LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
September 24/08

Bible Reading of the day.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 8,19-21. Then his mother and his brothers came to him but were unable to join him because of the crowd. He was told, "Your mother and your brothers are standing outside and they wish to see you." He said to them in reply, "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and act on it."

Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus (1873-1897), Carmelite, Doctor of the Church
Last Conversations, 21/08/1897 (©Institute of Carmelite Studies)She lived by faith like us
How I would have loved to be a priest in order to preach about the Blessed Virgin! One sermon would be sufficient to say everything I think about this subject. I'd first make people understand how little is known by us about her life. We shouldn't say unlikely things or things we don't know anything about! For example, that when she was very little, at the age of three, the Blessed Virgin went up to the Temple to offer herself to God, burning with sentiments of love and extraordinary fervor. While perhaps she went there very simply out of obedience to her parents... For a sermon on the Blessed Virgin to please me and do me any good, I must see her real life, not her imagined life. I'm sure that her real life was very simple. They show her to us as unapproachable, but they should present her as imitable, bringing out her virtues, saying that she lived by faith just like ourselves, giving proofs of this from the Gospel, where we read: «And they did not understand the words which He spoke to them,» (Lk 2,50). And that other no less mysterious statement: «His father and mother marveled at what was said about him,» (Lk 2,33). This admiration presupposes a certain surprise, don't you think so? We know very well that the Blessed Virgin is Queen of heaven and earth, but she is more Mother than Queen; and we should not say, on account of her prerogatives, that she surpasses all the saints in glory just as the sun at its rising makes the stars disappear from sight. My God! How strange that would be! A mother who makes her children's glory vanish! I myself think just the contrary. I believe she'll increase the splendor of the elect very much. It's good to speak about her prerogatives, but we should not stop at this... Who knows whether some soul would not reach the point of feeling a certain estrangement from a creature so superior and would not say: If things are such, it's better to go and shine as well as one is able in some little corner!  What the Blessed Virgin has more than we have is the privilege of not being able to sin, she was exempt from the stain of original sin; but on the other hand, she wasn't as fortunate as we are, since she didn't have a Blessed Virgin to love. And this is one more sweetness for us!

Free Opinions, Releases, letters & Special Reports
Don't soon expect a Syria-Lebanon border agreement. By Nicholas Blanford 23/09/08
Lebanon's Constitution guarantees equality, but women know otherwise. The Daily Star 23/09/08

Latest News Reports From Miscellaneous Sources for September 23/08
Bush lashes Syria, Iran as terrorism sponsors-AFP
Egyptian Ambassador To Lebanon Meets With Hizbullah Deputy Leader-MEMRI
Hezbollah and the Palestinians-CounterPunch
Ain el-Hilweh Blast Kills One, Wounds Four-Naharnet
Lebanon calls for more funding for Hariri probe-Financial Times
MP Ghanem: Parliament would Decide when Municipal Leaders Should Resign-Naharnet
Qahwaji: Syrian Deployment Aims Only at Combating Smuggling-Naharnet
MP Franjieh: Intra-Christian Reconciliation Requires Apologies-Naharnet
Fatfat: Contacts Underway for Hizbullah-Mustaqbal Meeting-Naharnet
Bsarma Victims Did Not Kill Each Other-Naharnet
Suleiman, Rice Discuss U.S. Support for Lebanese Armed Forces-Naharnet
Hizbullah in Qoreitem Wednesday to Relay Invitation from Nasrallah-Naharnet
Syria Boosts Military Presence Along Northern Border, Digs Wells-Naharnet
Syrian troop build-up concerns Lebanon-Jerusalem Post
Syria's Military Deployment Across Lebanon's Northern Borders Does Not Alarm Paris and Washington-Naharnet
Suleiman's Visit to New York, Washington Aimed at Reviving Presidency's Role-Naharnet
Saniora Meets King Abdullah in Mecca-Naharnet
Hizbullah, AMAL MPs in Damascus-Naharnet
Hizbullah: Geagea Apologized to Avoid Reconciliation-Naharnet
Phalange Party Welcomes Intra-Christian Reconciliation-Naharnet
MP Murr Supports Geagea, Criticizes Franjieh, Aoun-Naharnet
Don't soon expect a Syria-Lebanon border agreement-Daily Star
Lebanon likely to face power shortages for years to come - expert-Daily Star
Lebanon's Constitution guarantees equality, but women know otherwise-Daily Star
High cost of Internet impeding social, economic development - NGO-Daily Star
Graziano marks Peace Day by remembering UNIFIL casualties-Daily Star
Turkish FM: Other states could join if Syria, Israel talk directly-www.worldbulletin.net
Lebanon supports Cyprus, says President Christofias-Financial Mirror
Accommodations to Russia don't prevent arms deliveries to Syria-WorldNetDaily
Aoun warns he may pull out of dialogue with 'corrupt people-Daily Star
LAF officer plays down massing of 10,000 Syrian troops on border--Daily Star
Hizbullah 'not gearing up for war' - Israeli-Daily Star
Sleiman joins 63rd General Assembly session at UN headquarters-Daily Star
Campaign aims to raise environmental awareness-Daily Star
Sidon's traditional carpenters hang on despite tough modern competition-Daily Star
Kurds complain of discrimination during annual iftar-Daily Star

