Saturday, July 29, 2006

Wake up Israel!

Last night Walid Jumblatt asked:"To whom will [Sayyed Hassan] Nasrallah give his gift of victory [over Israel]? To the Lebanese people or to Iran and Syria?"
And Nasrallah answered tonight when he said:"Hezbollah's victory is for Lebanon and for all the Lebanese...Christians and Muslims... Our victory will make Lebanon more united than ever."

If Nasrallah is sincere, and he usually is, than Hezbollah should win. The Israelis destroyed my country and my life and put their country for the first time since the creation of their state under direct attack.

Their military adventure and their refusal to seek a peaceful solution with their neighbours has exposed them. Might might be right for a short period but geography and history will always prevail.

I call upon the Israelis to stop this useless slaughter, vote their present government out and go back to the negotiating table.

The Arabs were clear. They want peace, a just peace. In 2002 at the Arab Summit in Beirut, Arab states proposed a peace initiative that was rejected by Israel. In 2003, a group of Israelis and Palestinians worked out a virtual peace solution in Geneva and again it was rejected by Israel.

A just peace is the solution. Bunker buster bombs, the killing of innocent children or the destruction of Lebanese villages, will only create more hatred, radicalism and misery.

Wake up Israel!

Thursday, July 27, 2006

Unite

Today whatever our grievances, we should unite. We do not need more divisions and another civil war because everyone will surely loose.
Let us unite, not for Nasrallah, nor for Jumblatt. Let us unite because we are all in the same boat even though Hezbollah is driving it. But if we panic we will all sink.

Some of the displaced are lifting Hezbollah flags in certain regions that have opened their houses and schools for them and that is causing friction. But forgive those who provoke. They have lost their houses and their land. They have lost everything they had. Embrace them, after all they are Lebanese like you.

Hezbollah may serve Iran and Syria, but the majority of its supporters are poor and miserable people who need welfare. Be patient and unite and defend your brothers even if they are wrong.

As for Hezbollah supporters, they should be more humble and not label people who truly care about their country more than any cause as traitors. Indeed, the Party of God has conscripted the whole Lebanese population to join their ultimate battle. Can't they understand our anger and grief?

This is the moment to turn the other cheek to Hezbollah, especially when Israeli bombs are killing our children and ruining our dreams.

Tuesday, July 25, 2006

An Act That Is Worth 1.5 Billion Words

While Israel and Hezbollah are destroying Lebanon and Iran and Syria are claiming to stand by their Lebanese allies in words and venomous threats, Saudi Arabia showed its true friendship and love and sent us $1.5 billion.

This makes Saudi Arabia 1.5 billion times more important to Lebanon than any member of the axis-of-evil. This makes Syria and Iran 1.5 billion times more crimal and cowardly than they actually are. This makes Hassan Nasrallah look 1.5 billion times more petty. This makes all the pro-Syrian politicians 1.5 billion times less patriotic than they ever were. This is an act of solidarity in the face of Israeli rage that is 1.5 billion times more powerful than any Arab League meeting.

Thank you to the people and government of Saudi Arabia for standing by us.

The Day I Realized That My Lebanon Is No More

Lebanon is not mine anymore. I always realized that day was coming. In fact most Westernized Lebanese thought so.

I could see it. The misery, the poverty, the inequality. It was bound to explode. Hezbollah was born amidst desperate people and with its mix of preaching, charity and military victories against a supposedly unbeatable foe, it gave meaning to their lives.

More than a million people support Hezbollah and idolize its leader Hassan Nasrallah and Israeli bombs today only reinforce the Party of God's grasp on its community.

After this crisis, Hezbollah and its allies will rule. And in anticipation I am trying to cut all ties to the Lebanon that I gave 13 years of my life for while others emigrated at the first opportunity that came up.

I believed, but not anymore. Now it is Hezbollah's turn to impose its Lebanon and I do not want to be a part of it. I lived war and refuge from 1975 till 1990 and I do not want to do it anymore.

I want to axe my ties to Lebanon.

I want the best for my children and Lebanon is not it and will never be.

Therefore, my wife and I have started looking for a school that will accept our children come September, and I am looking for a job, any job. I can be a pretty good waiter or janitor. I have the skills.

I guess Walid Jumblat, the Druze leader, was right when he said that he preferred to be a garbage collector in New York than a political leader in Lebanon. (But I do not think that he has the skills, after all he is a Bey).

A friend of mine suggested today that I become a banker, a rich and respectable one. But I like being a journalist and I like covering troubled spots as a foreign correspondent but not as a victim.

Therefore if any of you out there has a job offer please send it my way. (What a cheap way of exploiting my blog! What comes next? Advertising!)

Sunday, July 23, 2006

A Five Star Evacuation

A few weeks ago I had promised my wife and kids a weekend on the beach in Cyprus, which is 40 minutes away by plane from Beirut. But I could not deliver on that promise because of my busy work schedule, until we were evacuated on board a Royal Navy vessel, the HMS Gloucester, courtesy of Islam and Zionism battling it out in my backyard.

I am not complaining and I am deeply indebted to the British government for rescuing my little British hooligans, their beautiful British mother and my "shocked and awed" self, but the journey was no Disney cruise.

The British Embassy told us to be at the Forum of Beirut, a large concert hall by the port, between 9:30 am and 2:30 pm. My plan was to drop my wife and kids and stand tall in Lebanon. And then my kids cried, "don't leave us daddy", my wife cried, "I will not leave without you" and my business cried, "we are going to go bankrupt if you stay".

