Articles which have caught my interest. Mostly Israel stuff and other nubbins from the ongoing holy war.

 
Global Branding Follies

Apropos Starbucks shutting down its Israel operations, Haaretz has an interesting article about why some global brands fail to make it. The biggest problem, of course, is an inability to adapt your brand to local tastes. In the case of Starbucks, this meant that the food offerings were too meager. In the case of KFC, the breading and batter weren't so suitable for kosherized chickens. Other chains, like Domino's Pizza find stiff competition from mom-and-pop operations.

The article also makes an interesting point about the coffee chain: Starbucks made a tactical mistake by starting out in the Tel Aviv area, where a deeply rooted coffee culture meant an uphill battle to change peoples' tastes. They could have started in outlying areas without any competition and perhaps been more successful. Or they could have offered botz.

In any case, it's interesting that Israel is something of a graveyard for global brands. Coca-Cola and McDonalds have set up shop nicely, but a whole range of food conglomerates from Wendy's to Pepsi haven't been able to overcome the local market and its quirks and eccentricities.
posted at 1:26 PM

 
The New Middle East, Pt. 1

There's an interesting discussion in Prospect Magazine this month which deals with the question of democracy and the Middle East in general and more specifically how can we foster democracy in Iraq (and what form should this democracy take) once the current duck hunt in Baghdad winds down.

The five essays presented here examine the propensity of Arab countries towards authoritarian rule. This propensity is based on a combination of Islam and the clan-based structure of Arab societies. They also point out that the region has managed to develop a variety of flavors of authoritarian rule, from the Stalinist rule-by-fear of Baghdad, to a kind of corrupt clientelism found in Jordan and Egypt.

While most of the writers here favor bringing democracy to the Middle East, they all warn about trying to force democracy from above, at the point of a gun. Instead, we are presented with a range of democratic-type institutions that have sprung up in the region despite the general lack of democracy. Parliaments in Morocco, Jordan, and Bahrain; elections of a sort in the Palestinian Authority; and a general trend towards openness in Iraq all get mentions.

In short, democratizing the Arab world will take a looooong time and will involve many baby steps along the way. But the hope remains that one day it will be enough to turn one of the world's most backwards and repressive regions into something less awful.

The New Middle East, Pt. 2

On the same subject, but off in his own sphere, is Josh Marshall, a hawkish neo-lib with a bee in his bonnet about the neo-cons and their grand schemes of imposing disorder in the Middle East, purposefully causing chaos and thus forcing a knock-down drag out with the Islamic world.

Marshall, who publishes the Talking Points Memo, draws up a rather detailed, if not outright paranoid, vision of what GWB and his evil henchmen have in store for the region. Unfortunately, I found the piece a bit lacking in the any-sort-of-proof-to-back-it-up department.

In fact, Marshall doesn't present the readers with one piece of evidence that the plan for the complete restructuring of the Middle East exists anywhere outside a small group of neo-con theorists and advisors.
posted at 1:24 PM

 
The Angry National Id

One of my guilty pleasures is "The Center Stage," a nightly radio program on the popular, Tel Aviv-area 103 FM. The show's setup is simple: the radio station provides a call-in number for listeners can leave a message, up to a minute in length, about anything which happens to be on their minds. Personal information, sales pitches, and openly inciteful messages are screened out, but otherwise the station airs the messages as is. The combination of simplicity and anonymity leads people to air view they might otherwise be hesitant to express in mixed company. Many of the callers -- like callers to radio shows everywhere -- tend to be loudmouths. But even so, "The Center Stage" serves as a window on the national psyche.

Normally, about 60 percent of the callers complain about leftists and Arabs. Another 20 percent preach religion. The rest complain about a variety of other things.
With the war going on in Iraq and a recent suicide bombing in Netanya, I expected that the main topic of conversation would remain, as always, Hamatzav ("The Situation," as the well of crap we sink into here is generally known). But surprisingly it hasn't.

You do get the odd message about Iraq, usually exhorting Ariel Sharon to take a lesson from Bush and deal with terrorism more harshly. However, lately, a bulk of the calls have been to complain about the economic situation, and more specifically the economic reform package recently unveiled by Finance Minister Netanyahu. Not only has the subject matter changed, but so has the tone. Netanyahu's plan calls for massive cuts in government handouts and a major reduction in the public sector. In the short run, this will hurt a lot of people whose economic situation ain't all that great to begin with. And people seem to realize this, as evidenced by the feeling of hostility that seeps into a lot of the messages.

A lot of people call in to discuss how the national economic pie should best be divided. Well, actually a lot of them call in to complain that one sub-sector or another of society is getting more than its fair share and/or is responsible for the economic situation being as bad as it is in the first place.

