Stratfor said.

Now that’s going to work out quite well. Civil War Part Deux anyone?

The hardware the US plans to provide to the Lebanese Army as well as an anti-Hezbollah special unit.

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