Happy news from Lebanon, and Tony Badran’s analysis is, as always, excellent. The defeat of Hezbollah has regional significance. It will undoubtedly affect the Iranian “elections,” since one of Ahmadinejad’s major claims has been that his tough line has produced success after success. The Lebanese have given him a spanking, and this will not be lost on the Iranians.
Second, I cannot help thinking that the Lebanese learned something from Obama’s Cairo speech (and Bush’s second term), namely that they cannot rely on the United States to confront terrorists like Hezbollah. They, and others all over the area, are going to have to do a lot of their own fighting, and take their own chances, even though they know they cannot count on American support.
And maybe one can say the same thing about the Europeans. Surely the advance of Geert Wilders’s party in the Netherlands, and the widespread rejection of the Left all over the continent in the European elections must have at least something to do with the recognition that Obama doesn’t cater to Europe (I haven’t run the numbers, but he’s offended an impressive number of European countries by now).
One of those paradoxes through which history unfolds, as Hegel might say.