Chris Hitchens and the Critical Beatdown

About a month back, a strange rumour stumbled its way across the blogosphere. In various tellings, none of which made a great deal of sense to me, it was recounted that Christopher Hitchens, after a long night of drinking in Beirut, found a political sign with a swastika on it, defaced it, and was subsequently embroiled in a massive throwdown with a series of Lebanese fascists, going punch for punch like any good journalist. The real story, alas, is far less epic. Hitchens does deface the sign, and is approached by two thugs who see him. Then:

We hail a cab and start to get in, but one of our assailants gets in also, and the driver seems to know intimidation only too well when he sees it. We retreat to a stretch of sidewalk outside a Costa café, and suddenly I am sprawled on the ground, having been hit from behind, and someone is putting the leather into my legs and flanks. At this point the crowd in the café begins to shout at the hoodlums, which unnerves them long enough for us to stop another cab and pull away. My shirt is spattered with blood, but I’m in no pain yet: the nastiest moment is just ahead of me. As the taxi accelerates, a face looms at the open window and a fist crashes through and connects with my cheekbone. The blow isn’t so hard, but the contorted, glaring, fanatical face is a horror show, a vision from hell. It’s like looking down a wobbling gun barrel, or into the eyes of a torturer. I can see it still.

The story is definitely worth reading in full, for two reasons. One is Christopher Hitchens. Yes, he can be an asshole, and he's made some terrible calls in the past (supporting the War in Iraq looms largest, alongside the aggressive atheism thing), but articles like this remind me that he is a very principled man and his opinions, right or wrong, stem from those principles before anything else. He's also a very good writer, and his ideological perspective doesn't fit very well anywhere on the modern American political spectrum, meaning that he still gets it right 50% of the time.

The second reason the piece is worth reading is because it's about Lebanon. Late last year, The Atlantic published a fairly upsetting article about the UN investigation into the assassination of Rafik Hariri, the widely beloved former Prime Minister of Lebanon. He was blown up, along with 22 other people, in 2005, and the investigation, which followed on a demand by the UN that Syria withdraw its forces from Lebanon, is getting closer and closer to a predictable yet politically dangerous conclusion: the Syrian government had him axed, along with a string of other nationalist Lebanese politicians. Hitchens notes that, as of now, four Lebanese generals with ties to Syria have been arrested and are slated to be tried in a UN tribunal at The Hague. What happens next, obviously, will have significant effects on the region. Many Lebanese want justice, but it's clear that this may in turn threaten Syria, which in turn will antagonize Iran, and the current strategic climate suggests that the international community will try very very hard not to antagonize Iran, at least until they accede to the NPT or show convincing signs of dismantling their nuclear program. This is all a very big shame because, as Hitchens shows it, Lebanon still is a pluralistic and somewhat moderate country within a pretty hostile region. They could serve as an exemplary model of how a federalist system can restrain and balance sectarian impulses peacefully, and serve as a goal for reformers in other parts of the Middle East to shoot for. Who knows what will happen, though, if/when the international community opts not to act on conclusive evidence that Syria is still, in violation of a UN mandate, meddling in Lebanese affairs - Syria may be emboldened to hop back in, Lebanon may take steps on its own, etc. Even if nothing significant comes of the process, it will be just more evidence, to those who want to look for it, that the West is in the business of selectively meting out justice, only when it is convenient to do so.