LCCC ENGLISH NEWS BULLETIN
December 12/06Bible Reading For the Day
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 5,17-26.
One day as Jesus was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of the law were sitting there who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and Jerusalem, and the power of the Lord was with him for healing. And some men brought on a stretcher a man who was paralyzed; they were trying to bring him in and set (him) in his presence. But not finding a way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and lowered him on the stretcher through the tiles into the middle in front of Jesus. When he saw their faith, he said, "As for you, your sins are forgiven." Then the scribes and Pharisees began to ask themselves, "Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who but God alone can forgive sins?"Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them in reply, "What are you thinking in your hearts? Which is easier, to say, 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Rise and walk'? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins''--he said to the man who was paralyzed, "I say to you, rise, pick up your stretcher, and go home."He stood up immediately before them, picked up what he had been lying on, and went home, glorifying God. Then astonishment seized them all and they glorified God, and, struck with awe, they said, "We have seen incredible things today."Free Opinions
Waiting for Godot in Beirut. By: Joseph Hitti 12/12/06
Lebanon's Self-Jailed Leaders-By: By Mohammed Salam -Naharnet
Audio Interview with Elias Zoghby
Dear member: It is my great pleasure to share with you today an Audio 44 minutes interview with Mr. Elias Zoghby, the well known Lebanese politician, journalist, media specialist, Patriotic activist, political commentator and ex FPM Media Chairman/ The Interview is posted on the LCCC website http://www.10452lccc.com
Mr. Zoghby addressed scientifically and with facts and reason the Hezbollah militant demonstrations and sit ins that have been unfolding in Beirut's streets during the last 10 days. He shed light on the shameful - marginal role that General Aoun and what is left of his supporters are Trojanly playing in these Iranian Syrian schemes in a mere contraction to their Lebanese Christian Community's historical and conscientious convictions and political-safety tracks.
Mr. Zoghby believes strongly and based on tangible facts and studies that only 3% of the Lebanese Christian community members are taking part in the Hezbollah sit ins that are fully orchestrated by the Iranian - Syrian leadership through Hezbollah. He explained fully the aims of these demonstrations that revolves around executing a coup against the Lebanese regime and its democratic and legitimate institutions. He affirmed that Aoun's support is wearing off on daily basis and in the best it does not currently exceed 25%.
Mr. Zoghby stated that those Christians who are taking part in the Hezbollah militant sit ins are not by means affiliated to any of the five pillars of the Christian Lebanese community (The Maronite Patriarch, the Christian Bishops, the Christian regional congregations, the Christian universities, and the Christian NGO's/parties. They are simply individuals who are still under the effect and halo of all or some of the previous Aoun's national and patriotic slogans.
Mr.Zoghby called on the Lebanese to focus on Aoun's newly Syrian-Iranian adopted stances and platforms. He affirmed that Aoun has turned against all his pre Liberation convictions, platforms and promises.
Mr. Zoghby assured that Hezbollah no matter what he does in regards to threats, terror and other intimidation means will not be allowed by the Lebanese or the regional-international communities to take any role in the Lebanese life that is not designated to its own community on the account of other Lebanese communities.
Mr. Zoghby called on the Lebanese in Lebanon and Diaspora to maintain their perseverance, faith and hopes because Lebanese, the democracy, love, peace and multi culturalism will prevail in the end and be victorious/
Direct Link to the interview
http://www.10452lccc.com/audionews/zoghbi11.ram
Yours Truly
Elias BejjaniLatest News from miscellaneous sources for Decembe 12/06
Leading Lebanon from a gilded cage-Los Angeles Times
Failure of first Hezbollah rally prompts another-Ya Libnan
Free Shiite Movement Leader slams Hezbollah, Iran & Syria-Ya Libnan
Lahoud made a wrong decision-Gulf News
Build unity, peace solutions at Lebanon's grave moment ...Catholic Online
Nasrallah accepts Arab League plan for Lebanon-Jerusalem Post
Lebanon's Self-Jailed Leaders-Naharnet
Lebanon parties to discuss Arab League compromise proposal-Ha'aretz
Hezbollah allies deliver ultimatum to Lebanon-Boston Globe - United States
Conflicting Mass Rallies Widen Lebanon's Split-Naharnet
Lebanon, Iran top Olmert's agenda on visit to Germany, Italy-Ha'aretz
Lebanon's Shiites Forge Identity-Free Internet Press
Syria backs Arab League efforts on Lebanon: envoy-Reuters
A French presidential hopeful likened Hezbollah to the Nazis.-TlA
Lebanon heading toward a breaking point-San Jose Mercury News
Baker, Hamilton press diplomacy with Iran, Syria-Washington Times
MK Sneh: Syria is preparing for an Israeli attack-Jerusalem Post
IDF: Syria not planning for war with Israel-Ha'aretz -
Talking to Syria and Iran would be a mistake 12/11-St. Petersburg Times
Robert Fisk: Revolution in the air as Lebanon's rift widens-Independent
Iraq sectarian violence casts shadow over Lebanon-Reuters
Geagea Moves Closer to Beirut-Naharnet
Free Shiite Movement Leader Slams Hizbullah-Naharnet
Assad Committed to Lebanon's Stability-Naharnet
Anti-Government Sunni Figures Harassed; Report-Naharnet
Saniora Misses Freedom-Naharnet
Lebanese Victims in Algeria Bomb Attack-Naharnet
Conflicting Mass Rallies Widen Lebanon's Split-Naharnet
Sfeir: War Starts with Words-NaharnetBeirut Gossip (Quotes excerpted from miscellaneous press reports on the demonstrations in Downtown Beirut)
Updated Dec. 11, 2006
• “There is a constant and massive rearmament of Hizbullah”… “The weapons are for the most part Iranian and are entering Lebanon thanks to the complicity of Hizbullah supporters inside the Lebanese intelligence service” (Senior UN official, quoted by the French daily Le Monde, Dec. 8, 2006).
• “… A 50-man squad of militants linked to Al-Qaida [are] charged by Damascus with killing 36 anti-Syrian Lebanese personalities. The militants were recruited among fighters in Iraq and infiltrated via Syria into Lebanon, where they are based in a Palestinian refugee settlement in the north of the country” (Confidential document sent to U.N. headquarters, reported by AFP-Naharnet quoting the French daily Le Monde Dec. 8, 2006)
• “By God, neither the support of the US nor the Western countries and some Arab countries will help you.” (Naim Qassem, Hizbullah's second-in-command, Sunday Dec. 10, 2006, addressing Prime Minister Saniora)
• “You want to bring the Americans and we want to drive them away”, (Naim Qassem, Hizbullah's second-in-command, Sunday Dec. 10, 2006)
• [Addressing Prime Minister Siniora directly]: "If you want to truly show that you support the resistance and this people, as you say, then I advise you to prove it by doing one of two things, if not both. The first is that you issue an order to the Lebanese Army to give the resistance back the truckload of arms which it confiscated [in November].” (Naim Qassem, Sunday Dec. 10, 2006, addressing Prime Minister Saniora)
• “There is no fear! There is no fear! The blood of Shiites is a Kalashnikov.” (The crowd)
• “Does Bush want popular expression in Lebanon? Do the West and the Arabs want to hear the voice of the people in Lebanon? Tell them 'Death to America!'” (Naim Qassem, Sunday Dec. 10, 2006)Lebanon parties to discuss Arab League compromise proposal
By Yoav Stern, Haaretz Correspondent
A solution to the political crisis in Lebanon appeared close Sunday after the opposition and coalition majority announced their willingness to discuss a compromise proposed by the Arab League. Mustafa Ismail, envoy to the Arab League secretary general and foreign affairs adviser to the Sudanese president, is expected to arrive in Lebanon on Monday to promote the plan. In an interview Sunday night to Al-Arabiyah television, Ismail said that both sides had expressed their willingness to discuss the proposal.
