Now he wants peace with Lebanon:

The timetable for a pullout coincided with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s call for peace talks.

“How natural, how understandable it would be for the prime minister of Lebanon to respond to the many calls I have made toward him and say, ‘Come on, let’s sit, shake hands, make peace and end once and for all the hostility, the jealousy, the hatred that some of my people have toward you,’” Olmert said while touring a school in northern Israel.

“I hope this day comes soon. I yearn for it,” said Olmert.

No way, say the Lebanese (at least the ones who went on record for this article):

Lebanese Information Minister Ghazi Aridi responded angrily and quickly.

“Let him dream on. He will never see the day,” Aridi said. “Before he talks about peace, he is required to withdraw his troops from Lebanon and lift the blockade.”

“Olmert must know that Lebanon will never negotiate with Israel or with him,” he told The Associated Press. There is “absolutely no trust between Lebanon and Israel.”

“Why should we negotiate with them?” said the information minister. “Israel will not get through peace what it failed to get in war.”

His words echoed a widespread Lebanese sentiment that Hezbollah’s fierce resistance during the 34-day war was a victory for the group.

Last week, Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora also rejected the idea of talks with the Jewish state, saying that Lebanon would “be the last Arab country that could sign a peace agreement with Israel.”

His office issued a statement Sunday restating that position.

The government “is not prepared to listen to such things. Such invitations are rejected before they even happen,” it said.

Apart from being smart strategically, this is a shrewd move on Olmert’s part. It may not work, but in today’s world it’s hard to criticize someone who extends a hand of friendship—and that someone gets a lot of press. (And that’s true no matter how outrageous the individual. Witness the effect of Tom Cruise’s headline-making apology to Brooke Shields. Witness Ahmadinejad telling Kofi Annan that he supports the UN resolution regarding Lebanon.)

Seriously.

He says that the movies Pearl Harbor and Black Hawk Down “worshiped the machinery of war.” The filmmakers of the 1990s were insufficiently anti-war. And so Americans, who up until then had been pacifists, were too easily convinced to actually go to war in Iraq.

Unlike previous decades, which also produced antiwar films, Stone said, the ’90s were dominated by pictures “that promoted the concept of war.”

“I have reasons to be depressed as a Vietnam veteran,” said Stone, who made the Vietnam film Platoon. “And I can say many Vietnam veterans are depressed about why we are in Iraq.”

That’s rich from the guy who has been accused of making films that rewrite history, that incite both violence and anomie, and who has claimed that he’s only making movies, for God’s sake, so get off his goddamn back, you stupid reactionaries (pick a quote, any quote).

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (L) shakes hands with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan during their meeting in Tehran. Annan has won a pledge from President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to support a UN resolution bringing peace to Lebanon but was warned Iran would not suspend sensitive nuclear work before negotiations.(AFP/Atta Kenare)

A new al Qaeda-created sensation erupted yesterday, when an American-born jihadi (Adam something or other) delivered a 43-minute video message to Americans on behalf of Islam, al Qaeda, jihad, and whatever else he believes he’s serving. A four- or five-minute portion of the tape was given over to bin Laden’s partner Zawahiri, giving “Azzam al Amrikee [Adam] the al Qaeda imprimatur.

Walid Phares of the Counterterrorism blog explains what it means:

…For “Azzam al Amrikee” [Adam] is the clearest specimen of Jihadism’s second generation within the US, in as much as the 7/7 videos revealed the type of future Jihadists for Great Britain’s second generation. However, when one would listen carefully to the taped video, you’d find a treasure of knowledge and indicators for the current state of thinking of al Qaeda and its ideologues. In short it is a sample of what is on the mind of Salafi Jihadists for the United States and the West. Following are few of the issues I noted:

1) The hand behind the message

In short, Azzam’s videotaped message is indeed “American.” Experts have heard it in US and Canadian cities and internet is flowing with it. Whether Gadahn was reading from a prompter or not –and I believe he was with great skills- I tend to believe that such a speech –rather than being dismissed as mere propaganda- is a message coming to us from what’s already inserted inside America, which leads me to the second point

2) Who is it destined to?

It is basically addressed to those who will carry a “Jihad in America,” possibly asserting Adam Gahdan as their leader. Also, this is a very intelligent move to pierce the linguistic shield of America’s media and reach US citizens directly, as a way to spread confusion at least among those who have a hazy understanding of the Jihadists.

3) The ideological platform

In short, the “Azzam” video reconfirms clearly, in an English language that academic translators won’t be able to distort, that al Qaeda’s movement worldwide and in the United States is seeking total annihilation or conversion of the enemy: American and other democracies.

4) Argumentation tactics:

The “speech writer,” emulating many commentators on al Jazeera or al Manar, hopes to rally many among those who “hate Bush and Blair” but stops short of stating that Jihadism will hate all future US Presidents and British Prime Ministers “if they do not convert.” He reminds us of the Crusades, Inquisition, Hiroshima, and killings in Iraq and Afghanistan. Obviously, the “writer” skips the Genocides of Sudan, and the massacres of Algeria, the Kurds, Shiites perpetrated by Salafists or Baathists.

5) The enemies of Jihad in America

Sensationally but not unexpectedly, he “name” a number of intellectual-enemies in this country: Daniel Pipes, Steven Emerson, Robert Spencer and Michael Spencer. Rarely Jihadi Terrorists at this high level media exposure named symbols of their enemy’s intelligentsia. And in addition to “experts” named in the tape, Gadahn goes on a ferocious attack against American “Tele-Evangelists” and their media, showing the other type of foes al Qaeda is very upset with.

6) The “friends” of al Qaeda?

“Azzam” names “sympathetic” personalities for whom he has messages for action; He asks journalist Seymour Hirsh to “reveal more” than what was published in a New Yorker article on the War: Obviously an open call by al Qaeda to M Hirsch to resume the attack against the US War on Terror. Then “Azzam” turn to two British journalists and thank them for their “admiration and respect for Islam” encourage them to do the final step: Convert. He names British MP George Galloway and journalist Robert Fisk. But more troubling in Gadahn’s tape was his direct call to Jihadists within the US Armed forces to work patiently till the time comes and they should continue to aggregate while escaping the surveillance of their military authorities. This theme, which I covered briefly in Future Jihad, is of great concern to US national security. The “Azzam” speech brings further concerns as to the credibility of this threat.
7) The Al Qaeda offer: Conversion or fire

“Azzam”’s mission in this tape was to deliver a message. His bottom line is this: We –the Jihadists- have you cornered everywhere and you are not going to win this war. His central message is typically Jihadic: “Surrender, convert or the fire:” Meaning war on Earth, all of it, and Hell fire after death.

Hmmm. I wouldn’t feel too comfortable if I were on the enemies’ list. Or, for that matter, the list of friends.