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Bible Reading of the day
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 16,13-19. When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi he asked his disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?"They replied, "Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets."He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter said in reply, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God."Jesus said to him in reply, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

Latest News Reports From miscellaneous sources For 23/02/07
Panic Prevails After Explosives, Detonators Found in Beirut-Naharnet
Aoun's Sons In Law wounded in Car accident-Naharnet
Geagea for New Cabinet and International Tribunal-Naharnet
Imad Saliba Freed in Niger Delta-Naharnet
Lebanon fines newsmen for defaming Lahoud-Middle East Online
Israeli Army Chief: We Have to Deal with Hizbullah Attempts to Rearm-Naharnet
Syria reportedly bolstering armed forces- AP
Blair to Syria: Destabilizing Lebanon is Isolation-Naharnet
Hizbullah Shifts to 'Government for Tribunal'-Naharnet
Israel Blows Up Hizbullah Cave-Naharnet
Olmert says UN, Lebanese army curbing Hezbollah-Reuters
Lebanon violates UN ceasefire-United Press International - USA
Stranded Tourists Finally Rescued-Naharnet
Lebanese construction firm scoffs at US decision to freeze its assets-International Herald Tribune
Hezbollah construction company ignores US blacklisting (Roundup)-Monsters and Critics.com
Lebanon unrest worries Britain-United Press International - USA
Ehud Olmert said Hezbollah was finding it difficult to recover ...Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Syria beefing up its arsenal in wake of last year's Israel ...International Herald Tribune

Latest News Reports From The Daily Star For 21/02/07 -Naharnet
Israeli drone draws fire from Lebanese Army
Opposition reiterates threat of civil disobedience
Ban to visit Lebanon next month 'if situation allows'
Resistance dismisses Israeli allegations that group has lost its edge
Hizbullah rips sanctions on construction firm
UAE ambassador to inaugurate rebuilt Ouzai harbor
Nigerian militants release Lebanese hostage
Sri Lankan victim of Israeli attack found in Tyre
Hizbullah number 2 reaches out to Hariri
Iranian group pledges to rebuild eight bridges in South
Oslo leads global efforts to ban cluster bombs
Salameh keeps up drumbeat in support of reform
UN team investigates site of twin bus bombings
South Korea to build two new schools
New health report key to better policy - Mouawad
Panel to discuss long plight of displaced with MPs
Lions clubs launch campaign to prevent smoking in public areas
YWCA schedules special event to thank Japan for helping renovate auditorium
Beirut festival celebrates the dying art of storytelling

Syria said to boost arsenal after war
By STEVE WEIZMAN, Associated Press Writer
JERUSALEM - Syria has embarked on an "unprecedented" effort to bolster its armed forces with Iranian and Russian help, the Israeli daily Haaretz reported Thursday. Damascus has large numbers of surface-based missiles and long-range rockets, including the Scud-D, capable of reaching nearly any target in Israel, the report said, and the Syrian navy has received new Iranian anti-ship missiles. Haaretz also said Russia was about to sell Syria thousands of advanced anti-tank missiles, despite Israeli charges that in the past Syria has transferred those missiles to Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon. Syrian officials did not immediately comment on the Israeli reports, but President Bashar Assad said in a television interview immediately after the fighting that Syria was preparing to defend itself. Israeli defense officials confirmed that Syria had ordered new stocks of the anti-tank weapons after noting Hezbollah's successful use of them against Israeli armor in last summer's fighting in south Lebanon. Syria also ordered new supplies of surface-to-sea missiles after Hezbollah used one to hit an Israeli warship, killing four crewmen, off the Lebanese coast last July, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. The officials said Syrian ground forces adjacent to the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights had been reinforced after the outbreak of last year's Israel-Hezbollah conflict and had not yet fully returned to their prewar footing. Israel and Syria are officially at war, though there have been no open hostilities between them for decades. Syria has demanded the return of the Golan, which Israel captured in 1967 and later annexed, as the price for any peace deal. Israel says it will not discuss a formal treaty with its northern neighbor as long as Damascus continues to back Hezbollah and the radical Islamic Hamas group.

Panic Prevails After Explosives, Detonators Found in Beirut
Naharnet: Police discovered separately on Thursday abandoned explosives and detonators in Beirut's Ashrafiyeh neighborhood, causing panic to the already jittery Lebanese over the recent bus bombings that left three people killed. Police said a wooden box containing 19 TNT explosive blocks with a combined weight of eight kilograms was found shortly before 9 a.m. next to a streetside garbage container on the Hikmeh main road in Ashrafieh.
Police were called in and traffic was blocked as sappers examined the box. Less than half an hour later a garbage cleaner discovered another box about 100 meters away containing 13 detonators, police said. The National News Agency had earlier said that the wooden box with the TNT explosives was discovered inside a tunnel in Ashrafiyeh. It was the second time explosives were found in Beirut since Monday, when a two kilogram-bomb was found concealed inside a used car tire in the Bir Hassan neighborhood off the airport road. The finds stoked fears gripping Lebanese after two bombs ripped through twin minibuses in the Metn town of Ain Alaq Feb. 13 and street clashes in January amid the ongoing political impasse between the government and the Hizbullah-led Opposition. Three people were killed and least 20 others wounded in the Ain Alaq explosions.
Beirut has been hit by a series of mysterious bombs in the last two years. The biggest was a suicide truck bombing that killed former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in February 2005. Nine people have been killed and more than 300 injured in violent street clashes and rioting pitting pro- and anti-government activists since the Opposition campaign began Dec. 1 in a bid to bring down Prime Minister Fouad Saniora's government.(Naharnet-AP) Beirut, 22 Feb 07, 12:48

Aoun's Sons In Law wounded in Car accident
Naharnet: Gen. Michael Aoun's sons in law, Jibran Bassil and Roy al-Hashem, were wounded in a car accident in Nigeria, the official National News Agency reported. The short report did not disclose further details about the exact health conditions of the two. It said a private jet was waiting to fly them to Lebanon for treatment "if needed." Beirut, 22 Feb 07, 19:51