Under the proposal, the number of Lebanese cabinet ministers would increase to 30. Of these, 19 would represent the parliamentary majority and 10 would come from opposition parties. The remaining minister would be proposed by the opposition and be subject to majority approval. In addition, the new cabinet would approve the creation of an international court to deal with the murder of former prime minister Rafik Hariri. The Arab League proposal does not entail replacing President Emile Lahoud, who does not have majority parliamentary support.
Ismail said Sunday that Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri was expected to summon the parties to discuss the terms of the proposal. The Arab League envoy said all parties were willing to stop their street protests. "Hassan Nasrallah informed me that he is not interested in a revolution or in changing the current regime," Ismail said. He added that the Hezbollah leader would be willing to accept Prime Minister Fouad Siniora as the head of a unity government.
The Arab League proposal does not contradict a Lebanese Christian initiative according to which the Christians would decide Lahoud's fate.
Sunday's surprising development came on the heels of a huge opposition rally in the center of Beirut, during which speakers predicted Siniora's imminent resignation and threatened to establish a shadow government if he was prevented from stepping down. Christian leader General Michel Aoun declared Sunday that if a solution satisfactory to the opposition was not found, it would declare the creation of an alternate government that would take action toward holding new elections. Some 20,000 security forces were deployed against the demonstrators, particularly around the prime minister's office. Barbed wire was laid down to keep the hundreds of thousands of demonstrators from overrunning Siniora's offices.
Aoun hinted that the demonstrators' patience was running out. "Barbed wire fences will not protect the government offices when the people expand naturally," he warned. Shi'ite supporters of Hezbollah and Amal and Christian supporters of Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement at the demonstration called for Siniora's immediate resignation. One poster featured a picture of the prime minister kissing U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on the cheek and the words, "Thanks, Condi."Last week, Nasrallah accused Siniora of collaborating with Israel and the U.S. against Hezbollah. Hezbollah deputy secretary general Sheikh Naim Qassim said his organization did not want to rule Lebanon alone. "We want to participate, we are extending our hands ... we must join hands to defeat those who seek to destroy Lebanon," he told the demonstrators.
Lebanon, Iran top Olmert's agenda on visit to Germany, Italy
By Yossi Verter and Assaf Uni
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is to depart this afternoon for a visit to Germany and Italy, where his talks will center on developments in Lebanon following the war and the threat posed by Iran's nuclear program. Olmert will meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel tomorrow and on Wednesday will meet with his Italian counterpart, Romano Prodi, and with Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican. In Berlin, Olmert will discuss the two Israeli reservists abducted by Hezbollah in July, the Prime Minister's Office said yesterday. Germany has played the role of mediator in the past, and has also been involved in current efforts. Olmert will also talk about the conduct of the multinational peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, in which German units are participating, as well as efforts to limit the flow of smuggled weapons from Syria to Hezbollah. In his talks with Merkel and other German officials over the Iranian nuclear program, Olmert will bring up the economic links between German firms and Iran. In an interview on a German television station, Olmert said that "the economic interest of private businessmen in Iran should not be allowed to influence political decisions on the issue of Iran."
Another subject that is expected to be raised is the Palestinian question, particularly in view of the fact that Germany is assuming the rotating presidency of the European Union in January, and will represent the EU in the Quartet (consisting of the U.S., the UN, Russia and the EU).
During his meeting with Merkel, Olmert is expected to reiterate the main points of his Sde Boker address, in which he delineated the terms under which Israel is willing to relinquish territory and contribute to the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state.
The prime minister will also stress Israel is serious about embarking on a diplomatic process with the Palestinians. A senior diplomatic source in Germany told Haaretz that "time is against us and we need to revive the road map," referring to the Bush administration's initiative for a two-state solution in resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Sources at the Prime Minister's Office said the German chancellor is considered to be the European leader closest to Olmert and pointed out that the two leaders talk on the telephone at least once a month. However, parallel to the support for his speech at Sde Boker and Israel's restraint in view of Qassam rocket attacks following the cease-fire agreement in the Gaza Strip, the German hosts will ask for progress in the road map with the assistance of the Quartet.
Yesterday, Merkel met with Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak, who made an official visit to Germany. At the conclusion of their meeting, Merkel said that "we would like to take advantage of the encouraging signs coming from the Israeli government in order to achieve progress. We need to achieve results to put an end to violence in the territories." In this light, it is expected that the German government will suggest that the willingness of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan to cooperate on furthering the peace process should be utilized to make progress. Diplomatic sources said "it would be a very serious mistake to ignore the centrality of these states to the process." The German government concurs with Olmert that the conflict in Iraq should not be linked to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. However, sources in Berlin expressed concern that the two problems may merge, and also come to include the crisis in Lebanon, transforming the Middle East into a global confrontation.
During his visit Olmert is also scheduled to meet with the German President Horst Kohler, as well as with leaders of the Jewish community.
The prime minister will begin his day in Berlin with a ceremony at a nearby train station, commemorating the victims of the Holocaust. On Wednesday morning, Olmert will meet the Pope in the Vatican. He will then have lunch with Prime Minister Prodi, and will later hold a working meeting in which the two will discuss Italy's central role in the United Nations force in southern Lebanon. The prime minister will also meet Italian President Carlo Ciampi.
French candidate raps Hezbollah
A French presidential hopeful likened Hezbollah to the Nazis.
Addressing supporters Saturday, conservative Nicolas Sarkozy denounced his left-wing rival in next year’s election, Segolene Royal, for meeting lawmakers from the Lebanese militia during her recent visit to Beirut. “The fact that someone was elected alone does not warrant meeting with him,” Sarkozy said. “I’d like to point out that Hitler was also elected, and that didn’t make him a responsible person or respectable leader.”
One of the lawmakers who spoke to Royal likened Israel’s Lebanon offensive to the Nazi occupation of France, and the French candidate drew fire for not disavowing the comment immediately.
Build unity, peace solutions at Lebanon’s ‘grave moment,’ pope tells nation, int’l leaders
12/11/2006
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)
VATICAN CITY (Catholic Online) – Urgent, peaceful and just solutions must be found to “this grave moment” in Lebanon and the whole of the Middle East, said Pope Benedict XVI.
In remarks made to an estimated 40,000 tourists and pilgrims gathered Dec. 10 in St. Peter’s Square here for the reciting of the midday Angelus, the pope urged Lebanon’s leaders to work towards building unity in the country and the international community to meet its responsibilities and commit to work toward a lasting peace. "I appeal to the Lebanese and to their political leaders to be interested exclusively in the good of the country and harmony between its communities, inspiring their commitment in that unity that is the responsibility of one and all, and that requires patient and persevering efforts, along with confident and permanent dialogue," he said in his Angelus remarks. The people of Lebanon, the pontiff said, “on whose soil today as yesterday, men who are different on the cultural and religious plane, are called to live together to build a nation of dialogue and coexistence, and to favor the common good."
The Middle East is beset with tensions where the possibilities for a solution face the challenges of “fears of new violence,” he said.
He said “I share the strong fears expressed” Dec. 6 by the head of Lebanon’s Maronite Catholic Church, Cardinal Nasrallah Sfeir, warning that the escalating war of words between rival political factions could result in more violence. Benedict XVI called upon world leaders to "help to identify urgent, peaceful and just solutions, necessary for Lebanon and for the whole Middle East" and invited all to pray "in this grave moment."
On this second Sunday of Advent shortly after dedicating a parish church in Rome, the pope reminded those gathered that no one is excluded from building the kingdom. "During these days the liturgy reminds us constantly that 'God comes' to visit his people, to dwell among men and establish with them a communion of love and life, that is, a family," Pope Benedict XVI said, adding that believers become “living stones” to build the church community.
During a Dec. 3 Mass in Bkerke, Lebanon, Patriarch Sfeir said that if tensions keep rising “they will definitely lead to a clash that should be avoided."
"We believe a return to a calm and mature dialogue, regardless of how disappointing ... remains safer than strikes and demonstrations and paralyzing the market and terrorizing the people," he said, according to a Catholic News Service report.
