Marie Le Pen managed to find a country to receive her. It is for her a validation of her stature on the foreign policy dimension of her candidacy.
President Aoun is happy to receive her as it is a validation of his inflated ego on the international scene.
Both want also to validate Bashar Al Assad in Syria. God knows why?!
For Marie Le Pen it is a logical component of her extreme right ideology that advocate for so called Christian values and the alliance of minorities in the Middle East. A nice extension of colonialism.
Yet there is a backside to her visit.
Dual French/Lebanese citizens have voted strongly for her in the last elections. Many of them because of being bigoted Christians and to a certain extent populist with a tilt towards fascism, some because they are extreme right and more Gauls than the Gauls, others due to pure ignorance. They cannot understand that they are Arabs like all the other Arabs and will not be treated differently.
Her visit will give publicity to her policy that says that if she is elected she will require all people from non European origins to give up their original nationality if they want to keep the French one.
A racist policy that clearly discriminates against a group of citizens. But she really does not care about the values of democracy, does she!?
For Aoun it corresponds to his agenda of Christian rights and the alliance of minorities. Yet it is once again a knee jerk and ego boosting exercise. What are his gains? None.
Even in the case Le Pen wins the elections, she will not be able to do a lot when France gets out of the EU and falls into economic disintegration.
And if she does not win, then he has alienated the next President of France and the rest of the EU.
Another sticking point in all of this is Aoun relation with Hezbollah and the problematic of this relation with the new Trump administration declared anti Iranian policy. It might reflect on the support of the US to the Lebanese Army. And how is Le Pen explains her positiont given her declared admiration and alliance with Trump. And what about the Russian factor and their interference in all European election to promote extreme right candidates including Le Pen. The Russians until now are maintaining their alliance with Iran.
What a mess! and what is Hariri doing in the middle of all of this? until where his compromise will go? Who is the Godot he is waiting for?
Lebanon is a doomed country lead by politicians whose strategy is knee jerk reactions based on corruption, nepotism, and self serving policies. These same leaders are re-elected by the Lebanese every four years... Kafkaesque!
President Aoun is happy to receive her as it is a validation of his inflated ego on the international scene.
Both want also to validate Bashar Al Assad in Syria. God knows why?!
For Marie Le Pen it is a logical component of her extreme right ideology that advocate for so called Christian values and the alliance of minorities in the Middle East. A nice extension of colonialism.
Yet there is a backside to her visit.
Dual French/Lebanese citizens have voted strongly for her in the last elections. Many of them because of being bigoted Christians and to a certain extent populist with a tilt towards fascism, some because they are extreme right and more Gauls than the Gauls, others due to pure ignorance. They cannot understand that they are Arabs like all the other Arabs and will not be treated differently.
Her visit will give publicity to her policy that says that if she is elected she will require all people from non European origins to give up their original nationality if they want to keep the French one.
A racist policy that clearly discriminates against a group of citizens. But she really does not care about the values of democracy, does she!?
For Aoun it corresponds to his agenda of Christian rights and the alliance of minorities. Yet it is once again a knee jerk and ego boosting exercise. What are his gains? None.
Even in the case Le Pen wins the elections, she will not be able to do a lot when France gets out of the EU and falls into economic disintegration.
And if she does not win, then he has alienated the next President of France and the rest of the EU.
Another sticking point in all of this is Aoun relation with Hezbollah and the problematic of this relation with the new Trump administration declared anti Iranian policy. It might reflect on the support of the US to the Lebanese Army. And how is Le Pen explains her positiont given her declared admiration and alliance with Trump. And what about the Russian factor and their interference in all European election to promote extreme right candidates including Le Pen. The Russians until now are maintaining their alliance with Iran.
What a mess! and what is Hariri doing in the middle of all of this? until where his compromise will go? Who is the Godot he is waiting for?
Lebanon is a doomed country lead by politicians whose strategy is knee jerk reactions based on corruption, nepotism, and self serving policies. These same leaders are re-elected by the Lebanese every four years... Kafkaesque!
Very pertinent and what a staged charade…
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