Geagea for New Cabinet and International Tribunal
Naharnet The leader of one of Lebanon's main Christian political parties on Thursday urged the formation of a new cabinet together with an international tribunal to try suspects in the murder of ex-premier Rafik Hariri in order to end the country's political crisis. "We prefer that an international tribunal be adopted before the installation of a new government," said Samir Geagea, head of the Lebanese Forces, which has four deputies within the country's anti-Syrian parliament majority. "But we would accept a two-faceted solution pairing the international tribunal and the national unity government as long as it is done simultaneously," he told AFP. The pro-Syrian Shiite movement Hizbullah, which spearheads the opposition, on Wednesday asked the majority camp to discuss the heated issue of an international tribunal within the framework of a new government. Five-time prime minister Rafiq Hariri and 22 others were killed by a bomb blast in February 2005. An ongoing U.N. probe has implicated top level Syrian figures and their Lebanese accomplices, though Syria has denied involvement. The opposition has rejected the current plan for an international court and demanded it be amended.(AFP)

Hizbullah Shifts to 'Government for Tribunal'
Naharnet: Hizbullah has openly said the Opposition wants to exchange an international tribunal into Hariri's probe for a national unity government that would give them veto power over major decisions. "The international tribunal will take place when the national unity government is formed," Hizbullah Deputy Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem said Wednesday. "A national unity government with a guaranteed one-third is necessary to rebuild confidence amongst the (rival) officials," Qassem said at a ceremony honoring the death of 19 students from the Lebanese University who were killed as they fought Israeli troops in the summer of 2006. "This government will be the one to approve the tribunal," Qassem added. "We have agreed to the principle of the international tribunal, but we want it to be a criminal court," he stressed. Qassem extended a hand to the pro-government March 14 coalition, saying: "Let's discuss it (international court) together at the cabinet." He said Hizbullah was awaiting a reply from parliamentary majority leader Saad Hariri concerning "real participation" in the government. Addressing the rival camp, Qassem said: "We urge them to start a new journey to build Lebanon together." Beirut, 22 Feb 07, 13:35

Stranded Tourists Finally Rescued
Naharnet: Five people stranded in Jounieh's well-liked cable cars due to a technical failure in the Telepherique system were rescued overnight, Lebanese media reported Thursday. Sources at the Civil Defense Department had said that about 25 people were believed stranded in 15 cable cars when the service was suddenly interrupted at around 5 p.m. Wednesday. The Daily Star said two tourists were rescued at about 8 p.m. and the An Nahar newspaper said the other three were freed after midnight. One Civil Defense source told Naharnet the main pulley that controls the tug cable at the seaside Jounieh station was broken, which interrupted the whole line from the Harissa mount to the east down to the coast. The service suffered from a similar problem on March 2, 1989, and it took several days to rescue tourists stranded in the cabins over the wooded Harissa slopes. However, Joseph Sfeir, a technical adviser at the cable car company, told reporters the pulley remains in good shape, but the cable had skidded off its track and it takes a while to put it back and resume the service. Beirut, 22 Feb 07, 08:24

Israeli Army Chief: We Have to Deal with Hizbullah Attempts to Rearm
Naharnet: Israel's new army chief Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi has said that Israel may have to confront Hizbullah to halt the group's attempts to rearm after last summer's war. Ashkenazi said Wednesday that Israel delivered a tough blow to Hizbullah during the 34-day war, but the group, and its leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, are rapidly trying to refortify the group. "I think we all understand that ... he (Nasrallah) is not able to do the things that he could do before," Ashkenazi told reporters. "We see here and there smuggling and other things to bring weapons," he said. "We are following this and we apparently have to deal with this." Ashkenazi's comments came the same day Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Hizbullah became "weaker" after the July-August conflict. Ashkenazi spoke while observing a military exercise on the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau near the Syrian and Lebanese borders captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast War. Israeli officials have expressed concern recently that United Nations peacekeepers deployed in Lebanon as part of the Aug. 14 cease-fire that ended the war have not stopped Syria from continuing to transfer weapons across its border with Lebanon to Hizbullah.
"The United Nations has to stop the weapons smuggling to Hizbullah and in our opinion they have not done enough," Vice Premier Shimon Peres told the Yediot Ahronot newspaper this week during a tour along the border with Lebanon.
Hizbullah currently possesses more than 10,000 short-range rockets, down from between 12,000 and 14,000 before the war, according to estimates of Israeli intelligence, Yediot reported. Weapons are constantly coming across the border from Syria, the daily said.
Lebanese Defense Minister Elias Murr denied recently that the fighters have been receiving weapons from Syria, noting the presence of 8,000 Lebanese troops deployed along the Lebanese-Syrian frontier. Attending Wednesday's military exercise, Defense Minister Amir Peretz said Israel was trying to avoid a further confrontation with Hizbullah. "There's no doubt that this exercise ... doesn't demonstrate any intention to get involved in any confrontation or friction," Peretz said.(AP-Naharnet) Beirut, 22 Feb 07, 10:23

Olmert Downplays Hizbullah's Ability to Fight Again
Naharnet: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has defended his handling of the Lebanon war and said Hizbullah became "weaker" after the July-August conflict. Hizbullah "is weaker, much weaker than they were," Olmert said Wednesday at an annual news conference with foreign journalists in Jerusalem.
"I am not certain that they have any appetite to fight with Israel again," he added. He said the beefed-up U.N. peacekeeping force working with the Lebanese army, which deployed in southern Lebanon according to the U.N. resolution that ended the war, has largely contained Hizbullah, making it "almost impossible" for the fighters to function in the south. The summer war, and the Israeli public's perception that Olmert and his team had bungled it, helps explain the prime minister's extraordinarily low approval rating, now below 20 percent. Many Israelis believe the war's inconclusive results damaged their country's long-term deterrence, increasing the likelihood of another war with Hizbullah or even its sponsor Iran. The conflict erupted after the Shiite group kidnapped two Israeli soldiers in a deadly cross-border raid on July 12.(Naharnet-AP) Beirut, 22 Feb 07, 08:43