Syria Boosts Military Presence Along Northern Border, Digs Wells
Naharnet/Syria has boosted its military presence along the northern border with Lebanon, although Damascus stressed that the move is linked to a crackdown against smugglers. "Nearly 10,000 Syrian special forces have been deployed in the Abboudieh region along the border between Lebanon and Syria," a Lebanese army spokesman said. "We asked Damascus for clarification and we were told that the measures were strictly internal and on Syrian territory, and that they were in no way directed against Lebanon," he added. The spokesman said the Syrian authorities have assured the Lebanese army that the build-up is aimed at cracking down on smuggling and other crime along the border. The strengthened deployment is visible from the Lebanese side of the border.
Al-Mustaqbal newspaper on Tuesday said the Syrian deployment was "nothing but a cover-up" for digging wells along the border.
It said Syrian trucks have carried out a similar operation a few weeks ago on the Lebanese part of the village of Wadi al-Ashaer in Rashaya province.
Al Mustaqbal said the digging only stopped following the personal intervention of President Michel Suleiman.
Meanwhile, the daily Asharq al-Awsat quoted political sources as expressing fear that the Syrian move was likely a cover-up provided by Turkey or even France for any action to be taken against "extremists" in north Lebanon. The sources, however, ruled out any U.S. cover-up for this measure.
Traffic is continuing to pass through the main border point, although the Syrian army is cracking down on illegal crossings, making it more difficult to go through, travellers told AFP. Al-Mustaqbal newspaper said the troops began deploying along the northern border at the weekend.
News of the build-up raised fears in Lebanon after statements made by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in early September expressing his "concern" at the recent interfaith violence in the northern city of Tripoli. Assad said he had asked his Lebanese counterpart Michel Sleiman to "urgently send more troops to the north."
The anti-Syrian parliamentary group said this was "interference" in internal Lebanese affairs and could serve as a "pretext" for a return of Syrian troops to its tiny neighbor. Following the assassination of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri in 2005, Damascus was forced to withdraw its forces from Lebanon after three decades of military and political domination. It nevertheless continues to wield influence through its allies in Beirut.(Naharnet-AFP) Beirut, 23 Sep 08, 08:38

