I saw an interview on Al-Manar today, with the father and uncle of a young Lebanese man in his early twenties, Hassan Daaboul, sent by Hezbollah to fight and die in Idleb.
The presenter was congratulating the grieving family members as if his death was a blessing, while it was easy to read their faces which suggested they would prefer to be sharing the joy of his wedding instead.
The young man was not killed defending his land or honor or in a battle against Israel – which, according to Nasrallah, still occupies Lebanese territory. He was killed hundreds of kilometers away from the borders of Lebanon, which Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah claims these young men defend. He was killed in a battle against Arabs and Muslims, who suffered all the horrors of murder and torture for over 40 years at the hands of a tyrant who cares for no religion or principle.
The interview was directed as if Daaboul travelled to Idleb to defend Hussein, not to defend the Iranian project to dominate the region. Iranian leaders use their agents, like Nasrallah, to deceive these young people and send them to death, in return for a handful of cash provided by Iran – money taken from the Iranian people who are deprived of their most basic rights like health care, education and infrastructure. This money is sent to these militias to stoke a sectarian strife that will only come back to burn the Iranian people, with the only beneficiary being Israel.
It was a painful half an hour to endure, but it illustrates Hezbollah’s ability to use the media to deprive ordinary families, like Daaboul's, from their loved ones, only to then praise the ones who sent them to their deaths.
On the other hand, I saw another interview yesterday – presented by al-Jazeera’s Ahmed Mansour – with a pilot from the Assad regime; a pilot turned into a murderer of women and children by the Tyrant of Damascus, a pilot who claimed to have dropped barrel bombs that destroyed dozens of Syrian cities and villages. I expected to sympathize with Mansour and hate the criminal pilot, as nothing justifies a sane and balanced person to drop explosive barrels civilians and their homes. But the vulgar way in which the pilot was questioned, and the attempts to make clear that the interview was only conducted upon the captive’s free will – how a captive has free will I do not know – all reminded me of Syria’s state TV channels.
In fact, the lack of respect for the minds of its Arab audience drew me out of the heinous crimes committed by the pilot. I was constantly reminded of the silly program broadcast on Syrian television; Police in the Service of People, where the host, Aladdin al-Ayyoubi, conducted interviews with despised criminals. But the spiteful methods used by Ayyoubi caused the viewer to sympathize with the criminal instead of condemn his acts.
Translated and edited by The Syrian Observer