Imad Saliba Freed in Niger Delta
Naharnet: Lebanese hostage Imad Saliba abducted with three Italians in southern Nigeria has been freed after more than 70 days in captivity, the Lebanese consul general in Lagos said. "He is safe and has been through a medical check-up," along with the freed Italians Shawki Bou Nassar told An Nahar newspaper Thursday. The daily said that Saliba, who hails from the town of Btighrine in the north Metn province, will return to Lebanon on Friday.
Their abduction from one of Agip's facilities at Brass in southern Bayelsa State was one of several kidnappings carried out by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), which is seeking to highlight what it says is the unfair distribution of oil wealth in the region.
A spokesman for the Italian foreign ministry in Rome had earlier confirmed the Lebanese captive's release, adding that negotiations were continuing over two Italian hostages still being held. The third Italian was freed on January 18 because of health problems.
The Italian hostages work for the oil firm Agip while Saliba works for a Lebanese restaurant chain that caters for the company, An Nahar daily said.
They were kidnapped in the Niger Delta region on December 7.Since the start of the year, 55 foreigners have been kidnapped by separatist groups and armed gangs in southern Nigeria, almost as many as for the whole of 2006. The latest foreigners reported kidnapped were two Croatian seamen and a Montenegrin worker abducted on Sunday. Separatists announced earlier this month that they would no longer engage in hostage negotiations as long as the current government is in place in Lagos. But the government's chief negotiators denied the talks had broken off.(AFP-Naharnet) (Picture released by MEND in January 2007 shows kidnapped oil workers (L-R) Lebanese Imad Saliba, Italian Cosma Russo and Italian Francesco Arena in the Niger Delta Creek) Beirut, 22 Feb 07, 07:46

Blair to Syria: Destabilizing Lebanon is Isolation
Naharnet: British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Wednesday urged Iran and Syria to choose between backing democratic progress in Lebanon, and Iraq or face isolation. "There is evidence recently that Syria has realized the threat Al-Qaeda poses and is acting against it but its intentions toward Iraq remain ambiguous and toward Lebanon hostile," Blair told parliament. The United States has accused Syria of turning a blind eye to Islamist militants crossing its border into Iraq, while it is suspected of carrying out the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
"The statements emanating from Iran are contradictory," he said during a statement on plans to reduce British troop numbers in southern Iraq, in which he also called for greater support for democracy and progress in the region. But citing Mohamed el-Baradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the world's nuclear watchdog, Blair said Iran's "nuclear weapons ambitions appear to continue". Though Iran insists its nuclear program is peaceful, the West fears that Iran seeks to build nuclear weapons by enriching uranium. Uranium is enriched to be civilian reactor fuel but can also make the explosive core of atom bombs. "But both countries, though very different, have a clear choice," Blair said.
"Work with the international community or defy it. They can support peace in Palestine, democracy in Lebanon, the elected government of Iraq, in which case they will find us willing to respond," Blair said. "Or they can undermine every chance for progress, uniting with the worst and most violent elements, in which case they will become increasingly isolated politically and economically," the prime minister said. Blair said the Middle East was in the throes of "an epochal struggle between the forces of progress and the forces of reaction."(AFP) Beirut, 21 Feb 07, 17:57

Israel Blows Up Hizbullah Cave
Naharnet: Israeli forces on Wednesday uncovered and blew up a cave near the Jewish State's northern border with Lebanon that had been used by Hizbullah before last summer's war, the army said. The cave was found on the Israeli side of the Blue Line drawn by the United Nations to delineate the border between two countries.On February 7, Israeli and Lebanese soldiers traded cross-border fire for the first time in decades after Israeli sappers moved in to clear unexploded ordnance. Israel insisted its troops had remained on Israeli territory but Lebanon accused them of straying on Lebanese territory. It was the first shooting incident at the Israeli-Lebanese border since Israeli troops left Lebanon in October after the war with Hizbullah that killed more than 1,200 people in Lebanon and at least 160 Israelis. It was also the first border incident involving the Lebanese and Israeli armies in around three decades, given that Lebanese forces only redeployed to the border area after the August ceasefire for the first time in years.(AFP) Beirut, 21 Feb 07, 17:04

ALC expresses its gratitude to President Bush
Washington DC-February 19, 2007
The American Lebanese Coalition would like to express, once again, its sincere gratitude for the US Administration’s unwavering support for Lebanon’s Cedar Revolution and for its multi-faceted efforts to sustain the restored democracy in that country, which is represented by the Siniora Government..
From the leading US role in the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1559, which gave international legitimacy to the Lebanese people’s struggle to regain their country’s sovereignty and freedom, to the steadfast support for the Lebanese Cedar Revolution, which liberated Lebanon from Syrian occupation, and until today, this Administration and this President have shown their true commitment to the cause of democracy in the Middle East and have spared no effort to translate that commitment into material and political support.
In the past few weeks, while Lebanon has been undergoing difficult times, we have witnessed many positions and actions on different occasions from the President, from the Secretary of State and from a number of high ranking US officials re-affirming the US commitment to a free, peaceful and democratic Lebanon.
In that vein, it was heartwarming, but hardly surprising, to hear the President mention Lebanon, the Cedar Revolution and the U.S. commitment thereto in his State of the Union address. Besides the political and diplomatic efforts, the US has pledged economic aid up to 1 billion dollars, in addition to aid funds coming from the private sector through the US-Lebanon Partnership.
Following the devastating war that hit Lebanon this past summer, the humanitarian and reconstruction assistance from the US has been remarkable. Moreover, the US is providing security and military assistance to strengthen the Lebanese Army and the Internal Security Forces, and is leading the effort to bring justice to the Lebanese people through the formation of a Special U.N. Tribunal to try the culprits in masterminding, financing, assisting, executing and covering-up the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri and of the many Lebanese advocates of freedom and innocent men and women who lost their lives in subsequent terrorist bombings.
In conclusion, this Administration, besides being a true friend of the Lebanese people and a staunch advocate of democracy in the Middle East, does realize the importance of a fully free and democratic Lebanon in any effort to stabilize and pacify the region.
The Lebanese-American community and the people of Lebanon salute President George W. Bush. We are eternally grateful.