Syria's Military Deployment Across Lebanon's Northern Borders Does Not Alarm Paris and Washington
Naharnet/French and U.S. diplomats in New York appear confident that the deployment of Syrian troops close to Lebanon's northern borders is not an alarming development and might facilitate implementation of U.N. resolutions on Lebanon. Sources with the French diplomatic mission to the United Nations told Naharnet the Syrian move is part of the "agenda" that Damascus had promised President Nicolas Sarkozy to implement as a goodwill gesture in return for proceeding with the west's "openness" towards Syria. The French sources talked to Naharnet on the sidelines of a reception hosted by U.S. President George Bush at New York's Waldorf Astoria Hotel for foreign officials attending deliberations of the U.N. General Assembly (UNGA).
They said banning the smuggling of weapons and infiltration of gunmen from Syria to Lebanon is one of the French conditions set for Syria and falls in line with what the international community had asked Syria for to help stabilize the Iraq situation. A diplomat affiliated with the office of U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon had a positive interpretation of the Syrian move that contradicts concerns circulating in Beirut.
The diplomat said the deployment off Lebanon's northern border is a preemptive Syrian move prior to deliberations by the U.N. Security Council in October of reports on the implementation of international resolutions on Lebanon, mainly UNSCRs 1559 and 1701, especially regarding the smuggling of weapons into Lebanon and border control.
Aides who had accompanied U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to the meeting with President Michel Suleiman say irrespective of interpretations, they can confirm "there is no room for any form of a Syrian military comeback to any corner in Lebanon irrespective of any circumstances, reasons or pretexts."
Other diplomats who asked not to be further identified, believe the Syrian military deployment that coincided with Suleiman's visit to New York and Washington is meant to relay a political and practical message of warning to Lebanon against proceeding with "flying outside the Syrian flock," especially following the recent independence-adhering clarification made by Suleiman regarding topics he had discussed with his Syrian counterpart Bashar Assad.
In answering a question about the deployment, ranking sources with the Syrian diplomatic mission told Naharnet:
"Lebanon adopted what it deemed necessary for its security by redeploying an army brigade that had been assisting UNIFIL in south Lebanon, and Syria carried out what it deems appropriate for its security."
The Syrian sources said additional military and security measures adopted by the Lebanese authorities have bolstered their control over the terrain, which raises the possibility that some Islamist militants might try to escape the control by infiltrating into Syria across the border line. Such militants, the sources added, "might either re-base in Syria in an effort to destabilize the situation and carry out terrorist attacks against Arab and foreign interests, or try to cross into Iraq where terrorist cells are active threatening Iraq and neighboring states." Sources with the Lebanese delegation say President Suleiman "does not seem concerned by what is happening in light of reports that he had received" on the situation. Beirut, 23 Sep 08, 12:37

Suleiman's Visit to New York, Washington Aimed at Reviving Presidency's Role
Naharnet/"President Michel Suleiman is aware that he won't bring back with him from the United Nations and Washington tangible results that would reflect on the situation in Lebanon but still he decided to go to the United States."
With these words a member of the Lebanese official delegation in New York summed up to Naharnet the reasons behind Suleiman's visit to the U.S. during a chat at the Waldorf Astoria hotel. "The president, who is working since taking office to return the role of the president,…had to go to New York and Washington after...taking several steps in inviting for the dialogue table and sponsoring it on Sept. 16," the source said.
"The Lebanese presidency has been practically missing from the U.N. since four years, particularly after the adoption of (Security Council) Resolution 1559 which considered in one way or another the extension of ex-President Emile Lahoud's mandate illegitimate. This led to a rupture in relations between the international community and the president which reflected negatively on the presidency and its role," the official source added.
He said several Lebanese officials have visited the U.N. headquarters in New York and the White House except for the president who remained "isolated."
Lahoud's last visit to the U.N. "consolidated the presidency's isolation" as the former president didn't meet with heads of state of major powers, the official said.
"That's why President Michel Suleiman decided to bring Lebanon back to the international stage" and take part in several events, including the 63rd U.N. General Assembly session and the Francophone summit that will be held in Canada in October, he said.
Meanwhile, Suleiman began his work schedule in New York with talks with Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abulgheit and Arab League chief Amr Moussa before heading to a meeting of world leaders to assess Africa's development. Representatives of more than 160 countries, among them French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete, and U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon attended the high-level gathering, a day before the General Assembly's annual general debate. Suleiman also held talks with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to prepare for his meeting with U.S. President George Bush and other officials in Washington on Thursday. The Lebanese president further met with Paraguay's president Fernando Lugo and Cypriot leader Dimitris Christofias who invited Suleiman to visit their countries. Beirut, 23 Sep 08, 04:35