He expressed concern that Christians were divided between supporting the anti-Syrian, Western-backed government and supporting Syria and a new unity government. "We are what we are – now divided, insulting each other. But we ask you to remain united and to resist the voices of evil which want to divide. Only national unity can save this country," said the patriarch. The U.S. bishops recently spoke out about the crisis in Lebanon, noting that the United States and the international community must expand and strengthen efforts to secure the sovereignty and stability of Lebanon and provide for much needed humanitarian aid to rebuild the country.
In a Dec. 1 letter to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in the wake of the Nov. 21 assassination of Lebanese Minister of Industry Pierre Gemayel, Bishop Thomas G. Wenski of Orlando, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Committee on International Policy, urged the Bush administration to work “with even greater resolve” to support the full implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701 on Lebanon.
“Our conference believes that concerted action by the United States and the international community is required at this time to ensure the sovereignty and stability of Lebanon,” the Orlando bishop said. “Tragically and predictably, the recent war in Lebanon and northern Israel not only devastated civilian communities, but it also weakened the forces of moderation and democracy and emboldened radicals,” he said.
Resolution 1701, unanimously approved by the U.N. Security Council on Aug. 11, 2006, sought to resolve the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict, receiving support of the Lebanese and Israeli cabinets and Hezbollah before the ceasefire began on Aug. 14.
The resolution called for the full cessation of hostilities and permanent ceasefire, Israeli withdrawal of all forces from Lebanon, Hezbollah disarmament, return to Israel of its captured soldiers, full control of the country by the Lebanese government, no paramilitary forces in southern Lebanon and implementation of council resolutions 1559 (2004) and 1680 (2006) requiring the disarmament of all armed groups in Lebanon.
“All nations in the region will need to play constructive roles in helping the Lebanese people resolve their own internal political crisis and refrain from actions that could further destabilize the situation,” Bishop Wenski urged.
”The United States should join the international community in providing substantial humanitarian and reconstruction assistance to Lebanon to help rebuild the civilian infrastructure and restore devastated communities that experienced destruction due to the war,” he said.
“We must replace the despair that feeds radicalism with a hope for a brighter future for the long suffering people of Lebanon,” Bishop Wenski urged.
More than 1,000 people, mostly civilians, were killed during the summer fighting between Israel and the Shiite militant Islamic group Hezbollah. Southern Lebanon's infrastructure and the country's economy have been severely damaged.
Leading Lebanon from a gilded cage
What's left of Siniora's government holes up in his hilltop palace in Beirut as Hezbollah protesters clamor below.
By Megan K. Stack, Times Staff Writer
December 10, 2006
BEIRUT — In the palace on the hill, the chants and curses from the street below are easy to hear.
The voices float up through the clear wintry air, wisps of tension rising from the roiling anti-government demonstrations. Weary ministers listen to the heart-pounding bass beat of Hezbollah fighters' anthems, the political speeches screamed into microphones, the roar of the crowd. After sunset, the glare of floodlights arches like a gigantic halo over the tent city that's cropped up in the upscale shopping districts of downtown.
Inside the Grand Serail, what remains of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora's government toils away, trying to ignore the thousands upon thousands of people massed at its gate. The people outside describe the government leaders as unwanted and illegitimate, pawns of U.S. interests.
"We hear their voices, but we feel no compassion for them," said Fouad Saad, a lawmaker and former Cabinet minister who, in his neat suit, lingered between meetings under the glittering chandeliers of a cavernous reception room. "These people have received orders from Syria and Iran…. They are trying to drag us backward many years."
This is the kernel of a dangerous political standoff. The government stays put, refusing to regard the raucous calls from the protesters for its officials' resignations. Instead, they say, foreign powers are scheming to take over the country. The Grand Serail is a hulking sprawl of an Ottoman-style palace that was ravaged by civil war and reconstructed as a proud icon of a nation's rebirth. It now stands isolated behind snarls of razor wire and layers of soldiers and security forces. In the shabby maze of tents below, the mood is stoical and confident. The demonstrators seem convinced that the government will, inevitably, collapse, that Siniora and his allies cannot stay in place with so many people on the streets.
"When this stuff happens in other countries, the government falls," said Sami Harb, a 21-year-old computer communications student.
Tough talk on both sides On a cold night, Harb paced the pavement near the line where demonstrators' tents were pitched next to the tanks and soldiers that seal off the main road to the palace. He turned up the hill, and waved an arm in disgust.
"Here somebody died," he said, referring to a young Shiite Muslim man shot and killed in sectarian-tinged street fighting, "and Siniora is still sitting right up there." Organizers insist that the demonstration will remain peaceful. Still, some protesters speak of overrunning the palace if the government doesn't leave.
But in a tough-talking interview last week at his heavily fortified home in Beirut, Saad Hariri said that his allies would never be driven from office by the Hezbollah-led demonstrations. Hariri, the head of the Sunni Muslim community and leader of the parliament's majority bloc, said that to give up would be akin to handing Lebanon over to Iran and Syria. Even if fighting erupts, even if stability is shaken, the government will stay, Hariri said.
"You're not preserving stability, you're killing your democracy," he said of resignation. "It's about putting Lebanon in the hands of Syria and Iran."
Pro-government parties are planning counter-demonstrations in coming days, he said, adding that he was having a hard time keeping his supporters off the streets. In Sunni neighborhoods, men speak openly of their thirst for revenge.
"You have no clue how many people call us: 'We want weapons, we want this,' " Hariri said. "We have to be the Gandhis of Lebanon. We have to stand in their faces and say no."In the meantime, the army has swarmed and cut off every road that leads to the Grand Serail. The surrounding neighborhood has been swallowed in an expanded security zone. Visitors have to pass through an army checkpoint, then walk along a once-bustling street now rendered ghostly, footsteps echoing off closed shops. Soldiers sprawl on the steps of a church. Perhaps out of desperation or optimism, a lone merchant has kept his interior decorating shop open for customers who can't get there.
Inside the Grand Serail, many of the Cabinet ministers have been living, almost on top of one another, in the guest quarters. They have been there since one of their number, Pierre Gemayel, a Christian, was gunned down in November. They are afraid that if they leave, the same will happen to them.
A recent visit found Youth and Sports Minister Ahmed Fatfat drying his socks on a radiator and chatting with his visiting wife.
What the ministers know about events in the tent city below they mostly get from television.
The other night, the ministers huddled together before a television set to hear Hezbollah chief Sheik Hassan Nasrallah insult them.
They heard Nasrallah, arguably the most popular political leader in Lebanon, refer to "what remains of this falling government in the Serail."
He called them a "government of one color and a despotism of one group," a "dead end," "the government of the American ambassador." They heard him say that he would keep his people at the gates until the government fell. And they heard the crowd scream with the throaty abandon of a rock concert, hoisting their toddlers on their shoulders, chanting, "God preserve Nasrallah!"
When the Hezbollah chief finished speaking, the sky thundered with fireworks and celebratory gunfire.
Support by the busload
The ministers woke up the next morning and pressed on with business. These days, "business" seems to involve accepting moral support and doing work that will be moot if the government falls. Day after day, the buses rattle into town from the mountains in the north, the cities of the south, the Bekaa Valley. One day it's a delegation of Bedouin tribes, another day the Druze, or supporters from Sidon, the southern port that's home to the powerful Hariri family and Siniora. A swarm of visitors from Sidon was ushered through the grand stone hallways and sleepy courtyards last week, and packed into a hall where they staged a tiny counter-demonstration. They stood on their chairs, waved pictures of Lebanon's Sunni leaders and sang the national anthem.
"Today it's the turn of the people of Sidon to come," said Omar Hariri, a 50-year-old engineer. "You have to chose a side, to be on one side or the other."
"What's happening outside is disgusting," added Maher Chamma, also 50.
When a pale, weary-looking Siniora swept to the front of the room, borne along on a swift current of bodyguards, the cheers rang off the high ceiling. "May God bless you," the people cried. "With our blood and our souls, we will redeem you, Siniora."