Culprits include new immigrants, people with two large incomes who aren't being taxed, the religious, fatcat politicians, and, weirdest of all, performing artists. (About the latter, one woman called it to criticize artists and performers who complain about the lack of arts funding in Israel. "They all get huge salaries," she declared. "The reason they don't have any money is that they spend it all on fashionable clothes and going to nightclubs.").

The rampant and misplaced anger seems to indicate that everyone is hurting and no one trusts the politicians to fix the situation.

posted at 6:36 PM

 
Day 14

I don't know if it's just me, but there's a feeling that things have started moving again with the war, that the coalition is taking the initiative again. All afternoon we've been hearing reports about coalition forces entering the "red zone," that area within a radius of 50 miles from Baghdad within the range of Saddam's rockets and artillery (and, thus, in range of chemical weapons).

In the meantime, the US troops have pounded the Republican Guard's Baghdad division outside Karbalah, opening up the Southern approach to Baghdad itself in an amazing spectacle of firepower unleashed against the Republican Guard. (Check out this picture of missiles launched by the US Army 3rd Infantry). Today's actions included a vicious firefight for control of one of the bridges across the Tigris

There's a real feeling that it's Go Time for the assault on Baghdad.

The other good news today was, of course, the commando mission in Nasiriyah which rescued American POW Jessica Lynch. This kind of stuff is good for morale.

The big question still remains the condition of the Great Moustachioed One himself. I was watching the news last night at around 19:30 and they were all buzzing about a speech that the GMO was scheduled to give. The Arab affairs reporter said that this would be one of the biggest developments of the war so far. Very dramatic stuff.

Except that the GMO didn't show. Instead, we got that crude knuckle-dragger of an information minister, Muhammad
Said Al-Sahhaf, reading a prepared statement allegedly from his boss.

At this point, you really have to wonder about Saddam and why we haven't seen any appearances by the guy save for those two pre-taped ones which may have been him and may have been one of his doubles. You'd think that at this critical juncture Saddam would want to show his people and the Americans that he is alive and in control. Are there no video cameras available in all of Baghdad? Could he not film himself holding up a copy of today's newspaper?

(BTW, today's Onion has a real chuckler on this topic: "Saddam Speech Suspiciously Mentions Nelly Song From Last Summer")
posted at 5:35 PM

 
LGF is Stealing My Headlines

I used the same "Won't Get Fooled Again" reference on two separate occasions in the last six months ago when talking about the Palestinian Legislative Council and Abu Mazen.
posted at 3:31 PM

 
Starbucks Bye Bye

Here's an interesting object lesson for anyone who think that multinational food chains are unstoppable behemouths which take over markets and destroy the local competition, Godzilla-style: After about a year and a half in Israel, Starbucks is calling it quits here and shutting down its 6 local branches. A combination of the ongoing recession and poor marketing have sealed the chain's fate here locally.

As such, it joins such other global brands as Wendy's, Dunkin' Donuts, KFC, and Burger King which tried penetrating the Israeli market and ended up shutting down completely or scaling their presence to a minimum.

Still, it's a little weird to see Starbucks -- one of the most frequent targets of anti-globalist scorn -- keel over and die. The chain's demise has a number of causes, hubris being the biggest. It entered the local coffee market late in the game, arrogantly believing that the brand name alone would win over local cafoholics, and didn't adapt itself to local tastes.

When the chain first made noises about setting up shop here, a friend of mine wondered whether they'd serve up "Starbucks botz" (a reference to the muddy Turkish coffee popular in the army). It turns out that they didn't. Neither, as Alison Kaplan Sommer points out in her blog, did they take into account the Jewish demand for food, food, food to go alongside their coffee.

Starbucks' market research was all wrong. The chain is built for selling coffee to go. Israelis, however, prefer to sit down with their coffee (yes, and eat). There are already three homegrown chains which cater to these needs. I myself am a fairly hardcore caffeine fiend who has no problem at all with Starbucks, and in fact kind of rely on it when I'm overseas. But I don't remember patronizing the local branches more than once or twice.

So, goodbye Starbucks. I'll look you up next time I'm in New York.
posted at 5:34 PM

 
The One-Minute Berlitz Course in Iraqi Arabic

Here's an amusing glossary of Arabic insults, culled from the speeches of Iraq's crass Information Minister, Muhammad Said Al-Sahhaf. Funny stuff.
posted at 4:20 PM

 
Reporters, Embedded and Fired

Well, if anything, the war is serving as the stage for all sorts of journalistic conundrums. In recent days, the spotlight has been focused on Peter Arnett. Arnett squandered a lot of his journalistic credibility by giving an interview to Iraqi state TV in which he praises the fortitude of the Iraqis and provides quotes such as this one:

In answer to your question, it is clear that within the United States there is growing challenge to President Bush about the conduct of the war and also opposition to the war. So our reports about civilian casualties here, about the resistance of the Iraqi forces, are going back to the United States. It helps those who oppose the war when you challenge the policy to develop their arguments.