Hizbullah in Qoreitem Wednesday to Relay Invitation from Nasrallah
Naharnet/Mustaqbal Movement leader Saad Hariri will meet Wednesday a delegation representing Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah.
News reports on Tuesday said Hizbullah MP Mohammed Raad will head the delegation that will meet Hariri at his residence in Beirut's Qoreitem district.
Reports leaked from Qoreitem said the Hizbullah delegation will relay to Hariri an invitation from Nasrallah for a joint meeting with him. The reports added that Hariri will comply with Nasrallah's invitation before the Fitr holiday which is expected to start Sept. 30.Mustaqbal sources, however, refrained from setting dates.
Beirut, 23 Sep 08, 08:23

Suleiman, Rice Discuss U.S. Support for Lebanese Armed Forces
Naharnet/U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has reiterated the Bush administration's support for Lebanon in all fields, including the army and security forces, Baabda Palace said in a statement. It said that Rice's comments came on Monday during a meeting with President Michel Suleiman at New York's Waldorf Astoria hotel where the Lebanese head of state is staying. Foreign Minister Fawzi Salloukh also attended the talks. The statement said that Suleiman and Rice discussed about the situation in Lebanon in the aftermath of the national dialogue that was launched at the Baabda Palace on Sept. 16. They also talked about Lebanese-Syrian relations, monitoring of the border between the two countries and the issue of arms. Suleiman told Rice that Lebanon, the United States and other developed countries share the same humanitarian values, and called for continued U.S. support for Lebanon and its armed forces so that they could face all dangers and challenges. Suleiman stressed that any solution in the Middle East won't be comprehensive unless Palestinian refugees return to their homeland.
Late Monday, Suleiman and the first lady attended a welcoming ceremony hosted by U.S. President George Bush.Suleiman is to address the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday. Beirut, 23 Sep 08, 05:48

Saniora Meets King Abdullah in Mecca
Naharnet/Premier Fouad Saniora has discussed with Saudi King Abdullah the situation in Lebanon and the region, Beirut media reported Tuesday.
Before the one-hour meeting, the king hosted Saniora at an iftar banquet at the Safa Palace in Mecca in the presence of Saudi officials, local newspapers said.
Saniora also visited Saudi Crown Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz. The prime minister announced on Saturday that Saudi Arabia donated $44 million to support public school students in Lebanon. He said the donation covers tuition fees and books for public school students from Kindergarten through Grade 9 for the academic year 2008-2009.Saniora returned to Beirut on Tuesday. Beirut, 23 Sep 08, 06:19

Hizbullah, AMAL MPs in Damascus
Naharnet/Syrian Prime Minister Mohammed Naji Otari has discussed with a parliamentary delegation made of Hizbullah and AMAL Movement ways to boost cooperation between Lebanon and Syria. The official SANA news agency said Otari on Monday met with MPs Hassan Fadlallah, Mohammed Haidar, Ali Khreis and Abdul Majid Saleh. The two sides also discussed the phases of the rebuilding process in a number of southern villages which Syria took responsibility for building. SANA said the Lebanese delegation thanked Syria for its "support" for Lebanon's security and stability and for its contribution to rebuilding some villages in south Lebanon that have been damaged during the 2006 Israel-Hizbullah war Beirut, 23 Sep 08, 10:30