Siniora launched into a speech deriding Hezbollah. Then he told them, "Sitting with you gives me a lot of comfort."
But when it was over, the visitors were packed back into buses and driven off through the back entrance, out of sight of the demonstrators.
Passing through a courtyard where pigeons splashed lazily in a fountain, Social Affairs Minister Nayla Mouawad said she had just finished writing a request for international money to help Lebanon rebuild from the summer war between Israel and Hezbollah.
"We are working much better and more efficiently than before," she said, her tone defiant. "You can concentrate here. You don't have the house, you don't have the children." But moods shift fast. A moment later, Mouawad said she felt physically threatened. She fretted about rumors that demonstrators might try to take the palace by force.Both sides insist they are open to negotiation. But at the same time, Nasrallah said his party would be wary of wasting time. And Hariri, too, seemed pessimistic. "My only concern is, do they have the authority to negotiate?" Hariri said. "Because their authority comes from outside, from Iran and Syria. "We did not create the problem," he added. "They created the problem." megan.stack@latimes.com
Failure of first Hezbollah rally prompts another
Sunday, 10 December, 2006 @ 6:34 PM
Beirut- On this Sunday chants like "Sinioria, out" have replaced the Christmas carols in Beirut as hundreds of thousands of Hezbollah protesters packed into the capital for another rally to topple Lebanon's Government.
So far the first rally and the subsequent sit- in have failed to shake the defiant Fouad Siniora, who continues to call for dialogue as the only solution to Lebanon crisis.The army described as "unprecedented " the size of the demonstration in downtown Beirut.
"Change is coming," banners of Hezbollah and its pro -Iranian and Syrian allies boasted as thousands of demonstrators waving Lebanese flags spilled into the streets surrounding the offices of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora.
Fully veiled Shiite women, Christian students wearing General Aoun T-shirts and fathers hoisting children on their shoulders were among the crowds who cheered a series of opposition speakers urging the resignation of the anti-Syrian government.
As in the first rally FPM leader Gen. Michel Aoun delivered a speech in which he said sectarianism, political corruption and feudalism are trying to instigate strife in the country. He also accused the March 14 forces of fearing reform because it uncovers corruption in the government.
Aoun called for early parliamentary elections.
Hezbollah’s Deputy Secretary General Sheikh Naim Qassem called on Premier Fouad Saniora to resign “to preserve your dignity and honor as well as Lebanon’s honor ".Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, whose Damascus-backed movement has spearheaded the protests which kicked off December 1, has vowed his supporters will not quit the streets until the cabinet makes way for a government of national unity.
As many as 20,000 troops deployed on the streets and around the government building where Siniora has been holed up.
Hezbollah's Al-Manar television said the protest promised to be larger than the December 1 rally that kicked off the opposition campaign.
"This is a sea of demonstrators unprecedented in the history of Lebanon," an army spokesman said, estimating that "hundreds of thousands" had gathered in the heart of Beirut and on access roads to the city center. In addition to red-and-white Lebanese flags, some demonstrators waved orange banners and photos of Christian former general Michel Aoun, as well as yellow Hezbollah flags and the green standards of the Shiite movement Amal.
As the deadlock deepened in a political crisis which many fear could plunge Lebanon back into civil strife, the opposition vowed to escalate its action and paralyze main roads, including the Beirut airport road. Siniora warned against such actions, saying they "will put the country into a cycle of violence which will not be in anyone's interest." The prime minister acknowledged that "our political and democratic regime is facing a challenge," but said that "Lebanon is a strong country -- we will overcome this crisis."
He again called for talks instead of protests. "Our hand is extended. We will not close any doors. We will work on opening doors."
Government supporters have staged large counter-rallies amid the deadlock that threatens to paralyze the legislative process with the spekaership of parliament in the hands of the opposition. Arab envoys have also shuttled between Lebanese leaders in a bid to broker a settlement.
King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, a key financial backer of Lebanon, opened a Gulf summit Saturday with a warning that the Arab world was a powder keg waiting to explode. "In Lebanon, we see dark clouds threatening the unity of the homeland, which risks sliding again into... conflict among the sons of the same country," he said. The Lebanese opposition accuses the government of weakness and corruption, and says it no longer represents the people after six pro-Damascus ministers submitted their resignations last month.
The protesters want to replace the current cabinet, formed after 2005 elections, with a national unity government that they say is required by the power-sharing arrangements in force since the 1975-90 civil war. Siniora, who has received messages of support from the whole world community, except Syria and Iran has pledged that what he branded an attempted "coup" by Hezbollah will fail.
The premier also expressed concern about the deployment to the capital of troops he said ought to be safeguarding Lebanon's borders after the July-August war between Hezbollah and Siniora's coalition has accused the opposition of seeking to block a cabinet endorsement of plans for an international tribunal to try suspects in the 2005 murder of former premier Rafik Hariri, widely blamed on Pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud who on Saturday formally rejected the cabinet decision on the court, saying it should be "be reviewed by a legal, constitutional and consensual government."
Syria and Iran are blamed
Both Syria and Iran are blamed for the street protests. Both countries have been voicing support for Hezbollah in the most belligerent language, which prompted one analyst to accuse Iran of declaring war on Lebanon. The March 14 forces have accused Hezbollah and its allies of engineering a coup with the help of Syria and Iran which they call the Coup axis.
Hezbollah's chief covering up for his mistakes
Many analysts strongly believe that Hezbollah's chief is trying to use the protests to cover up for his miscalculation failures that led to the war with Israel. The Shiites were the most affected as a result of this war as thousands of their homes were destroyed and almost 1 million were displaced.
These same analysts are also now saying that Hezbollah has overplayed its hand in Lebanon and its persistence in going after the government will backfire as more Lebanese will rally in support of PM Siniora. Yesterday in Aley, a resort town in Mount Lebanon, thousands protested in support of Siniora and today in Tripoli, Lebanon's northern capital hundreds of thousands rallied in support of Siniora.
Ali Hussein- Ya Libnan volunteer
Free Shiite Movement Leader slams Hezbollah, Iran & Syria
Monday, 11 December, 2006 @ 6:20 PM
Beirut- Sheikh Mohammed Hajj Hassan, who heads the Free Shiite Movement, slammed Hezbollah, Iran & Syria after meeting in Mukhtara with MP Walid Jumblatt , PSP leader and head of the Democratic Gathering. He accused Hezbollah of being responsible for any assassination attempt that might target any of the group's leaders resulting from signing the "petition disavowing from us.""We fear that this is the beginning of assassination attempts that could physically target us and we hold Hezbollah fully responsible for any harm that could happen to any of the movement's leaders," Hajj Hassan told reporters on Sunday. Sheikh Mohammed slammed Hezbollah's "hegemony" over the Shiites, saying "what we see in Beirut streets is a dangerous indicator and exposes national unity and peace."
"This is what (Syrian President) Bashar Assad has promised to do, and unfortunately destruction has begun on the hands of the Lebanese," he added.
He declared opposition to what he dubbed "Farsi project" ,Iran is allegedly seeking to impose on Lebanon with the backing of the Syrian regime. This in reference to the recent Iranian reports about declaring Lebanon as an “Islamic Republic” by Hezbollah.
Sheikh Mohammed insisted that only dialogue will solve the current crises and urged Hezbollah to refrain from the protests that have damaged Lebanon’s economy and return to the roundtable discussions
He said he will soon be holding a conference after discussions with his allies including the March 14 alliance , whom he is very proud to be allied with.
He said "what is happening today is a cover up for the July August war defeat. He added " this was not a victory when the country was left in ruins ( with a large bill to pay for repairs), people were displaced and the economy destroyed".
He said the majority of the Shiite people are with the government of PM Fouad Siniora which they consider legitimate and constitutional .
