Hazem Saghieh

The difficulty of reaching an agreement on an amnesty law has been a prominent news story in Lebanon. The reason for this difficulty lies in the distribution of those prisoners among three sectarian blocs and the insistence of each major sect’s representatives that their sect’s prisoners are the…

It could be said, until further notice, that in the event of a resumption of the American-Israeli war with Iran, whatever form it takes, an American victory would be difficult and an Iranian victory would be impossible. Disregarding wishful thinking and the marketing of rosy narratives, we find…

Some reproach those who advocate for the “state” against Hezbollah and its weapons on the grounds that these advocates are not genuinely seeking a state and that what they actually want is the perpetuation of a corrupt status quo that makes building any real state impossible. Many on the receiving…

There are some Lebanese voices, not necessarily coming from the same political camps, who warn Lebanese negotiators not to go as far as they can and stress their unequivocal preference for stopping at the bare minimum. These arguments could be made on solid grounds. Nothing undermines them more…

The Dutch-American political scientist Arend Lijphart developed what he called "consociational democracy," a democratic system in which the leaders of prominent social communities share power in order to ensure that no single group dominates the others. Accordingly, consociational democracy has…

Regarding the Lebanese–Israeli negotiations, which have not yet begun and whose ambiguities still far outweigh what is clear, Hezbollah, along with its supporters and allies, has been waging a broad campaign of slander. Since these polemicists anchor their positions in specific doctrines and…

Today’s column will host a few excerpts of texts by individuals from southern Lebanon; there is no space for a larger number of them, but the few examples presented here are powerful. Their authors have lost loved ones, property, and homes. In these excerpts (copied from Facebook posts) and others…

During the season of diatribes against the Camp David Accords and President Anwar Sadat, "separate peace" was the dominant catchword. Most of those making these accusations had not been aware that, under the leadership of Lenin, the Bolsheviks in Russia concluded the most consequential "separate…

When we are hit with the bitter truth that Iran has launched fivefold more strikes on the Gulf than it has on Israel, we go back decades searching for the roots of this behavior. The origins are probably found in the early days, 1979, and the trajectory is peaking this war season. From its…

Seeing an unfamiliar face, we sometimes tend to liken it to someone familiar and think to ourselves: “like father, like son” or “he clearly got that from his uncle”... The same happens with politicians we like or dislike: if someone admires an emerging politician, they could, depending on the…