Muntadhar al-Zaidi (inset) laughs with Ahmed Tharwat
BY AHMED THARWAT
President Trump sent Lebanese-American Tom Barrack to Lebanon as a special envoy to discuss post-Hezbollah Lebanon. Mr. Barrack, is a long-time friend of Trump, a private equity real estate investor and the founder and executive chairman of Colony Capital. This top American diplomat was meeting on Tuesday with the Lebanese President Joseph Aoun in Beirut to discuss plans for the disarmament of Hezbollah.
Briefing Lebanese media after the meeting, Mr. Barrack, who is of Lebanese descent, scolded reporters for shouting out questions all at once. The patriotic self-hating Arab told these over-eager journalists their behavior resembles the conflict in the Middle East. The American diplomat who represents a country whose savage behavior and aggression in the Middle East has caused the death of millions of Arabs and Muslims, from a country that is participating in a genocide in Gaza, is asking Arab journalists to act civilized.
“We’re going to have a different set of rules… please be quiet for a moment,” Barrack said. “And I want to tell you something, the moment this starts becoming chaotic, like animalistic, we’re gone. So, you want to know what’s happening? Act civilized, act kind, act tolerant, because this is the problem with what is happening in the region.”
The American envoy acts like an Orientalist with a colonial mandate. He wants Arab journalists to “act civilized.” Most Western media ignored Mr. Barrack’s outrageous insults, which prompted a swift backlash in Lebanon and outrage from people around the Arab world. Lebanese journalists and commentators are accusing the American envoy of displaying arrogance and a racist attitude. The Union of Journalists in Lebanon called on Lebanese and Arab media to boycott the American envoy’s future events. The Lebanese Presidency expressed regret over the comments, saying in a statement on X that the government has “full appreciation for all journalists” and “extends to them its highest regards for their efforts and dedication in fulfilling their professional and national duties.”
Mr. Barrack is asking Arab journalists to “act civilized” while the Israelis have killed 270 journalists in Gaza so far, without any outrage from Mr. Barrack or Western media and First Amendment folks in America; for the American diplomat, a civilized Arab Journalist is a dead one.
So, what should an Arab journalist do when they are asked to act civilized? The last time an Arab journalist was asked to act civilized was Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi. We all remember 2008, when President Bush was in a joint press conference in Baghdad with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki at the time. Bush was in his final months as president as Barack Obama was about to take over. Mr. al-Zaidi threw his shoes at President Bush in protest at the American occupation of Iraq: “… here is your goodbye kiss, you dog.” [It sounds more poetic in Arabic.] Bush ducked twice to avoid being hit by the shoes.
I had Mr. al-Zaidi on an insightful Zoom conversation. He was thoughtful, personal, and in a very good mood. Mr. al-Zaidi had wide media coverage and he was a hero in the Arab world. He had such celebrity status that a shoe manufacturer claimed his shoes were made there. There was a shoe statue in Tikrit, marriage proposals, book, films, offers, a TV series. I asked him how he prepared for this shoe-throwing press conference.
The shoe-throwing incident sparked international
coverage.
Mr. Al-Zaidi explained that he has been pursuing President Bush’s media appearances for quite some time. He heard that President Bush was coming to Iraq for a news conference in Baghdad on Dec. 14, 2008, for a farewell visit. The Bush administration thought they would be greeted with roses. They had just liberated them from the jaws of the ruthless dictator Saddam. “I had just bought new shoes from Lebanon, but I wore old shoes I bought from Egypt a while ago.” He wanted to humiliate Bush with old shoes, not new ones. “Bush will get the old shoes instead,” al-Zaidi explained his motive and choice. Al-Zaidi had a plan, “I prepared for this wedding and waited for the groom (Bush),” he explained. Al-Zaidi kept his plan secret; no one knew what he was up to. Al-Zaidi wrote a will outlining what people should do if he were killed. He wore comfortable, loose clothing, a casual jacket, and the Egyptian-style, comfortable old shoes.
“I have no idea what happened to the original shoes; all pictures of the shoes are fake, all have shoelaces, mine had none.” Even the picture that was made by orphanages to his honor in the city of Tikrit. Still, PM al-Maliki took it down after a few days.
– How about all these stories about your shoes, it is becoming a mythical shoe!
– “… all not true, all fake, no one got it right,” he said.
– Bush thought the shoe was size 10 (size 45″ )
– Bush is a liar, he even lies about my shoe size,”!
– What size was it..?
– What is the number of presidents? He asked
– Bush was the 43rd President of the US, .
– That is my shoe size. .. 43!!
We both laughed…
– Why would a journalist throw shoes at Bush, instead of throwing a question, I asked
– We weren’t allowed to ask any questions … and they asked us to act civilized, Mr. al-Zaidi lamented!!
Ahmed Tharwat is Host and Producer of the Arab American TV show BelAhdan www.ahmediatv.com