Source: LBC, Naharnet, Ya Libnan Published: 11/12/2006
Lahoud made a wrong decision
Gulf News
Seeking to uncover the truth behind the 2005 assassination of Rafik Hariri must not be subject to political wrangling. It is a cause that enjoys the unanimous support of the Lebanese people regardless of their political or religious affiliations.
Therefore, it was wrong for President Emile Lahoud to refuse to endorse a draft accord sent to him by the Cabinet to create an international tribunal to try suspects in the killing of the former prime minister. Lahoud, a supporter of the Hezbollah-led opposition which is trying to topple the government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, said he regarded the Cabinet as unconstitutional. Six ministers from Hezbollah and its ally the Amal Movement resigned from the Cabinet two weeks ago. The president's view is subject to debate. But it should not be a basis to hinder the national and international efforts to find out and prosecute those responsible for killing Hariri. Lahoud's actions only deepen the division among the people and give justification to the allegation by Siniora and his allies that the current opposition movement is aimed to sabotage the international court to protect Syria.
Lahoud should use his position as the president of the country to bridge the gap and help figure out the truth. For the sake of the divided country he should reconsider his decision.
'Nasrallah willing to compromise'
By JPOST STAFF AND AP
Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah accepted in principle an Arab League plan to stabilize the Lebanese political crisis on Sunday night, Mustafa Ismail, an Arab League envoy said in an interview with Dubai-based Al-Arabiya television. Another newspaper claimed Ismail was informed of Nasrallah's decision in Damascus and passed the message onto Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, Israel Radio reported. According to opposition sources, Nasrallah informed the envoy "that he sees the initiative as positive," and told him he would be returning to Beirut on Monday.
According to the plan, the number of ministers in the Lebanese government will grow to 30. Two thirds of them will represent the parliamentary majority and one third will be from the opposition. The plan also gives the new government power to establish a new international court for the investigation of the murder of former prime minister Rafik Hariri. The approval comes a few hours after almost one million Lebanese opposition supporters, led by Hizbullah, gathered in the central district of Beirut to take part in a mass rally to exert pressure on the anti-Syrian government to resign.
The demonstration could be a tipping point in Lebanon's burgeoning political crisis, ten days after a coalition of largely pro-Syrian opposition groups launched a series of rallies against Saniora's anti-Syrian, US-backed government.
Holed up in his fortified office downtown, the prime minister spoke Sunday by video link to a memorial for an anti-Syrian politician killed in a car bomb last year, and addressed the political climate and protests.
"What is the great cause for this tense political clamoring and the open sit-ins?" Saniora said. "Is this the ideal way to achieve demands, whatever they are?" He said he was open to dialogue between his government and the opposition, and acknowledged that the political crisis threatened Lebanon's security, economy and political system. "We don't want Lebanon to be an arena of the wars of others. Lebanon is a nation, not an arena," Saniora said, in a veiled reference to Hizbullah's backers in Syria and Iran. Lebanese combat troops and armed police sealed off major roads and added more layers of barbed wire around the prime minister's sprawling downtown complex, where he has been living along with most of his ministers since Dec. 1.
The political unrest has split the country along dangerous sectarian lines, with most Sunni Muslims supporting the Sunni prime minister and Shiite Muslims backing the militant group Hizbullah. Christian factions are split between the two camps.
Thousands of demonstrators camped out in two downtown Beirut squares overnight, and hundreds of thousands more joined the crowd for the afternoon demonstration. Several hundred tents have lined the area for more than a week. Police had no immediate crowd estimates, but the rally - filling downtown Beirut's plazas and many neighborhoods - promised to be one of the biggest in Lebanon's history.
Protesters streamed downtown, waving Lebanese and Hizbullah flags as loudspeakers blasted anti-government speeches and anthems in support of the guerrilla group. Bands of musicians pounded drums in a carnival-like atmosphere, while Hizbullah security agents wearing white caps fanned out in the crowd. "Down with the corrupt government," read one banner. "We want a clean government," read another.
Let the government fall!" an organizer shouted through a loudspeaker, with the crowd roaring after him in approval. Addressing Saniora, he said: "Do you want blood or what?" "We have come to show them how big our size really is," said Reem al-Zein, a 20-year-old philosophy student wearing a Muslim headscarf. "I think this lying government will not be able to last much longer after today."
Lebanon's political crisis began after talks over a national unity Cabinet collapsed, and Hizbullah's two ministers and four allies resigned from the Cabinet and joined the opposition. It erupted Nov. 21 with the assassination of anti-Syrian politician Pierre Gemayel, followed by a national strike, his funeral and the opposition sit-in. Street protests have since paralyzed the core of Beirut. A Shiite Muslim supporter of the opposition was shot dead in a Sunni Muslim neighborhood on his way home from protests a week ago.
Saniora has refused to quit and has received hundreds of supporters daily at his office complex to counter the opposition protests and sit-ins outside. He and Hizbullah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah have exchanged unprecedented accusations and insults.
Tension had been brewing for months, and relations between the two camps deteriorated after the Israel-Hizbullah war last summer and a UN draft for the creation of an international tribunal to try suspects in the 2005 assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri.
The summer war ravaged parts of Lebanon. Hizbullah's fight against Israel sent its support among Shiites skyrocketing, emboldening it to grab more political power. Hizbullah now accuses Saniora and some elements in his government of working with Israel to destroy the guerrilla force. Pro-government groups, in turn, resent Hizbullah for sparking the war by snatching two Israeli soldiers. They, along with the United States, accuse Hizbullah's Syrian and Iranian backers of seeking to overthrow the government.
On Sunday, the crowd of protesters gathered under a giant banner depicting Saniora kissing U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on the cheek on a visit to Beirut during the war. Written in English on it was: "Thanks Condy." Hizbullah and its allies fault the US for refusing to push the UN Security Council to call an immediate cease-fire. American officials said they wanted to make sure a truce would stick before pushing for an end to the fighting, which lasted 34 days and killed more than 850 people on both sides.
President Emile Lahoud on Saturday refused to endorse the draft accord sent to him by Saniora's divided Cabinet to create the international tribunal. He maintained that the remaining Saniora Cabinet had lost its constitutional legitimacy, an argument the prime minister has disputed because Cabinet meetings still have the quorum necessary to make decisions. The president's action was certain to intensify tension. Mass protests also followed the 2005 slaying of Hariri, which forced Syria to end a nearly three-decade military occupation of Lebanon. A UN investigation has said the attack's complexity suggested the Syrian and Lebanese intelligence services played a role in the assassination. Syria denies involvement. DPA contributed to this report.
Lebanon's Self-Jailed Leaders
By Mohammed Salam
A Leader, by definition, is a public figure.
However, in violence and fear-ridden Lebanon, major leaders share a unique status: They are prisoners, more specifically self-jailed figures.
Heads of major political factions, like Hizbullah's Hassan Nasrallah, the Progressive Socialist Party's Walid Jumblat, and al-Moustaqbal movement's Saad Hariri had the privilege of choosing their own Jails. Hariri is confined to the family's heavily-guarded palace in Beirut's plush Qoraitem neighborhood ever since he succeeded his late father, ex-premier Rafik Hariri, who was assassinated by a huge blast targeting his motorcade in February 2005.
His assassination has been blamed on the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, whose army and security service were controlling Lebanon when the crime was carried out. Hariri, who also heads the parliamentary majority, leads the effort to ratify a treaty with the United Nations creating an international tribunal to try his father's assassins. That is why, he believes that his father's killers would also try to target him.
In a rare "adventure" out of the Qoraitem palace, Hariri showed up in the crowded downtown Beirut a month
ago, where thousands of sympathizers jumped out of the posh restaurants and side walk cafes to shake his hands, kiss him and wish him well.
After having dinner at a restaurant in downtown Beirut, Hariri was whisked back to the family's palace, to which he was confined until Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel, a close friend and ally, was killed on Nov. 21. Hariri went out again on an unpleasant adventure this time, to take part in Gemayel's funeral. Jumblat, an ally of Hariri and one of the main leaders of the anti-Syrian March 14 coalition, is an older prison "inmate."