UN team investigates site of twin bus bombings
Daily Star staff-Thursday, February 22, 2007
BEIRUT: A technical detachment with the UN team investigating the assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri on Wednesday examined the scene of twin February 13 bus bombings in Ain Alaq that killed three people, judicial sources said. The sources told The Daily Star that the team was assisting the Lebanese judiciary in investigating the crime and was cooperating with First Investigating Magistrate Rashid Mezher, supervisor of the probe.
Twenty-three people were wounded in the explosions near the Metn town of Bikfaya. The sources said a meeting was held earlier this week at the UN team's headquarters in Monteverdi to discuss ways to help investigate the crime.Security sources said Wednesday the Internal Security Forces (ISF) suspected that one person had placed the two bombs on the buses. They said that the suspect boarded the first bus, placed the bomb and then left and moved to the other bus. The sources added that after placing the second bomb, the suspect left the area. The ISF is expected to circulate a sketch of the suspect, according to the security source. Technical experts are conducting DNA tests on a LL1,000 note that the suspect paid one of the bus drivers.
Meanwhile, Lebanese Army intelligence continued its examination on Wednesday of a bomb found earlier this week in the Beirut neighborhood of Bir Hassan. The bomb was concealed in an old tire. It was found by Jihad Kaak, a mechanic working near the Hajj Hussein Ouwaini Palace in Bir Hassan, when he was disconnecting the tire from the rim. The explosives were attached to a timing mechanism but a judicial source told The Daily Star that the device had not been activated. - The Daily Star

Hizbullah number 2 reaches out to Hariri
LEBANESE UNIVERSITY honors 19 of its students who lost their lives fighting Israel last summer
By Rym Ghazal - Daily Star staff
Thursday, February 22, 2007
BEIRUT: Hizbullah's number two, Sheikh Naim Qassem, extended a conciliatory hand to the Future Movement Wednesday, saying the opposition merely wanted "real participation" in ruling the country. Qassem was speaking before hundreds of students and their families at the Lebanese University in a ceremony honoring 19 of its students who had fought and died in the summer 2006 war with Israel. The families of the youths were presented with a "diploma of martyrdom." "We extend our hand to the Future Movement [and its leader, MP Saad Hariri] for real participation in governing our country," said Qassem, in the first overture by Hizbullah to a specific group in the March 14 Forces. "The international court [to try those accused of assassinating former Premier Rafik Hariri] will happen," he added, "when the national unity government is formed."The international court remains one of the main obstacles in the political deadlock between the two camps. "Lebanon is in crisis due to internal and external factors," he said. "The external one is because of the US. The United States does not want stability in Lebanon because it will lose control over the country if it settles." As for the internal factors, Qassem said there are "two figures" preventing the political deadlock from being resolved.
"One leader is hiding behind bigger and stronger leaders, and the other desperately wants to become part of the ruling team," he added, indirectly referring to Hizbullah's strongest critics, Druze leader Walid Jumblatt and Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea. But, he added, "let us return to discussion in order to reach a final solution as Lebanon has suffered enough." Qassem paid tribute to the 19 "martyrs" from Hizbullah's "Operation True Promise" whose portraits lined the stage. "Because of these young men, Lebanon can hold its head high," he said. The 19 students from the LU were among 85 killed during the war from the "education sector" in Lebanon - whether students or teachers. Estimates of the total number of Hizbullah fighters killed during the war fluctuate between 250 accodring to Hizbullah and 700 according to Israeli officials.
Qassem also warned that "Lebanon is in danger" as Israeli overflights are averaging about "five times a day.""From November 20 to February 5, Israel violated our airspace 384 times," said Qassem, adding that amounts to an average of "five air violations a day, along with 14 land violations."
"Daily violations occur but no one seems to care or cry over them," he said. Qassem then turned to the mothers of the youths who had died in the war - the "women behind the martyrs."
The relatives of those killed received a glass trophy and a diploma sealed with the drawing of a metal name tag beside a bullet added to the school's symbol. "The resistance's mothers, sisters and wives are the true pillars of this movement," he said. One mother, Altaf Khanafer, from the Southern town of Aynata, was there to pick up her son, Kazim Khanafer's "martyrdom diploma."Speaking to The Daily Star, she said she hadn't known her son was a fighter until his death on July 26. "I had this dream of him becoming this great doctor since he was so gentle and kind ... He would have been a great doctor," she said through tears. Kazim was 20 years old and studying at LU when the war started and he disappeared.
"I miss him so much, I can't believe he is gone," said Khanafer, as she held a photo of her son when he was younger, decked out in a scout's uniform.
Khanafer wept during a documentary broadcast at the ceremony showing clips of the students playing soccer and then gearing up to fight Israel.
Youmna Sarhal, 20, Kazim's friend and colleague, still can't believe he was a fighter. "He never said anything to anyone, and he was just too delicate to be a fighter," she said. Another mother stood up and read out a poem she devoted to her son, Wassim Sharif. "I wish the congratulations I have been receiving since your death were for your wedding, not your martyrdom," she cried. "Why did you leave me?" As a precaution against any potential clashes on the university campus, the head of the Lebanese University, Zuhair Shokr, declared the event "a national nonpolitical event.""It is an event for all the Lebanese, as these students belonged to all of Lebanon," said Shokr.