Hizbullah: Geagea Apologized to Avoid Reconciliation
Naharnet/Hizbullah on Monday accused Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea of making an apology to avoid reconciliation. The head of Hizbullah's parliamentary bloc MP Mohammed Raad made the charge while visiting Marada Movement leader Suleiman Franjieh at his northern residence in Bnashii to pay condolences for the death of the latter's bodyguard in the Bsarma shooting last week. Raad also criticized Geagea for rejecting Hizbullah weapons, saying "you cannot ask a major component that backs the state to lay down its arms to expose the country to the enemy." Raad said any reconciliation "requires the appropriate climate. This has been achieved as far as Beirut is concerned." Beirut, 22 Sep 08, 22:08

Phalange Party Welcomes Intra-Christian Reconciliation
Naharnet/The Phalange Party on Monday welcomed efforts to arrange intra-Christian reconciliation and reiterated its rejection of weapons that are not controlled by the state. The party, in a statement released after the weekly meeting by its politburo under ex-President Amin Gemayel, also rejected maintaining areas that are not controlled by state authority, in reference to Hizbulllah strongholds that are off limits to regular troops and security forces. The statement urged Hizbullah leadership to "clarify the political stand it adopts regarding the fate of weapons."The party urged authorities to issue a statement "as soon as possible" clarifying the aim of the recent deployment by Syrian troops close to Lebanon's northern borders. "It is the right of every Lebanese citizen to know the truth regarding what is happening (across the northern borders) to safeguard Lebanon's sovereignty," the statement noted. Beirut, 22 Sep 08, 21:58

MP Murr Supports Geagea, Criticizes Franjieh, Aoun
Naharnet/MP Michel Murr on Monday declared support for Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea's stand on "issues of principle" that enjoys the backing of "a large Lebanese and Christian section" and said he accepts his apology. Murr, talking to reporters after meeting U.S. Ambassador Michele Sison, said Geagea on Sunday spoke of "issue of principle and his stand on such issues enjoys the backing of a large Lebanese and Christian section." Such issues, according to Murr, include "Hizbullah weapons and maintaining them until after the liberation of Jerusalem as well as the issue of downing the army helicopter in Sujud." He criticized Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun, without mentioning him by name, for asking the army command why the chopper was allowed into the southern Sujud region that is controlled by Hizbullah.  "Such issues do not facilitate reconciliation because the other side (Hizbullah) would not give up its stand," Murr noted.
Asked whether he believed Geagea's apology included the 1991 assassination attempt against him, Murr said: "I did not file a lawsuit against Geagea or the Lebanese Forces. The verdict that was issued was based upon the prosecution's position. "No matter what, it was among the mistakes he (Geagea) confessed to making. He had the national courage to apologize," he added. He said that after the apology made by Geagea "I got over the personal issue. I forgot it."
Murr criticized Marada leader Suleiman Franjieh without mentioning him by name for "attacking (Maronite) Patriarch Nasrallah Sfeir daily."
Beirut, 22 Sep 08, 21:27

Hizbullah: Resistance Weapons Would Not Be Tackled During Dialogue
Naharnet/Hizbullah on Monday declared that its resistance weapons are not subject to any discussion, even while tackling the issue of a defense strategy.
MP Mohammed Raad, head of Hizbullah's parliamentary bloc, made the remark during an address at the southern village of Kafra.
"When we discuss the defense strategy during the Conference on National Dialogue there would be no room for tackling the resistance weapons before the last inch of our national soil is liberated," Raad said. "We've stretched a hand to others for dialogue so that we can integrate with them … we do not want to replace any faction," Raad added. He criticized calls for "reconciliation within each sect, which is aimed against forces in other sects."
Raad also criticized those who "want to work out understandings and reconciliation against the resistance weapons." Beirut, 22 Sep 08, 20:36