Shortly after Telecommunications Minister Marwan Hamadeh, a fellow Druze politician escaped an assassination attempt by a car-bomb explosion on Oct. 1, 2004, Jumblat left his Beirut residence for Moukhtara in his Chouf Mountain stronghold south east of the capital.
Heavily-guarded members of the PSP guard the palace. Cars are not allowed to park in the town's main street which goes by its stone fences, visitors are thoroughly searched and even hills overlooking the palace have been changed to bases for Jumblat's guards who are keen on preventing potential snipers from picking up nests to shoot their leader. Jumblat accuses the Syrian regime of responsibility for his father's assassination in the Chouf mountains back in March 1977, as well as for that attack on Hamadeh and Hariri's killing. He is convinced that he is a "prime target' for the Assad regime.
Despite security risks, Jumblat ventured out of Moukhtara to check on Gemayel at hospital and took part in his ally's funeral. However, the vehicles he used in both calls, as the roads he took, remain unknown.
Nasrallah is more of a "unique" case of self-jailed leader. His hideout is a mystery.
Unlike Hariri and Jumblat, Nasrallah's supposed enemy is not Syria, but Israel which killed his predecessor Sayyed Abbas Mousawi in a helicopter gunship raid targeting his motorcade in south Lebanon in the 1980s.After Hizbullah's 34-day summer war with Israel, Nasrallah stopped taking part in scheduled meetings with other politicians. His visitors, though few and rare, have no advance knowledge of where he is supposed to receive them.
"My enemy is malicious and smart," Nasrallah told Jumblat in a rare meeting at the Shiite leader's office before outbreak of the July 12 war.
Jumblat replied: "my enemy is malicious and stupid."The new members of what is referred to as "politicians-prisoners club" are ministers of Prime Minister Fouad Saniora's government. After Gemayel's Nov. 21 assassination, all cabinet ministers moved to the Grand Serail, or government offices, in Beirut.
The ancient compound with its beautiful gardens is surrounded by a security dragnet in an apparent effort to avoid what the majority government believes is an attempt to assassinate any of its members. In case of such a feared-of assassination, the government would collapse because it would lack the two-third quorum constitutionally required for its survival. To avoid the risk of assassination, Saniora on Sunday delivered a speech from the Serail by video conference to a gathering convened less than one kilometer away to commemorate the annual anniversary of MP-Journalist Gebran Tueni's killing.
Also on Sunday, Leader of the Free Patriotic Movement Michael Aoun, addressed an anti-government rally in downtown Beirut by video conference.
Wearing an orange-colored outfit resembling his movement's flag, Aoun spoke from his heavily-guarded residence in Rabiyeh northeast of Beirut.
All self-jailed Lebanese politicians have stated one way or the other that they face the threat of assassination by enemies that they have identified.
Aoun is an exception. His perceived enemy remains unknown. Beirut, 11 Dec 06, 16:24 -Naharnet
Lebanon heading toward a breaking point
By Tom Lasseter
McClatchy Newspapers
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators piled into downtown Beirut Sunday, demanding that the U.S.-backed government step down immediately or face an escalation in a siege on the prime minister's headquarters being coordinated by the Shiite Muslim Hezbollah militia.
While accounts vary of what the heightened tactics could consist of - a government worker's strike and a storming of the headquarters have both been mentioned - it's clear that the nation is headed toward a breaking point. Hezbollah and its allies have been camped in the center of the capital for more than a week, demanding that Sunni Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and his Cabinet step down. The implications are profound for U.S. efforts to counter Syrian and Iranian influence in the Middle East. The Bush administration counts the massive "Cedar Revolution" protests that expelled Syrian forces from Lebanon last year as a key victory for pro-western democracy. But now, as U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan face significant setbacks, it is Syrian and Iranian ally Hezbollah that is filling the streets of Beirut and calling for revolution.
Speaking in front of the crowd on Sunday, Hezbollah's second in command, Naim Qassim, said in a message to Saniora: "Have a press conference tonight or tomorrow to tell the Lebanese people that you are resigning. ... If you resign today, it would be a positive step, but if you don't it will be negative for the future" of Lebanon. Qassim also led the crowd in a booming chorus of "Death to America" and "Death to Israel."
Michel Aoun, a Christian leader who has aligned himself with Hezbollah, went a step further.
"This must be the last big rally we'll call for, because in the next one there will be no room for all the protesters," Aoun said. "And the barbed wire will no longer protect the (government building) because people will move there naturally and without any instigation."
Sunni and Christian leaders have warned that a storming of the building could lead to large-scale unrest.
"You can control the people for one, two, maybe 10 days, but after that you cannot control the people; we will take down any fences between us" and the government building, said Ali Zein, one of the demonstrators. "The cup is full now, everything has its limits."
Both sides appear to have hardened their positions: Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah accused Saniora of working with the Israelis last summer during a 34-day war between Israel and the militia, and Saniora replied that Nasrallah's remarks were "an unnecessary fit of anger and rudeness."
Representatives from the Arab League have tried brokering a deal that would lead to an increased Hezbollah say in Cabinet decisions - a process marked by rumors of success that have yet to pan out. Hezbollah officials said Sunday night that they were working to find a solution to the impasse, but it was unclear if anything would come from the Arab League discussions.
Tensions between Lebanon's sects - particularly Sunnis and Shiites - have been moving toward a boil during the past week. With each story of a fight between men with pipes and rocks, each insult heard and repeated, the divide between the groups widens.
The Lebanese Army has blocked the entrances to many Sunni neighborhoods between downtown and the southern Shiite suburbs in an effort to prevent Shiite protesters from clashing with mobs.
Many in the Lebanese government are concerned that increased Sunni-Shiite violence could split the army along confessional lines.
"It will continue to be OK, unless there is a big clash between the two communities, this would put the army in a difficult position," said Joe Sarkis, a Cabinet member and a senior official in the Christian militia cum political party, the Lebanese Forces. "The army is telling us, please solve this soon, because if more time passes the situation might change for us."
Ahmed Fatfat, a Sunni Cabinet member and former Interior Minister, said he's gotten reports to that effect from officers in the army and other Lebanese security forces. "It's risky," he said. Asked how likely he thought it was that troops would abandon their posts and fight for their sect, Fatfat grimaced.
"It can happen," he said, and then paused for a moment: "Yes, it can."
The soldiers "go home at the end of the day," Sarkis said, "and there are politics in these neighborhoods."
The Sunni and Shiite neighborhoods are grouped closely together in the capital, a vestige of the 15-year civil war that drew battle lines between Christian and Muslim neighborhoods. "There are going to be problems in the neighborhoods, the street is out of control, they fight here every night," said Ghazi al-Koush, who owns an electronics store in the predominantly Sunni neighborhood of Basta. "There is a lot of tension on the streets, and it's going to explode - things here are not going to end peacefully." Al-Koush ran his hand across his face, and rested it for a moment near his glass eye. "During the civil war I lost my eye, I lost my house, I lost my shop, but I never saw Muslim brothers fighting brothers as they are now," he said. "This neighborhood stayed together during most of the civil war, but now it's falling apart." He blamed most of the fighting on Shiites driving down the streets at night and yelling anti-Sunni slogans. But it was clear from interviews with residents across Beirut during the past week that members of both sects are picking fights.
"If the Shiites keep the siege on the (Cabinet building), the Sunnis will keep attacking the Shiites on the street," said Mohammed Saaidon, a local leader in the Sunni neighborhood of Aisha Bakkar. "You can't imagine how angry the Sunnis are ... we won't let the Shiites take Beirut."
That sense of Sunni rage is met in many Shiite neighborhoods with a confidence that at times borders on an eagerness to fight.
"If this continues there will be problems," said Mohammed Hussein, who was walking through the streets of Dahiya, a Hezbollah stronghold south of Beirut.
A friend piped up, cheerfully: "It will be civil war."