Ban to visit Lebanon next month 'if situation allows'
Daily Star staff-Thursday, February 22, 2007
NEW YORK: United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is expected to visit Lebanon in March "if the political and security situation in Lebanon is appropriate," a diplomatic source in New York said Wednesday. "If the political situation allows it, Ban is expected to make a visit to Lebanon next March to provide the Lebanese with suggestions to solve the current political deadlock," according to the source. Ban's visit to Beirut would likely revolve around two main priorities, the source said. The first is inspecting the mission of the United Nations Interim Forces in Lebanon (UNIFIL). Ban would meet UNIFIL Commander General Claudio Graziano, who would brief him on the implementation of UN Resolution 1701. Ban's second priority would be to meet with Lebanese officials to discuss continued Israeli violations of Lebanese territories, the source said. Ban would discuss the marking of the Blue Line and the Israeli occupation of the Shebaa farm. The source said Ban "did not wish" the issue of the establishment of an international court to try suspects in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri to "be touched upon or discussed during his visit to Beirut." The same source said that Ban's personal consultant, Michael Williams, would visit Beirut "soon" in order to "assess the political atmosphere there in preparation for the secretary general's visit and to fix an appropriate date."Ban took office on January 1. - The Daily Star

Israeli drone draws fire from Lebanese Army
Thursday, February 22, 2007
SOUTH LEBANON: An Israeli aircraft violated Lebanon's airspace Wednesday, drawing anti-aircraft fire from the Lebanese military, the Lebanese Army Command said. The target of the anti-aircraft fire at 10:40 a.m. was an Israeli drone east of the Southern port city of Tyre. Israeli fighter-bombers had earlier flown for two hours at low altitude over various areas of Southern Lebanon, including the Tyre region, according to the army statement.
Israel has drawn intense international criticism by continuing overflights after the August 14 cease-fire that ended its 34-day war with Lebanon.
A spokesman for the UN peacekeepers in Lebanon confirmed to Reuters Wednesday that the army had opened fire. Israeli warplanes regularly fly over South Lebanon but witnesses said Wednesday's flights, seen from the Bekaa Valley and the Southern city of Sidon, were unusually frequent and at a lower altitude than normal. The United Nations has warned that the overflights undermine the credibility of its peacekeepers and compromise efforts to stabilize the region. Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz has said the overflights are necessary to monitor what he charges are continuing arms smuggling by Hizbullah. Meanwhile, another statement from the Lebanese Army said four Israeli warplanes violated Lebanese airspace Wednesday, flying over Alma ash-Shaab and heading north toward Rashaya. The aircraft left Lebanon at 11:45 a.m. The National News Agency (NNA) said Israeli planes conducted mock raids starting over the towns of Marjayoun and Khiam. Israeli planes also flew over Nabatieh, Iqlim al-Tuffah and Jezzine. The NNA correspondent in Tibnin said Israeli planes also flew over the qada of Bint Jbeil. The NNA also said two Israeli bulldozers were working along the barbed wire parallel to the towns of Kfar Kila and Adaisseh, and were escorted by an Israeli military patrol. - With agencies

Resistance dismisses Israeli allegations that group has lost its edge
Compiled by Daily Star staff -Thursday, February 22, 2007
A Hizbullah spokesman denied allegations made by Israel's prime minister and the army chief of staff that Hizbullah is weaker than before the 2006 summer war and said that the resistance was ready to fight Israel again if provoked. "If they commit a mistake then we will face them," Hizbullah spokesperson Hussein Rahal told The Daily Star, but he added that he did not believe Israel was ready for another war. "The Israeli Army won't be able to conduct any actual attacks for two years," he argued, "though they do have the desire for revenge."Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Wednesday said Hizbullah was weaker than before the war, rebutting mounting criticism of the war's effectiveness and rejecting calls for peace talks with Syria. Olmert criticized Syria for supporting Hizbullah, and defended Israel's performance in last summer's war, saying Hizbullah "is weaker, much weaker than they were." When asked whether Israel might react positively to signals from Syria that it is ready to enter peace negotiations, Olmert said the country's support for militants precludes such talks.
"We are interested in peace, not in the industry of peace ... not in helping Syria pretend that it's a peace-loving country," Olmert said at an annual news conference for foreign journalists in Jerusalem. Olmert, whose popularity plummeted amid Israeli perceptions that the war undermined national security by failing to crush Hizbullah, said that although Hizbullah was rearming, it was finding it hard to regroup in its former border strongholds.
"When they try to surface now they are disarmed and arrested by the international force and the Lebanese force," Olmert told foreign reporters. He said it was now "almost impossible" for Hizbullah to function in its heartland, Southern Lebanon.
"I am not certain that they have any appetite to fight with Israel again," Olmert added. The Israeli military's newly appointed chief of staff, Lieutenant General Gabi Ashkenazi, said Wednesday that Israel delivered a tough blow to Hizbullah during the 34-day war, but stressed that the group is rapidly trying to refortify. "Hizbullah is trying to recover the capabilities that it lost during the recent war. I think we're all agreed that they haven't got there yet," he said, speaking at the launch of a military exercise on the occupied Golan Heights, a strategic plateau near the Syrian and Lebanese borders captured by Israel in the 1967 war. "He [Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah] is not able to do the things that he could do before," Ashkenazi said, referring to Hizbullah's leader. "We see here and there smuggling and other things to bring weapons," he said. "We are following this and we apparently have to deal with this."
Rahal said that "the arguments within Israel concerns internal politics. They can't seem to agree on one thing. The politicians are trying to justify that Olmert was victorious but their intelligence reports are actually revealing that Hizbullah is even stronger than before the war."
The Golan exercies are part of an effort to learn the lessons of last summer's conflict in Lebanon, Defense Minister Amir Peretz said.
"These exercises are the army's most important for five years and mainly intend to absorb lessons learned from the [2006 summer war]," Peretz told public radio. Warplanes and a regiment of paratroopers were taking part in the maneuvers, as well as infantry, mechanized units, artillery and sappers.
"Conducting these exercises in this area does not at all mean that they are connected to a possible conflict," said Peretz, referring to media reports of impending military confrontation with Syria. The exercise came after a senior military intelligence officer renewed controversy in Israel about the effectiveness of last summer's war in degrading Hizbullah's offensive capabilities. Brigadier General Yossi Beidatz, a senior military intelligence officer, warned the Knesset's Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee Monday that "Hizbullah has reinforced and it is stronger today than it was before the war in Lebanon." On Tuesday, Deputy Prime Minister Shimon Peres said he saw no cause for alarm about the Hizbullah threat.
"I suppose they've got more weapons but I don't see that as any cause for hysteria," he said. On September 22, 2006, Nasrallah said: "We have rehabilitated our military capabilities in full." The group claims to stock over 20,000 missiles and Nasrallah said this month it has never stopped smuggling in missiles and that some arms have been reaching "the front." Taking part in the Hizbullah debate within Israel, Peres blamed the United Nations.
"The United Nations has to stop the weapons smuggling to Hizbullah and in our opinion they have not done enough," he told the Yediot Ahronot newspaper, referring to the UN Interim Force in Lebanon that was beefed up as part of the August 14 cease-fire agreement to patrol a weapons-free buffer zone south of the Litani River. Lebanese Defense Minister Elias Murr said recently that the Lebanese Army was closely monitoring the border with Syria and that no weapons were going through there. - Agencies