Arnett's interview kicked off a shitstorm of protest among people who saw his words as giving aid and comfort to the enemy in time of war, in other words borderline treason. In response, both of Arnett's employers, NBC and National Geographic, pink-slipped the guy. (Not to worry, Arnett was quickly snapped up by the tabloid-y London Daily Mirror, where he can now openly parrot Baghdad's party line.)

This whole incident once again brings us to the question of freedom of speech and the journalist's role in wartime. Let's be clear, Arnett is an idiot for essentially playing the part of a 21st-century Tokyo Rose. Whether his words are actually treasonous is a different matter. (That he doesn't have his facts clear, as Slate points out is a different issue.)

In slightly more amusing news we find the case of Geraldo Rivera vs. the Pentagon. (Amusing insofar as the words "Geraldo Rivera" automatically make something so.) Geraldo has been out in Iraq riding around with the 101st Airborne covering the war for Fox News. In a live broadcast yesterday, he apparently detailed where the 101st is heading to next. This, understandably, pissed off the military, who generally don't like to see their operational plans broadcast to the enemy by self-important tabloid journalists. And as a result, Geraldo found himself quickly disembedded.

The most recent update to this story has it that Geraldo will not be forcibly kicked out of Iraq, but will leave of his own accord. If you can spot the difference, please e-mail me and explain it.
posted at 4:20 PM

 
Day 13

American infantry forces and marines engaged Republican Guard and Saddam Fedayeen forces 80 km south of Baghdad. The fighting continues in Najaf, while coalition planes have been bombing the crap out of Republican Guard divisions inthe southern part of Baghdad.

In a really unfortunate incident yesterday, US troops accidentally shot 7 civilians who were in a van that ran an army checkpoint between Karbalah and Najaf. This is the type of incident that should no doubt be investigated, but will probably end up being justified. Unfortunately, in a war situation where one of the sides is known to use suicide bombers, this kind of incident -- however terrible -- tends to happen.

No word yet on the whereabouts of "Chemical Ali". I'm still hopeful.
posted at 4:20 PM

 
And Let Loose the Blogs of War

It's been a while since we had an authentic Internet-grown celebrity (anyone remember Mahir?). With the current crisis well underway, Salam Pax may be the latest.

Pax is the pseudonym of a blogger, allegedly living in Baghdad, who until a week ago was posting reports of life in that benighted place. His story, along with a general discussion of the blogsphere in times of war, was featured in Ha'aretz's Friday magazine.

Pax's blog makes for fascinating reading as he gives little slices of Iraqi life written in a wry tone that pokes at both the Iraqi regime and the liberators from the West. His entries are extremely well-written in very smooth English. So much so that there has been a hell of a lot of discussion about whether he's real or whether the blog is some kind of psychological warfare cooked up by COINTELPRO.

The site hasn't been updated in a week. James Lileks noted on his site yesterday (scroll down to the end) that the building which Salam Pax said provided him with his internet access appears to have been bombed.

One can only hope that if Pax is a real person, he'll make it to the other end of this thing and write again.
posted at 5:51 PM

 
Day 12

There's so much bad information or disinformation floating around out there. With some 700 embedded reporters, each one of them giving a small picture and often reporting rumors it's enough to make your head spin.

For instance, British troops today sheepishly admitted that the Iraqi General they nabbed yesterday in Basra wasn't actually a general. Oh well.

The fighting continues to inch towards Baghdad with coalition forces engaging Republican Guard units in the area of Najaf.

For me, the most interesting story of the day concerned the fighting in the southern town of Shatra. US forces bombed a number of targets in the city in an attempt to get Ali Hasan Al-Majid, the commander of the forces in the region. Majid, a scumbag cousin of the GMO, is better known by his nickname "Chemical Ali," which he earned by orchestrating the gas attacks on the Kurds in 1988.