On the morning of Wednesday 19 July 2006, I filled my "standard evacuation" Gap backpack with shaving kit and toothbrush, a few work documents, a couple of t-shirts and boxer shorts and lots of precious personal items, like the deed to my house, the birth certificates of my kids, my wife's jewelry and lots of regrets for leaving my father and mother, who are safe so far in their house in the mountains.
My parents, who were faced with the same dilemma during the 15 year civil war, have a "too old for this ####" attitude today and refuse to leave Lebanon again. Before heading to the ship, my mother hugged me and said with tears in her eyes:"don't go to Europe, it is too close to Lebanon. Immigrate to the US, Canada or Australia, leave this cursed country for good. Build your children a new life far away."

We took a taxi and got to the British appointed hangar, where Paul Anka and Julio and Enrique Iglesias performed in recent years, at noon. We then waited under the watchful eyes of the Lebanese police and the British military, until it was our turn to be registered by the local Embassy staff.
A lady in her eighties, held by her Ethiopian nurse, was at a counter near us. Although her nurse had a valid British visa, the civil servant refused her entry to the ship, which was only for British citizens and their direct dependents. The old woman had no choice but to head home.

Four hours later, we boarded the air-condition free buses and headed for the Beirut port, that Israel bombed the previous morning. An apologetic and sweaty Lebanese immigration officer boarded the ovens on wheels and checked everyone's passport and we simmered at 40 C for another hour.

We then headed to the batch three Type 42 destroyer of the Royal Navy and were escorted by groups to our quarters. My kids were impressed by the merry-go-round motions of the ship's radar, her machine guns and Sea Dart missiles that shot down an Iraqi Silkworm missile that was threatening the USS Missouri during the 1991 Gulf War.
We went down the ship's hull, a labyrinth of tight corridors and steep ladders, until we got to our assigned windowless room. We were about 80 evacuees in that 50 square meter space and my wife, kids and I sat on our backpacks and made friends with our newly discovered Siamese brothers and sisters.

During the next couple of hours the ship's crew offered us sandwiches and chocolates which I whole-heartedly ate, considering that my diet was not appropriate at such troubled times. And then the Gloucester departed; destination: Limassol, Cyprus.

My next arm to arm neighbour, Toufic, 65, asked the sailor in charge of our room in a loud voice:"When can I have a smoke and scotch on the deck, captain?"
"You can have a smoke in about 20 minutes when we get passed the Israeli blockade, but I'm afraid we're not offering any alcohol today."

While I got comfortable with my awkward sitting position on the floor, a nurse tread carefully in between our hands and feet and told the part English part German family sitting above me to make place for a semi-blind elderly woman. The wife in a heavy German accent protested, the nurse insisted until a British-Lebanese middle aged man got up and sat in the corridor.

When the time came, we were allowed on the front deck of the destroyer and my kids and I were impressed at the speed of this rather large ship and its stability. Indeed, the trip took five hours and very few people felt sea sick. We were processed again by the British in the port of Limassol and then moved by buses to the RAF airbase in Akrotiri.

By 3 O' Clock AM, my wife and children who had managed less than an hour of sleep that day, rushed to their stretchers with the sheets and pillow that the very helpful British military staff had provided us with, took a sip of water, and slept.

Although I had not slept that day, my priorities were different. I felt sweaty and dirty and all I could see were the toilets and the showers and the soap and the towel that were also provided for us evacuees at the base.

Clean again, I had some tea and slept on the stretcher, which felt, after the 5 hour yoga session on the ship, like a water bed.

I managed an hour of sleep and got up to join a group of Toufic with a group of British-Lebanese men. One of them had spoken to his family back home, (international phone calls and internet access were provided for free), and informed us that the Israelis had dropped 29 tons of bombs in the predominantly Shiite southern suburbs of Beirut next to the Palestinian camp of Burj al Barajneh.

A pumped up and shaven man shouted in Arabic a desperate "Ya Allah!" (Oh God!). And when I asked him what is the matter, he said that he had moved a few months ago from England and opened a body building club next to this area. He informed us that he had won several body building competitions in Britain and he showed us his oil and muscles pictures that he kept on his mobile phone, admitting that he shot himself with muscle enhancing drugs to get that big.

We all praised the British military for their excellent logistics and humane treatment. There was a play area for kids, a tent for mothers who breastfeed and special beds and mattresses for injured people. I must admit that if evacuations were rated, I would give this one five stars. The British military had certainly more manners, more respect and more desire to serve than the staff of any hotel in Paris.

By 1:30 PM we were taken to the base airport where an Air Caraibe Airbus, chartered by the British government, waited for us. Toufic begged and slimed for a first class seat with the right authorities and got it. But before we got on the plane, the military asked for our permission to let the press in and none of us objected.

Journalists, cameramen, photographers, radio and newspaper interviewers flooded the waiting room and in ten minutes photographed, filmed and interviewed many of us. We were news material and that made me feel like a victim and I did not like it. But all those feelings disappeared as soon as we got on the plane whose ownership and French speaking and suntanned crew were Caribbean based. And I told my kids to forget about Lebanon and to think that they were back from a trip in the French Martinique.

We landed in Gatwick in no time, we took a taxi and headed to my in laws house in Central London and I called my parents back in Lebanon and told them that we had arrived and as I was about to end the conversation, my mother said once again: "Go to the far end of the world my son. Take your family as far as you can from Lebanon and do not look back."