Syria and Lebanon watchers know that March is becoming a busy month politically, even somewhat crowded …

I've tried to ignore the Lebanese political scene this past week or so (it was getting a bit repetitive), but it's impossible to ignore Fouad Siniora's announcement that tomorrow's demonstration in Beirut by the Lebanese opposition amounts to a coup …

On the day of the assassination of Lebanese Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel, New TV was playing patriotic songs praising Syria and Hezbollah, the kind you usually find on Syrian television only.

I went to Lebanon a couple of weeks ago, using the normal route from Damascus - the Jdeideh post. We finished the formalities in minutes because so few people were there, and proceeded to drive through one ghost town after another.

It's not clear why anyone in Syria should be relieved that UNSC Resolution 1636 was "watered-down" with the help of a number of countries.

When UNSC Resolution 1559 was passed, the Syrian regime had gloated that it was a victory because it didn't mention Syria by name; it's fair to say that there is little possibility of that on Monday, when the vote on the post-Mehlis report resolution is expected.

Some of the comments I made this afternoon during a general meeting at Chatham House held just before the UN Security Council session on the Mehlis report.

On the Syrian side, people are despairing of the situation, sympathizing with the neighbors, but completely impotent, as always, to help anyone, least of all themselves.

Has anyone noticed that Robert Fisk is writing stranger and stranger things every day?

Most Syrians have for a long time been opposed to the regime’s handling of Lebanon, upset not by the departure from Lebanon but rather upset by the mishandling in the last years.

Many people in the Arab world were engrossed in a frenzy of excitement as the first Superstar program (the local version of Britain’s original Pop Idol, or the US’s American Idol) was coming to an end.