DEFENDING THE UMMA….This week’s cover story in The New Republic, a profile of Hezbollah leader Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah written by Annia Ciezadlo, is genuinely interesting:
Revered by the Shia, respected by his enemies, he has already earned the distinction of being the only Arab leader to evict Israel from Arab land without having to sign a peace treaty. But he is also a religious warrior. Today, as he fights a lopsided military battle against the Jewish state, he is becoming an icon ? not just in the Arab world, where he was already a hero, but in the umma, the world of Islam. Nasrallah’s war is not just a war between Lebanon and Israel, or even between Iran and America’s allies; it’s a war of myths and images, a battle to transform the Arab and Islamic worlds. Whatever battlefield setbacks Hezbollah may suffer in Lebanon, on this larger stage, Nasrallah has already won.
It’s well worth reading the whole thing.