Opposition reiterates threat of civil disobedience
By Hani M. Bathish -Special to The Daily Star
Thursday, February 22, 2007
BEIRUT: The opposition is considering ending its adherence to state institutions and beginning a civil-disobedience campaign against the government, Hizbullah politburo member Hajj Mahmoud Qmati said on Wednesday. Speaking to the Central News Agency, Qmati said the opposition was "seriously" considering further civil action to step up pressure on the ruling majority to form a national unity cabinet. He added that the opposition had followed through with each and every decision it had made in the past, making specific reference to the resignation of six ministers last November, an ongoing sit-in in the heart of the capital and a nationwide general strike held on January 23 that sparked sectarian clashes that left four dead.
"We still await the results of current initiatives ... In a matter of days the results of these initiatives will be clear and in light of these results we will decide our next step, which will likely be civil disobedience provided the opposition reaches consensus on the matter," Qmati said.
Each side of the political divide in Lebanon continues to accuse the other of hindering progress in a Saudi-Iranian initiative to end the three-month-old deadlock. An agreement between Riyadh and Tehran could pave the way for an inter-Lebanese agreement.
Diplomatic sources quoted in local daily Al-Akhbar Wednesday said efforts to resolve the deadlock were centered on reaching an agreement over unspecified changes to a draft for the international tribunal to try those accused of the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and the shape of a unity government. Qmati said Saudi Arabia has agreed to the "19 + 11" formula - meaning the parliamentary majority would receive 19 ministers and the opposition 11, and thereby veto power in the Cabinet - and has conveyed this to majority leader MP Saad Hariri.
Hariri was said to have agreed to the formula, but rejected the offer because Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea, a key Christian ally in the March 14 Forces, did not, insisting on a 19 + 10 + 1 formula on Wednesday, with the one minister being independent.
Speaking to reporters after a meeting of the LF parliamentary bloc, Geagea said any other formula would paralyze the government and create an authority vacuum in the country. But the Future Movement leader told Spanish Ambassador Miguel Benzo Perea, who visited the MP in Qoreitem, that he was confident the Saudi-Iranian efforts would produce results."I found [Hariri] determined to defend many positions while respecting the opposition's stance," Perea said. "He still sees room to maneuver to arrive at an agreement in the future."
Meanwhile, Premier Fouad Siniora met Wednesday with the UN special coordinator for Lebanon, Geir Pedersen, to discuss the general situation.
Pedersen said after the meeting that the latest report on the implementation of Resolution 1701 would be completed by mid-March.
In further meetings, Speaker Nabih Berri sent MP Ali Hassan Khalil to meet with former Premier Omar Karami in Ramlet al-Baida to discuss the latest developments in the deadlock.The crisis saw a bit of humor, with Berri and Geagea exchanging argumentative statements Wednesday, a day after the speaker threatened to reveal which parties were "really" blocking the Hariri tribunal.
Geagea said that if Berri had "one stone [secret] in his mouth, I have 10," to which the speaker replied that "if the LF leader has so many stones in his mouth, he should open a quarry." Geagea responded by saying: "I do not understand the quarry business. I would rather open a hospital."
Meanwhile, former President Amin Gemayel bemoaned what he called a "cold civil war.""We have been living in a state of civil disobedience for a while now through constitutional disobedience," he said in response to the opposition threat of further civil disobedience.Egyptian Ambassador Hussein Darrar met with the former president later in the day. The ambassador said an Arab League initiative had not reached a dead end as no party had rejected it outright. But while some proposals have come to light as a result of the Saudi-Iranian endeavor, the ball remains firmly in Lebanon's court, Darrar added.
Gemayel said the March 14 Forces want the opposition to participate in government but will not accept a paralysis of government institutions.
He also claimed confusion at the opposition's desire to revise the draft of the tribunal after an agreement had been reached over the court during national talks held a year ago. For his part, former Minister Suleiman Franjieh said the opposition was continuing to coordinate and discuss its next move should mediation fail. After meeting with a delegation from the Syrian Social Nationalist Party headed by SSNP leader Ali Qanso, Franjieh warned the ruling coalition not to take warnings from Berri lightly as anything the speaker said reflected the opposition's united position.
The Marada Party leader accused March 14 of "shooting down" serious initiatives to end the crisis, noting that while Saudi Arabia had agreed to the 19 + 11 formula, the Americans and Europeans had not.Hizbullah's number two, Sheikh Naim Qassem also blamed March 14 for the deadlock, saying: "We accepted the solution offered by [Arab League chief] Amr Moussa, but it was the other side that rejected it.""We also accepted the solution that later came out of the Iranian-Saudi meetings, which the other side accepted then changed their minds," he added.