Down the street, Bassam Boulud was sitting with a group of men, including a Hezbollah security worker.
"If we want, we can control the whole country in 72 hours, according to the latest (Hezbollah) study," Boulud said.
The Hezbollah guard put his hand on Boulud's shoulder. Boulud corrected himself: "But because of the wisdom of Hassan Nasrallah, this will not happen." After the demonstration Sunday, a group of women were standing beside the bus that brought them up from their south Lebanon homes in the town of Tyre. One of them, who gave only her first name, Ibtihal, said that she hoped another civil war wasn't coming, but that the time to act was drawing near. She said she knew that going into the government center downtown was a "redline" for the Sunnis and Christians, but that she hoped to be "the first one in the building." "We have been patient until now," she said, "but after today, we are willing to cross all redlines."Talking to Syria and Iran would be a mistake
12/11/06
By LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Published December 11, 2006
Talking to Syria and Iran could benefit the Mideast and the United States? The last time I checked, Lebanon, Israel and Kurdistan are all in that region, and not only would they not "benefit" from such talks, they would also be placed in a much more precarious situation than they face now.
The Syrians would demand that the United States look the other way as they continued to subjugate the Lebanese government using their proxy bullies in Hezbollah. The Iranians would ask for a free pass on their nuclear program, which threatens the existence of Israel. The Kurds would once again fear reprisals, and the resulting establishment of a Shiite crescent of power from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean would destabilize the entire region.
And we are to believe that schmoozing with Syria's Bashar Assad and Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a coherent plan?
Robert Fisk: Revolution in the air as Lebanon's rift widens
Published: 11 December 2006
With Fouad Siniora's cabinet hiding in the Grand Serail behind acres of razor wire and thousands of troops - a veritable "green zone" in the heart of Beirut - the largely Shia Muslim opposition, assisted by their Christian allies, brought up to two million supporters into the centre of the city yesterday to declare the forthcoming creation of a second Lebanese administration. A "transitional" government is what ex-general Michel Aoun called it, while Naeem Qassem, Hizbollah's deputy chairman, spoke ominously of the mass demonstrations as "the separatist day".
So, is the Hizbollah militia, which withstood Israel's disastrous bombardment of Lebanon last summer, really planning a coup on behalf of its Iranian and Syrian backers, as Mr Siniora suspects? Or are Mr Siniora and his cabinet colleagues - Sunni Muslim, Christian and Druze - working on behalf of the Americans and Israelis, as Hizbollah's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, proclaims?
Already, Mr Siniora's administration is being referred to in the American press as Lebanon's "US-backed government", the virtual kiss of death for any Arab leader these days, while Mr Aoun's split with his fellow Christians could prove fatal to him. Only because of his weird alliance with the Hizbollah can the latter claim that their opposition represents Christians as well as Muslims. True to the ironies of Lebanese politics, it was the same former general Aoun who fought a "war of independence" with Hizbollah's Syrian friends in 1990, a conflict which he lost at the cost of 1,000 lives.
But even supporters of Mr Siniora's administration were taken aback by the vast numbers of Lebanese that Hizbollah could mobilise yesterday, men and women who in many cases came from the villages and urban slums which suffered near-total destruction in this summer's war.
Their speakers played the role of representatives of the poor - "the people of the street" is how one foolish Sunni prelate called them on Friday - who had no time for the privileged classes or feudal pretentions of the government's supporters: Amin Gemayel, father of the murdered industry minister, Nayla Moawad, widow of a murdered Lebanese president, Saad Hariri, son of the assassinated ex-prime minister Rafik Hariri, and Walid Jumblatt, son of the murdered Druze leader Kamal Jumblatt.
If Lebanon's politics and history were not so tragic, there would be an element of Gilbert and Sullivan about all this. Mr Siniora, now regularly visited by America's busy little ambassador Jeffrey Feltman, was told by one of Mr Feltman's predecessors only a few years ago that his multiple re-entry visa to the United States was invalid because he, Mr Siniora, was believed to have donated money to a charity associated with - yes - the Hizbollah. And there was more than a hint of sarcasm yesterday when Mr Qassem announced that Mr Siniora worked for the Americans and the Israelis.
"Death to America - Death to Israel," he roared and, of course, the mass of demonstrators repeated this tired rhetoric. To the Arab nations which supported Mr Siniora's government, Mr Qassem had a simple message: "We are in the hearts of the Sunnis of the Arab world - not you!"
And the danger for Mr Siniora is that Mr Qassem's conviction is probably correct. Indeed, there was a hint of revolution in the air yesterday as the poor and the village youths and the people of the Beirut slums converged on Martyrs' Square where Hariri's tomb was cordoned off. Leila Tueni, the daughter of another of Lebanon's murdered political leaders, the journalist Jibran Tueni (like all the victims, anti-Syrian), stated in a hall only a few hundred yards from the protests that the real reason why Mr Nasrallah wanted to overthrow Mr Siniora's government, from which all Shia ministers have resigned, was to prevent it giving its approval to the UN tribunal intended to try Hariri's killers, whom Ms Tueni and the rest of Mr Siniora's supporters believe to include some of Syria's senior intelligence apparatchiks.
But something even more dangerous was getting loose yesterday. The sheer size of the crowds apparently permitted Mr Qassem and Mr Aoun to demand a different - or a rival - government. But it was not Shias but Mr Siniora's supporters who won the last elections in Lebanon. If that election result were no longer valid, what did this say about the Hizbollah's respect for electoral politics and Lebanon's constitution?
And the growing Shia-Sunni divisions here mirror, in faint, pale but frightening form, the tragedy of the two sects in Mesopot-amia. Shias have twice attacked the Beirut Sunni suburb of Tarek al-Jdeide, a Shia has been murdered and turned into an opposition "martyr", and the mufti of the Sunni Qoreitem mosque is reported as attacking the historic Shia imams, Ali and Hussein.
Mr Jumblatt has now called for students at the Lebanese University to study at home after a brawl on campus between Shia and Sunni undergraduates. "This university is for all Lebanese," Mr Jumblatt insisted. But is Lebanon?
With Fouad Siniora's cabinet hiding in the Grand Serail behind acres of razor wire and thousands of troops - a veritable "green zone" in the heart of Beirut - the largely Shia Muslim opposition, assisted by their Christian allies, brought up to two million supporters into the centre of the city yesterday to declare the forthcoming creation of a second Lebanese administration. A "transitional" government is what ex-general Michel Aoun called it, while Naeem Qassem, Hizbollah's deputy chairman, spoke ominously of the mass demonstrations as "the separatist day".
So, is the Hizbollah militia, which withstood Israel's disastrous bombardment of Lebanon last summer, really planning a coup on behalf of its Iranian and Syrian backers, as Mr Siniora suspects? Or are Mr Siniora and his cabinet colleagues - Sunni Muslim, Christian and Druze - working on behalf of the Americans and Israelis, as Hizbollah's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, proclaims?
Already, Mr Siniora's administration is being referred to in the American press as Lebanon's "US-backed government", the virtual kiss of death for any Arab leader these days, while Mr Aoun's split with his fellow Christians could prove fatal to him. Only because of his weird alliance with the Hizbollah can the latter claim that their opposition represents Christians as well as Muslims. True to the ironies of Lebanese politics, it was the same former general Aoun who fought a "war of independence" with Hizbollah's Syrian friends in 1990, a conflict which he lost at the cost of 1,000 lives.
But even supporters of Mr Siniora's administration were taken aback by the vast numbers of Lebanese that Hizbollah could mobilise yesterday, men and women who in many cases came from the villages and urban slums which suffered near-total destruction in this summer's war.
Their speakers played the role of representatives of the poor - "the people of the street" is how one foolish Sunni prelate called them on Friday - who had no time for the privileged classes or feudal pretentions of the government's supporters: Amin Gemayel, father of the murdered industry minister, Nayla Moawad, widow of a murdered Lebanese president, Saad Hariri, son of the assassinated ex-prime minister Rafik Hariri, and Walid Jumblatt, son of the murdered Druze leader Kamal Jumblatt.
