Here’s something I’m excited to check out... Filmmaker Parvez Sharma is in Beirut this week to screen his 2007 film, A Jihad for Love. Filmed in 12 countries and nine languages, the documentary explores the intersection of Islam and homosexuality.

The film is playing tonight at the Art Lounge in Karantina at 6:30 p.m. and tomorrow at Zico House at 5:30 p.m.

(Photo via gossipgamers.com)

What does Syria have against Pokemon?

According to the website Alkasir.com, the Nintendo franchise’s website is the top banned URL in the country. I don’t get it.

Click here to see the results.

The Armenian refugee camp of Sanjak is disappearing. The expanding Beirut suburb of Bourj Hammoud will consume the 20,000-square-meter area within the next few years, and in the process eliminate one of the last remaining Armenian refugee camps in Lebanon. The camp was established in 1939, in response to Turkey’s annexation of Alexandretta, an autonomous territory, within French mandated Syria.

An Israeli border police officer blocks the road after a settlers' car was ambushed by Palestinian gunmen killing two woman and two men on Tuesday night. (AFP/Menahem Kahana)

Four Israelis were shot dead near the West Bank Jewish settlement of Kyriat Arba on Tuesday, just ahead of renewed peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, Israeli police spokesperson Mickey Rosenfeld said. Rescue workers said four people were killed, including a pregnant woman.

The attack was claimed by the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, which is vehemently opposed to the talks that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas are to relaunch in Washington on Thursday.

So I got out my super reliable Magic 8-Ball to predict the outcome of the peace talks.

(Photo via thebsreport.wordpress.com)

The answer: Outlook not so good.

But wait, that’s not much different from predictions on the peace talks before the incident.

There was not one, but two separate incidents involving kidnappings in Lebanon yesterday.

The Lebanese army rescued two Polish tourists who were kidnapped by members of the Jaafar family in Baalbek. One of the Jaafar boys was killed during the rescue operation.

And in South Lebanon, a woman and her two children were kidnapped and held for ransom. No word yet on the status of their release.

Let’s hope this doesn’t turn into a Tuesday trend.

But just in case it does, here’s some food for thought:

(Photo via jumperlumps.com)

A cartoon by Sareen Akharjalian depicts a common fear in Lebanon: having your electricity stolen by your neighbors. (Photo via inkontheside.com)

(Photo via forums.evolutionm.net)

Harley-Davidson is coming to town. The iconic US motorcycle maker will open its first showroom in Beirut next month with a cool $2.5 million budget.

Yayyyyyy! You know what that means? More opportunities for men with impotence problems to compensate with symbolically phallic vehicles.

I know, I know. It’s not always a man behind the wheel, so let’s be fair and take a moment to honor all the douche bag drivers in the country.

ATV drivers
Sure, ATVs are supposed to be used for offroading on rocky, rural terrain, but these drivers prefer to think of the capital as more of a concrete jungle.

Scooter drivers
Wanna-be motorcyclists who make up for their shortcomings with pathetic wheelies…

Shock-seeking motorcycle riders



Service drivers
They will stop at nothing to cut you off on the road and scream obscenities with reckless abandon. Bonus points for holding together car bumpers with duct tape and rear-view mirrors with twice-chewed gum. MacGyver would be proud.

Oversized SUVs
A special shout out to the women who simultaneously double-fist a grande double caramel latte and their retardedly-small mouse dogs while driving.

Convoys
Your safety comes second to the politician trying to make it to KFC for the Iftar special.

Customized cars
These drivers cannot actually afford a real sports car, so they customize their dinky rides with black-tinted windows and a siren that mimics the sound of a cop car because, you know, that’s really close to being cool. Super cool, man.

And Everybody else…

Israeli soldiers appear to cut down a tree on the Lebanese side of the border in Aadaiseh, an event that sparked deadly clashes on August 3. (AP/Ronith Daher, via msnbc.com)

The document has not been made public yet, but according to Israel's Deputy Ambassador to the UN Haim Waxman, UNIFIL’s report says Lebanon is to blame for the deadly clash that broke out in Aadaiseh along the southern border on August 3.

A preliminary UN report already blamed the Lebanese army for the incident, but Waxman quotes the final report saying, “The Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) opening fire, which triggered the exchange, constitutes a serious violation of [UN Security Council] Resolution 1701 and a flagrant breach of the cessation of hostilities.”

Perhaps it is no surprise that the blame went to Lebanon. AFP reported that the UN Security Council showed its anger by saying it "deplores strongly the recent incidents involving UNIFIL peacekeepers."

You may remember back in late June and early July when residents in South Lebanon launched aggressive protests against UNIFIL peacekeeping forces, injuring soldiers and briefly disarming a unit.

UNIFIL renewed its mission in Lebanon for another year on Monday.
 
It also condemned the recent defacement of UNIFIL posters and monuments commemorating fallen peacekeepers by residents in South Lebanon.

Right-wing nut job and TV pundit Glenn Beck managed to rally tens of thousands of people to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington on Saturday for what some are calling an anti-Obama demonstration.

Click here for pics from the rally.

I haven’t taken Beck and crew very seriously, but it seems clear now that there is a growing disenchantment from Americans with the country’s leadership.

(Photo via 2.bp.blogspot.com)

Check this out in North Carolina: someone painted an Obama slur on a tennis court.

And the backlash begins…

Some of Israel’s top fundamentalist rabbis gathered on August 18 to defend a guidebook written by Rabbi Yitzhak Shapira on the killing of non-Jews.

The book Torat Ha’Melech or the King’s Torah was published last year. As Max Blumenthal writes in AlterNet, there are passages that say non-Jews are "uncompassionate by nature" and should be killed in order to "curb their evil inclinations."

"There is justification for killing babies if it is clear that they will grow up to harm us, and in such a situation they may be harmed deliberately, and not only during combat with adults,” wrote Shapira in the book.

According to Blumenthal, at their meeting earlier this month, the rabbis “declared in the name of the Holy Torah that [they] would not submit to any attempt by the government to regulate their political activities -- even and especially if those activities included inciting terrorist attacks against non-Jews. As one wizened rabbi after another rose up to inveigh against the government's investigation of Torat Ha'Melech until his voice grew hoarse, the gathering degenerated into calls for murdering not just non-Jews, but secular Jews as well.”