Learning nothing and forgetting nothing
By Michael Young -Daily Star staff
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Earlier this week, two statements neatly summarized the crisis in Lebanon. The first came from the EU's representative in Beirut, Patrick Laurent; the second from Syria's official Al-Thawra daily. Both reaffirmed in their own separate ways that the Syrian regime, since its army was forced out of Lebanon in 2005, has chosen to behave like the exiled Bourbons: learning nothing and forgetting nothing.
In an exchange with journalists, Laurent had this to say about Syrian behavior in Lebanon, and about European efforts to "engage" President Bashar Assad: "We tried everything, as did many others, employing both gentle means and pressure," but nothing seemed to work. As if confirming Laurent's doubts, Al-Thawra, in an editorial Tuesday, called for talks between Damascus and the US covering Lebanon, Palestine, the Golan Heights, and Iraq. "Syria insists on a serious and profound dialogue on all subjects without exception," the newspaper asserted.
Precisely where this extraordinary statement came from was unclear. Syria is a declining power, capable only of spreading instability in its neighborhood to ward off irrelevance. However, this game, which the late President Hafez al-Assad played to perfection, no longer works. By allying itself with an Iran that Saudi Arabia regards as an existential threat, Syria is in no position to make demands of the Arab states, let alone of the United States. The Syrians recently tried to take control of the Iraqi Baath Party, and failed. They tried to midwife a Fatah-Hamas deal in Damascus, and failed again. Assad has even managed to alienate Egypt, by thwarting its peace efforts on the Palestinian front and by ensuring that Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa's mediation in Lebanon would go nowhere. And in Lebanon, Assad has so angered the Sunni community that the prospect of a Syrian military return seems fanciful.
Most alarming from a Lebanese perspective, the Al-Thawra article showed that Syria has yet to grasp that the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1559 in 2004. In insisting on Syria's having a say in Lebanon's future, the newspaper disregarded that the resolution specifically asked Damascus to end its interference in Lebanese affairs.
Assad may have come out of his summit in Tehran last week invigorated by a sense that the Iranians need him in their confrontation with the Bush administration. It was always naive to assume that Iran would pressure Assad on the Hariri tribunal at a time when the nuclear issue was on the verge of reaching a climax at the UN - with more steps possibly coming at the Security Council to impose new sanctions on Tehran.
However, it is precisely because of this that Syria should be careful. Iran's ultimate guarantee against an American attack isn't the comradeship of Damascus, but a broad Arab consensus behind the benefits of a dialogue with Iran and the undesirability of an American military response to the nuclear standoff. Iran views its talks with the Saudis as the best means to avoid a war, but also to hinder approval of new UN sanctions and avert a Sunni-Shiite conflict that would cripple Iranian initiatives in the Middle East. In this context, Assad could emerge as a burdensome ally.
The Bush administration is more subtle than it has been given credit for. It authorized the Saudi-Iranian dialogue, realizing that this reflected the central Sunni-Shiite fault line dividing the Middle East. There are some in Washington who would love to bomb Iran, but there is no domestic traction for war, leaving room for diplomacy. This is where the Saudi-Iranian talks fit in. That Bandar bin Sultan, the former ambassador to the US, was named point man on the Saudi side surely reassured the Bush administration, particularly Vice President Dick Cheney.
As the Syrians look on, what is going through their minds? Their agenda can be reduced to a single item: undermining the Hariri tribunal. Neither in Iraq nor in the Palestinian areas is Assad indispensable. In Lebanon, Syria presumably faces Iranian "red lines" limiting the kind of intimidation it can employ, which is why the Syrian-Iranian compromise is for more stalemate, punctuated by controlled Hizbullah escalations. The latest scheme is for a civil-disobedience campaign. Yet this may end up backfiring like other opposition efforts did. Shiites would suffer as much as anyone from obstruction of the country's public administration.
Iran and Syria can agree over raising the heat in Lebanon to squeeze the Saudis. But beyond that the situation becomes more complicated. The Iranians want an advantageous deal in Lebanon, but not a civil war. They also don't want to break with the Saudis, because there will be more friction with the US and the Arab world in the coming months. An Arab League summit is to be held in Saudi Arabia in March, and there is nothing Iranian leaders would like less than for the predominantly Sunni Arab states to use that event to warn against the "Persian peril." This explains why the Syrians are so eager to act now in Lebanon, to ensure they can get something on the tribunal before eventual progress in the Saudi-Iranian relationship pushes their aims to the backburner. A Saudi-Iranian rapprochement would make it much tougher for Assad to kill the tribunal, whose passage the Saudi leadership considers non-negotiable.
Assad senses that the window of opportunity is closing. His last card is a Lebanese civil war, but it's not one that Iran and Hizbullah seem willing to play. However, the tribunal won't disappear. At best, if Syria aborts formal Lebanese endorsement of the institution, this will make the move toward Chapter VII of the UN Charter more likely. Only when Assad truly accepts Resolution 1559 and embraces Lebanon's sovereignty and independence, will he persuade anyone that his regime is worth saving.
**Michael Young is opinion editor of THE DAILY