If Lebanon's politics and history were not so tragic, there would be an element of Gilbert and Sullivan about all this. Mr Siniora, now regularly visited by America's busy little ambassador Jeffrey Feltman, was told by one of Mr Feltman's predecessors only a few years ago that his multiple re-entry visa to the United States was invalid because he, Mr Siniora, was believed to have donated money to a charity associated with - yes - the Hizbollah. And there was more than a hint of sarcasm yesterday when Mr Qassem announced that Mr Siniora worked for the Americans and the Israelis.
"Death to America - Death to Israel," he roared and, of course, the mass of demonstrators repeated this tired rhetoric. To the Arab nations which supported Mr Siniora's government, Mr Qassem had a simple message: "We are in the hearts of the Sunnis of the Arab world - not you!"
And the danger for Mr Siniora is that Mr Qassem's conviction is probably correct. Indeed, there was a hint of revolution in the air yesterday as the poor and the village youths and the people of the Beirut slums converged on Martyrs' Square where Hariri's tomb was cordoned off. Leila Tueni, the daughter of another of Lebanon's murdered political leaders, the journalist Jibran Tueni (like all the victims, anti-Syrian), stated in a hall only a few hundred yards from the protests that the real reason why Mr Nasrallah wanted to overthrow Mr Siniora's government, from which all Shia ministers have resigned, was to prevent it giving its approval to the UN tribunal intended to try Hariri's killers, whom Ms Tueni and the rest of Mr Siniora's supporters believe to include some of Syria's senior intelligence apparatchiks.
But something even more dangerous was getting loose yesterday. The sheer size of the crowds apparently permitted Mr Qassem and Mr Aoun to demand a different - or a rival - government. But it was not Shias but Mr Siniora's supporters who won the last elections in Lebanon. If that election result were no longer valid, what did this say about the Hizbollah's respect for electoral politics and Lebanon's constitution?
And the growing Shia-Sunni divisions here mirror, in faint, pale but frightening form, the tragedy of the two sects in Mesopot-amia. Shias have twice attacked the Beirut Sunni suburb of Tarek al-Jdeide, a Shia has been murdered and turned into an opposition "martyr", and the mufti of the Sunni Qoreitem mosque is reported as attacking the historic Shia imams, Ali and Hussein.
Mr Jumblatt has now called for students at the Lebanese University to study at home after a brawl on campus between Shia and Sunni undergraduates. "This university is for all Lebanese," Mr Jumblatt insisted. But is Lebanon?
Calls In Lebanon for General Elections and New Government,
December 10, 2006, Beirut
In the tenth day of the Lebanese opposition popular open-ended sit-in, Hundreds of thousands of Lebanese Christians joined a huge rally in Beirut to call for early general elections and a new government. The rally is so far the largest in Lebanon's modern history with crowds estimated at two million, roughly more than half of the Lebanese still living in Lebanon.
The demonstrators filled the plazas of Beirut and blocked all the entries to the city waving a forest of Lebanon's red and white flags. (This is equivalent to a hundred fifty million Americans in the United States asking for a new government).
The Christians made a clear statement Sunday with the large participation in the opposition gathering from all the Christians cities and towns of Lebanon. The Christian crowds, mainly belong to General Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement, came from Mount Lebanon and East of Beirut, the traditional heartland of the Christians of Lebanon; from Zahle, the capital of the Catholicism in the Middle East; from Zgharta; the largest Christian city in north Lebanon, and from Gizzine, the largest Christian city in South Lebanon.
Aoun's supporters, with their distinctive orange colored shirts and bands, filled the plazas, the bridges and blocked the Northern entries of the Capital.
It was a strong message from the Christians of Lebanon, who hardly ever march in mass rallies, to the government that undermines their political stands. The Lebanese Christians have been under political oppression for over 16 years. The Christians participated in similar mass rallies in February and March of 2005 during the Cedar Revolution that forced the pro-Syrian government to resign, and the Syrian troops to pullout from Lebanon.
The participants in the opposition rally today were, in addition to the Christians, mainly Shiite Muslims , and a lower percentages of Sunni Muslims and Druze.
Aoun Quotes the American Declaration of Independence
The leader of the largest Christian block in the Lebanese parliament, General Michel Aoun, addressed the crowd today asking the Lebanese premier to resign and to form a national-unity government or an cabinet with a sole purpose ' to organize general elections'.
Aoun addressed both the crowd and the United States administration declaring that the opposition demands are in the very heart of the democracy that the United States call for, as he quoted the first paragraph of the American Declaration of Independence: " .. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness ".
Aoun described the current government, that includes mainly politicians who were in office since the Syrian army was occupying Lebanon in 1992, as "corrupted and indecent". He blamed Premier Saniora, who was the Secretary of Finance in most of the pro-Syrian governments during Syrian occupation (1990-2005) for the economy failure since then, and for the $45 Billion of debt that Lebanon, once a debt-free country, is suffering now.
He also accused Saniora of fearing reform because it uncovers corruption in the government. It was a sort of referendum for the Christian participation in the opposition gathering as the pro-government media was claiming that the Free Patriotic Movement has lost its Christian support due to a common-dominator paper it agreed upon with Hizbullah Shiite group last February. The paper included a commitment from Hizbullah to disarm after resolving the borders and detainees' issues with Israel. It was the first time that the armed group accepts disarming. General Aoun was the first Lebanese politician to convince Hizbullah to sign such an agreement, especially that the current government grants Hizbullah the right to keep arming and to launch attacks against Israel without any restrains from the government.
Thousands of opposition supporters have been camping out in central Beirut since December 1, to put pressure on Prime Minister Fouad Siniora to set up a government of national unity.
Lebanon's Government and Opposition
The Lebanese government media and along with most Western media, tried to expose the sit-in as a sole act by Hizbullah group whose ministers resigned from the American-backed government and joined the Christian opposition last month.
This media also tried to label the opposition demonstrations as pro-Syrian while the major Christian partner in the opposition alliance, General Aoun, is the archenemy of the Syrian troops, and had fought against them for sixteen years ended with forcing them to pullout from Lebanon last year.
The Lebanese opposition masses consider Aoun and Hizbullah the true liberators of Lebanon, as the first lead the resistance against the Syrian occupation, while the later was the major force against the Israeli occupation of South Lebanon. On the other hand, most of the current government members allied themselves with the Syrian regime during its control of Lebanon, and some of them furthermore supported the recent Israeli attack against Lebanon last July.
While the Lebanese government tries hard to gain international support by claiming that the opposition is trying to launch a coup, or is related to regional changes, the opposition demands show rather democratic aspects for an internal problem. The demands are summarized by ' New Government and General Elections'.
United States and Saniora Government
The United States administration often played a confusing role in Lebanon post Syrian withdrawal late April 2005. Although Huzbullah organization is listed on the U.S. State Department's list of terrorist organizations, the current American-backed government in Lebanon has legalized Hizbullah's arms and granted it the right to keep arming and to launch attacks against Israel without referring back to the Lebanese government.
The American-backed government of premier Fouad Seniora that was formed in summer of 2005, included Hizbullah ministers, yet excluded the largest Christian block from the cabinet. The United States repeatedly confirmed its support to Saniora's cabinet in Lebanon despite the rights that Hizbullah acquired as a part of the current Lebanese government's constitutional status.
American-Backed Government Arms American-Banned Hizbullah
Last Friday (December 8), both the Lebanese Prime Minister and the Lebanese army commander admitted in separate statements that they worked to insure that Hizbullah gets all its arms during the last war with Israel.
The two officials were trying to dispute an argument about one load of weapons that was delayed by the army during the war last July. The Lebanese army commander, General Slymen said that the army has always implied Saniora government commitment to continue arming Hizbulah. Premier Saniora himself assured that the government is sticking to its formation commitment that grants Hizbullah unconditioned-right to arm and to attack Israel.