U.S. academic Finkelstein meets top Hezbollah official in Lebanon

[bemildred]

A vocal American critic of Israel met Monday with a senior official from the militant Hezbollah group and visited villages in southern Lebanon that witnessed heavy fighting in the 2006 war between the guerrillas and the Jewish state.

Norman Finkelstein, who resigned last year as a political science professor at DePaul University in Chicago, met Hezbollah's commander in south Lebanon, Nabil Kaouk, in his office in the coastal city of Tyre.

He visited the border village of Maroun el-Rass where heavy fighting between Hezbollah guerrillas and Israeli troops took place during the two side's 34-day war in the summer 2006, according to the state-run National News Agency and Hezbollah's Al-Manar television. Finkelstein also toured the border village of Aita al-Shaab, the location from where Hezbollah guerrillas triggered the war after they crossed the border, killing three Israeli soldiers and capturing two others in hopes of trading them for Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails, according to the report.

The 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war left more than 1,000 Lebanese, mostly civilians, dead. About 160 Israelis, including 119 soldiers, also died in the fighting.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/942454.html

[flyingfysh]

1. here is a little history on Finkelstein

He is considered a top-notch scholar on the Palestine situation, but has criticisms of Israel. He was up for tenure at DePaul, but Alan Dershowitz waged a campaign to have Finkelstein denied tenure at DePaul, even though Finkelstein's colleages wanted him. Unfortunately, the campaign was successful.

[rockymountaindem]

2. Just when you thought he couldn't sink any lower...

[LeftishBrit]

3. Has he flipped his lid?

Before we go on: I strongly opposed what I considered and still consider Israel's over-reactions in the Second Lebanon War; and especially the use of cluster bombs. If I'd been posting on this forum in 2006, I think I might have even been (wrongly IMO!) considered by some as anti-Israel for my opinions on the matter.

BUT to actively support HEZBOLLAH and say that 'the Hezbollah represents the hope. They are fighting to defend their homeland,"' - just wow.

Here's news for Finkelstein: it's possible for people to be against America, against Israel, and against what you consider to be the 'establishment' - and STILL to be far-RW murdering bastards!!! You remind me of Ronald fucking Reagan, who was so blindly anti-Soviet that he helped to build up the forerunners of the Taliban. Progressive, my arse.

[msmcghee]

4. This article is a perfect example of the type of unscholarly . .

. . ideology that consume Finkelstein's life - and why his tenure was so justifiably denied. At least now he can't attach the prestige of a major University to his hatred of Israel.