Don't soon expect a Syria-Lebanon border agreement
By Nicholas Blanford
Daily Star-Tuesday, September 23, 2008
When Lebanon's new president, Michel Sleiman, and his Syrian counterpart, Bashar Assad, held a landmark meeting in Damascus last month, one of the agreements reached between them was to delineate and demarcate the 320-kilometer border between their two countries. Although the announcement was widely welcomed, progress is likely to be slow as political realities in Lebanon weigh heavily on what should be a straightforward technical survey and joint agreement between Beirut and Damascus.
Complications are many and varied. The border remains disputed in numerous places, Syrian troops remain deployed on Lebanese soil in several spots, the border area is a transit route for weapons to Hizbullah as well as home to small military bases manned by pro-Syrian Palestinian groups, and it is an economic lifeline for residents of east Lebanon, long ignored by the state, who survive on commercial smuggling. Defining, demarcating and securing the Lebanon-Syria border, as called for by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701, woul threaten this status quo.
Borders can only be agreed upon with the goodwill of both neighboring countries. It takes mutually agreed maps and documents registered at the UN for a border to become internationally recognized. If one party to the process hedges then the border remains an open issue. One only has to look at the painstaking ordeal in 2000 of defining the UN-delineated Blue line in South Lebanon, behind which Israeli forces that had just ended their occupation of the area were obliged to withdraw, to understand the potential complexities of marking Lebanon's eastern border with Syria. The Blue Line was intended to "correspond" to Lebanon's southern border with Israel and the Israeli-occupied Shebaa Farms area; it was not a legal border, just a temporary boundary. Even so, because of the hostility between Lebanon and Israel, both countries squabbled furiously over perceived transgressions of literally a meter or less. If Lebanon and Syria were to apply the same demanding conditions to their mutual border, the project of demarcation would never be completed.
The continuing ambiguities over the exact path traced by the Lebanon-Syria border are due to decades of indifference by the Lebanese state to its wild and impoverished frontier regions and the reluctance of Syria to accept the notion of a separate Lebanon in the first place.
The French Mandatory authorities delineated the border in the years following the creation of Greater Lebanon in 1920, drawing detailed maps and on-the-ground sketches of the frontier in 1934. The border was supposed to follow the perimeters of four ex-Ottoman qadas: Akkar in the north, Baalbek in the east and Hasbayya and Rashayya in the southeast. For the sake of convenience, the boundaries were defined by the geographical features of the Nahr al-Kabir in the north and the peaks of the Anti-Lebanon Mountain Range and Mount Hermon in the east.
But these natural boundaries often conflicted with property rights, where Lebanese-owned land ended up inside Syria and vice versa, and with local demographics. For example, the village of Tufayl, which longitudinally lies just east of central Damascus, is connected to the Bekaa Valley by a narrow finger of Lebanese territory that projects eastward over the Anti-Lebanon range and into the flat semi-desert north of the Syrian capital. Tufayl was included in Lebanon due to its population being Shiite, therefore more closely connected to their co-religionists in the Bekaa than the Sunnis and Aramaic-speaking Greek Catholics who are their immediate neighbors in Syria.
In the decades after Lebanon and Syria gained independence in the 1940s, both countries formed several committees to settle border disputes, all of them unsuccessful. In 1975, the Lebanese Army produced a map marking 36 unresolved spots along the border stretching from west of Wadi Khaled in the north to the Shebaa Farms in the south.
In May 2005, a month after Syria withdrew its forces from Lebanon, I was invited onto a Syrian military base a few hundred meters south of Deir al-Ashayer village in southeast Lebanon. The base, according to Lebanese maps, lay 1.5 kilometers inside Lebanon. But a hospitable yet indignant Syrian Army colonel showed me his military map which clearly indicated that his base was 200 meters inside Syria.
"Right now you are sitting inside Syria, not Lebanon," he said.
In fact, the border on the colonel's map was very different from that portrayed on Lebanese Army maps, underlining the complexities ahead.
Syria has repeatedly stated it is willing to delineate its border with Lebanon on the condition that the Shebaa Farms area is left until last. Since 2006, a UN team has been mapping the precise contours of the farms, although its conclusions have not been made public.
Delineating and demarcating the border is only the first step, however. Resolution 1701, which helped end the war with Israel in 2006, called on Lebanon to fully secure its borders. A maritime component of the UNIFIL peacekeeping force keeps watch off Lebanon's coastline, and the government has deployed some 8,000 troops along the land border with Syria.
But the troops lack border security training, coordination between different security departments, and suitable equipment, such as standardized communications, night-vision capabilities and transport appropriate for the rugged eastern frontier. Commercial smuggling continues uninterrupted. The Lebanese government appears to have chosen to turn a blind eye to the practice, not wishing to enflame local sentiment in one of the poorest regions of the country.
Arms smuggling and infiltration by militants also appears to be unchecked. Hizbullah has claimed on several occasions that it has more than replenished its pre-2006 arsenal. The Shiite group is evasive on how it receives its weapons, but it has long been recognized that the porous Lebanon-Syria border is the most likely transit route. A UN fact-finding team following up on a 2007 tour of the border reported last month that the "situation along the eastern Green Border and the Green Border [the illegal crossings] remains as penetrable as it was during the mission of team 1 [in 2007]." Now that Hizbullah and its allies hold a one-third veto-wielding share in the government, the prospect of the state actively attempting to seal off the border is even less likely.
Indeed, it is hard to imagine that the Lebanon-Syria border will be fully delineated and demarcated until many of the unresolved questions affecting it - Hizbullah's armed status, Syrian-Israeli peace talks, the fate of the Palestinians - are answered first.
**Nicholas Blanford is a Beirut-based journalist and author of "Killing Mr Lebanon: The Assassination of Rafiq Hariri and Its Impact on the Middle East." This commentary first appeared at bitterlemons-international.org, an online newsletter.

