Word: arabism
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, a key mediator in the Arab-Israeli conflict for the past 25 years, is expressing displeasure with the Bush Administration's handling of the conflict in Lebanon. In written responses to questions from TIME, Mubarak said the emergency meeting with Arab envoys hosted by Secretary of State Condeleezza Rice in Rome Wednesday failed to halt the bloodshed. While not directly criticizing the White House's refusal to call for an immediate cessation of Israel's attacks on Lebanon, he complained that the crisis "could have been contained at its early stage" and demanded that the international...
...efforts." He also revealed that he asked Syrian President Bashar Assad to intervene with Hizballah to win the freedom of the two Israeli soldiers the Lebanese Shi'ite Muslim group captured to ignite the fighting in Lebanon. But Mubarak indicated that he would not join the U.S. push for Arab pressure on Syria, a key backer of Hizballah along with Iran, arguing that "attempts to isolate Syria are counterproductive." Mubarak criticized Hizballah for acting as a "state within the state," however, and complained that Iran's opposition to Arab-Israeli peace "further complicates an already complicated situation...
...Recognizing that Syria could play a decisive role in curbing Hizballah's capacity for violence, Administration officials have been talking up plans to "peel Syria away" from its ties to Iran, although its refusal to talk directly to Damascus means it has to outsource the job to Arab allies viewed by Syria with contempt. And unless they're offering a credible incentive, they're probably wasting their breath: Syria has withstood years of pressure and harangues from the U.S. - perhaps aware that the U.S. and Israel, knowing that the most likely alternative is the Muslim Brotherhood, actually want to keep...
...Wehbe's hometown of Beirut was, in many ways, a kind of Middle Eastern New York: a vibrant cultural capital where an educated homegrown populace rubbed elbows with a parade of jet-setting foreigners. By contrast, the far more conservative Damascus gives off an Arab-flavored Soviet vibe, from the paranoid residents and omnipresent secret police to the 30-year-old junkers rolling along the streets. The flow of refugees from Beirut to Damascus, therefore, has made for an odd tableau: the normally dreary city is suddenly teeming with sharply dressed Lebanese and foreigners figuring out their next move...
...Rome, where Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with Arab and European envoys, there was further evidence that the diplomatic united front against Hizballah that the U.S. was hoping to achieve has not materialized. A growing international clamor for an immediate cease-fire - and U.S. resistance to that call, on the grounds that it would simply restore the previous status quo - is leaving Washington more isolated than it would prefer to be. The final statement of the Rome meeting tried to paper over the differences with a pledge to "work immediately to reach with the utmost urgency a cease-fire...