In the days when Gamal Abdel Nasser was a mere captain, neighboring little Lebanon was making money hand over fist as the Middle Eastern go-between for Western entrepreneurs. It avoided violent nationalism, and Western businesses turned to it as to an oasis for their Middle Eastern headquarters, transforming .the tiny, tidy state into the Switzerland of the Arab world.
Last week the Middle Eastern Switzerland turned out instead to be a little Egypt. It threatened Iraq Petroleum Co., producer of one-fifth the Middle East's oil, with confiscatory fines, warned that it might...
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