At the moment, it's still unclear what happened to the guy, though if he is dead it's a big feather in the cap of the coalition.
posted at 5:51 PM

 
Another Suicide Bombing Here

And this happens also. After about a month's lull, another suicide bombing. This one was at a cafe in Netanya, not far away from the site of the Passover bombing almost a year ago. Today's event appears to have been mercifully small, and so far no casualties have been reported.


posted at 5:49 PM

 
Journalists, Embedded and Ejected

And this is going on as well. Two Israeli and two Portuguese journalists travelling around Southern Iraq were apprehended by U.S. force, accused of being spies, held for 48 hours (36 of them inside a jeep without food or water), roughed up, and eventually expelled. Boaz Bismuth, a reporter for the Israeli paper Yedioth Aharonot, and Dan Scemama made it through the ordeal unharmed, and returned with a lot of harsh words for the U.S. Military. One of the Portuguese reporters was a little less lucky; after trying to get up out of the jeep, he was beaten down by soldiers and ended up in the hospital with broken ribs.

This is an unpleasant story all around, but it's a little hard to pin the blame on any one side. On the one hand, Bismuth, Scemama, and the Portuguese must get some of the blame for their decision to play cowboy journalists. They entered a war zone and were trailing U.S. troops without getting accredidation from the military (as literally dozens of "embedded" journalists have received in the current conflict). On the other hand, Bismuth and Scemama would have had a hard time getting the proper accredidation in the first place. In order to travel with US troops, they would have had to have gone into Iraq through Kuwait, which refuses to issue press credentials to Israeli journalists. (The Jerusalem Post's Caroline Glick, who managed to get around the Kuwaiti ban because she also writes for the Chicago Sun-Times has a must-read first-hand account about dealing with the Kuwaitis).

The U.S. troops certainly seemed to have behaved a lot more brutally than one would expect, especially given that they were dealing with citizens of friendly countries. On the other hand, coalition forces are involved in a conflict with an enemy that sends out suicide bombers, and who pretends to surrender as part of an ambush. Given this, everyone's terribly on edge and the last thing the troops need is a bunch of civilians running around underfoot.

This story raises a number of issues about the role of jouralists in wartime that have come to light in the course of the current conflict. The whole concept of embedded journalism is a bit of a devil's bargain, as far as the world of journalism is concerned. You have a situation where every news outlet from the major news networks to People magazine and MTV has a representative tooling around with the troops, bringing a sense of front-line immediacy to wartime coverage that has never been seen before. On the other hand, these journalists are clearly playing ball to some degree with the military. Independent and too-critical journalists are rather discouraged, as the two Israelis found out to their chagrin.

(Side note: Scemama hastened to go on Channel 1 to tell his tale and harshly scold the military for their rough treatment. He also whined about the lack of independent voices coming out of Southern Iraq. To this, I need to laugh to some extent. Scemama comes from a country where a lot of the journalists are in bed with the IDF; as to his rough treatment, I'd like to see what had happened to an Israeli caught by the Iraqis. No, actually I wouldn't. However, I'd like to see what the Israelis would do if they caught a foreign journalist driving around a secure military area.)

I'm not going to serve up a sermon about how Truth is the First Casualty of War. BS. Embedded journalism is only the latest round of a very old dance between the media and the military. Frontline journalists have always relied on the military; it's a trade-off between total freedom of movement and total freedom of information.

However, we live in a world where you can get every flavor of war coverage from Fox News to the Baghdad Broadcasting Corporation (sorry, British Broadcasting Corporation), not to mention Al Jazeera, Indymedia, and a number of bloggers within the military itself. The information is out there, and it is the job of the information consumer to harvest it.
posted at 5:46 PM

 
Day 11

And a new week of fighting dawns, amid questions of whether coalition forces are taking abreather before heading onto Baghdad or not.

The biggest development of the last 24 hours was probably the Iraqi suicide bomber who killed 4 American soldiers in Najaf. This seems to open a new chapter in Saddam's book of tricks. It's increasingly looking as though the Iraqi army are going to play this one guerilla-style, making it a lot more difficult for coalition forces to get the job done.

But not all is going badly, despite the chorus of naysayers in the news media which is increasing in volume. British forces captured an Iraqi general in the South. Also, coalition forces are determined to liberate an Iraqi city in the hopes of triggering a chain reaction of uprising against Saddam. Towards that end, forces continued putting the hurt on Ba'ath Party targets in Basra, bombing a meeting of 200 party officials.

The calculus of the fighting has been curious. On the one hand, coalition forces were surprised to find the Iraqis putting up such a fight. On the other hand, Saddam has also miscalculated. He reckoned that the Americans and the British wouldn't be able to stomach any casualties. However, the opposite seems to be true.

The horror stories about bloody uniforms of American servicemen, torture implements, and shallow graves have only heightened the American desire for revenge. And over in the UK, home of massive anti-war protests in the last few months, recent polls show that support for the war has spiked heavily in recent days.

posted at 5:45 PM