RUTHFULLY YOURS

Diana West

It may take some of the sting out to refer to the Obama administration as a “regime,” but it also absolves us, the electorate, of complicity in enabling this top-to-bottom revolution to be lawfully, democratically advanced.

Before reading up on some of its fruits below, via Reuters, bear in mind that next month marks the 25th anniversary of the Hezbollah beheading of CIA Beirut station chief William Buckley (after more than a year of torutre) and the Hezbollah beating/murder of Navy diver Robert Stethem aboard Hezbollah hijacked TWA 847.

“Hezb” “Allah,” or Party of Allah — “the spear of Iranian influence in the Levant,” as the Wall Street Journal has called it — first came to US attention in 1983 with a series of catastrophic terror attacks in Beirut (including the US embassy, killing 63). These culminated in the October 1983 suicide truck bombing attack on the US Marine barracks, killing 241.

According to a 2003 federal court order regarding the incident, “The resulting explosion was the largest non-nuclear explosion that had ever been detonated on the face of the Earth.” It was,  CBS reported, “equal in force to between 15,000 and 21,000 pounds of TNT.”

“The force of its impact ripped locked doors from their doorjambs at the nearest building, which was 256 feet away,” read the ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Royce C. Lamberth. “Trees located 370 feet away were shredded and completely exfoliated.”

All the windows at the airport control tower, half a mile away, shattered. A crater eight feet deep was carved into the earth, and 15 feet of rubble was all that remained of the four-story Marine barracks.

“The force of the explosion ripped the building from its foundation. The building then imploded upon itself,” read a Defense Department report on the attack. “Almost all the occupants were crushed or trapped inside the wreckage.”

A U.S. investigation blamed lax security for allowing the bomber to get into the Marines’ compound.

These acts of war were never punished.

And now? John Brennan, White House adviser on homeland security and terrorism, is calling Hezbollah “a very interesting organization.”

From the revolutionary front:

“US wants to build up Hezbollah moderates: adviser”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Obama administration is looking for ways to build up “moderate elements” within the Lebanese Hezbollah guerilla movement and to diminish the influence of hard-liners, a top White House official said on Tuesday.

John Brennan, assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism, met with Lebanese leaders  during a recent visit.

“Hezbollah is a very interesting organization,” Brennan told a Washington conference, citing its evolution from “purely a terrorist organization” to a militia to an organization that now has members within the parliament and the cabinet.

“There is certainly the elements of Hezbollah that are truly a concern to us what they’re doing. And what we need to do is to find ways to diminish their influence within the organization and to try to build up the more moderate elements,” Brennan said.

He did not spell out how Washington hoped to promote “moderate elements” given that the organization is branded a “foreign terrorist organization” by the United States.

Problem identified: The USG still “brands” Hezbollah, “moderates” and all, a “foreign” “terrorist” organization.

“We don’t deal with them,” he acknowledged. …

Yet.