Lebanon's Constitution guarantees equality, but women know otherwise
By The Daily Star
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Editorial
Stressing Lebanon's reputation for democratic leadership in the Arab world is almost a national pastime, but on many levels our laurels are wearing thin. Perhaps nowhere is this more apparent than in the area of women's rights, one in which some countries in other parts of the Middle East are rapidly catching up with this one - and in which others have left it far behind. Those who put together the recently installed government of national unity, for example, only included a single woman in their 30-seat collage, there is nothing like gender parity in civil service jobs, and more than half of the country's citizens are not allowed to confer their nationality on their own children because they themselves were born with the "wrong" set of chromosomes.
Conversely, women in other Arab countries known for their progressive ways on this score have continued to make important strides. There is no longer any doubt that Algerian, Moroccan and Tunisian women enjoy greater equality than their Lebanese counterparts. What is more, even some of those countries long regarded as conservative are moving quickly to bring their policies into line with the realities of the 21st century. Apart from Saudi Arabia, the Gulf Arab monarchies are in the process of opening more and more doors for women, especially in terms of genuine political participation, a trend that cannot help but to accelerate progress toward other key measures, such as full equality before the law.
Lebanon has long experience with the outward trappings of democracy and republicanism, but these remain facades that obscure a far less enlightened reality. The (relatively) regular holding of elections means nothing in the face of an almost exclusively male establishment that rules the proverbial roost on a daily basis, and the existence of a Constitution that guarantees equality for all Lebanese is nothing less than an insult when everyday practice favors men over women at every turn.
Of course, women are not the only Lebanese who suffer from both societal and institutionalized discrimination. But if a group that makes up more than half the population cannot obtain justice, what hope do tiny minorities have? If they have any moral courage, those male politicians who think the status quo is acceptable should be open about their predilections. They could start by calling for an amendment to the Constitution so that it specifically confers second-class citizenship on women. In fact, they should start a whole new party built on the "need" to bar women and girls from education, to further curtail their inheritance and marital rights, maybe even to make male gender a prerequisite for a driver's license. Absurd, yes, but at least those signing up would be honest about their neanderthal views.