Hizbullah rips sanctions on construction firm Us 'is targeting reconstruction'
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Hizbullah said on Wednesday that the United States is trying to stop the reconstruction of Lebanese areas damaged during last summer's war with Israel by branding a building firm operated by the group as a terrorist organization. The US Treasury Department on Tuesday accused Jihad al-Binaa of bolstering Hizbullah's public standing by rebuilding war-torn areas.
"I say that this American decision condemns America and not Jihad al-Binaa because it is targeting an institution that is concerned with civic development and construction," said Hussein Rahhal, head of Hizbullah's media unit.
"Therefore America's aim is obviously the prohibition of construction in South Beirut and Lebanon," he said.
The Treasury said Jihad al-Binaa receives funding from Iran and is run by Hizbullah members and is overseen by Hizbullah's governing Shoura Council.
Rahhal said it was an independent body and when asked whether Iran funds the firm, he said: "Jihad al-Binaa receives funding from donors in Lebanon and outside of Lebanon ... Iran is not the issue."
Stuart Levey, the US undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, said in a statement that Hizbullah uses the firm for its own needs "as well as to attract popular support through the provision of civilian construction services. "We will take action against all facets of this deadly terror group," Levey added. Levey said in his statement that while acting against Jihad al-Binaa, "the US government is also working to ensure that legitimate reconstruction efforts, led by the Lebanese government, succeed." President George W. Bush pledged $230 million in reconstruction and security aid to Lebanon in August, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced an additional $770 million in aid last month. Jihad al-Binaa has been involved in debris clearance and reconstruction in the southern suburbs of Beirut and South Lebanon. Since 1993, it has restored at least 11,000 homes destroyed by Israeli atacks.The Treasury said these services were boosting the standing of Hizbullah, which the US government designates an "international terrorist organization."The action by the Treasury also bans Americans from doing business with Jihad al-Binaa and freezes any assets it may have under US jurisdiction. The firm's Web site, www.jihadbina'a2006.org, calls on individuals and institutions to provide volunteers, apartments or donations in order to "support the resistance and the steadfastness of the heroic Lebanese people and continue the victory by removing remnants of the American Zionist aggression." - Agencies

Washington's weird way of trying to make friends in Lebanon
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Editorial-Daily Star
Washington's latest salvo in the laughably named and prosecuted "war on terrorism" provides yet another example of just how profoundly it misunderstands the issues at hand. On Tuesday, the US Treasury announced sanctions against Jihad al-Binaa, a construction company affiliated with Hizbullah. On the surface the tactic means very little since Jihad al-Binaa is unlikely to hold substantial assets in the United States that can be frozen under the sanctions. As a gambit in the battle for hearts and minds that US President George W. Bush joined by declaring his intent to democratize the Middle East, however, the Treasury's move could not be more counter-productive.
In July 1993, an Israeli military onslaught in South Lebanon demolished or badly damaged more than 4,700 homes; Jihad al-Binaa restored virtually all of them. Three years later, the Israelis went on an even more destructive rampage that completely or partially destroyed about 7,000 residences; Jihad al-Binaa rebuilt or repaired 6,714. This past summer, Lebanon's wrathful neighbor to the south lost all sense of proportion and damaged or destroyed at least 86,000 homes; Jihad al-Binaa sent some 1,000 engineers and 5,000 volunteers to conduct site surveys (although actual rebuilding has been delayed by the current political impasse in Beirut). Leaving aside questions of right and wrong, what can the Bush administration hope to achieve with an empty statement of hostility toward an organization that has done so much good for so many Lebanese who have suffered so much heartache because of so many bombs and shells supplied by the United States?
Is America ready to take care of all those made homeless by the munitions it has lavished on its troublesome ally? This is an important question for any US policymaker hoping to wean great swathes of Lebanon's population off affection for and/or reliance on Hizbullah, and history is not encouraging about the answer. Successive US governments did absolutely nothing, for example, to end the 1978-2000 occupation of South Lebanon. And far from reining in the Israelis last summer, the current administration actually rushed them extra bombs - and provided them with diplomatic cover so they could extend a vicious offensive that accomplished no important military goals (unless one considers women and children legitimate targets).
The bottom line is that Jihad al-Binaa provides people in need with useful help. The United States arms the power that makes them needy, pressures the organization that wants to assist them, and provides riot gear to the security forces that are supposed to keep them silent.

In the Middle East, the US is off the road and in the ditch
By David Ignatius
Daily Star staff
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Are you on the road, or in the ditch?" Back when I covered labor negotiations 30 years ago, that was the question reporters would ask to get a sense of how contract talks were going. The phrase came back to me last weekend as I listened to a series of relentlessly negative presentations at a conference here on America's relations with the Muslim world.
We are in the ditch in the Middle East. As bad as you think it is watching TV, it's worse. It's not just Iraq, but the whole pattern of America's dealings with the Arab world. People aren't just angry at America - they've been that way to varying degrees since I first came here 27 years ago. What's worse is that they're giving up on us - on our ability to make good decisions, to solve problems, to play the role of honest broker.
Let's start with some poll numbers presented at the Doha conference by Shibley Telhami, a University of Maryland professor and a fellow of the Saban Center at the Brookings Institution, which co-sponsored the conference with the Qatari Foreign Ministry. The polling was done last year by Zogby International in six countries that are usually regarded as pro-American: Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
In these six "friendly" countries, only 12 percent of those surveyed expressed favorable attitudes toward the United States. America's leaders have surpassed Israel's as objects of anger. Asked which foreign leader they disliked most, 38 percent named US President George W. Bush; former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was a distant second at 11 percent; and the present Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, was third with 7 percent.
The poll data show a deep suspicion of American motives: Sixty-five percent of those surveyed said they didn't think democracy was a real American objective in the Middle East. Asked to name two countries that had the most freedom and democracy, only 14 percent said America, putting it far behind France and Germany. And remember, folks, this is coming from our friends.
During the Doha conference, speakers put into words the attitudes summarized by the poll numbers. Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a fiery Sunni preacher who appears regularly on Al-Jazeera, said that America acted as if "some people were created to lead and others to be led," and that America had "lost the trust and confidence" of Muslims.
Well, okay, he's notorious for his anti-America and anti-Israel views. But I heard the same thing from Amr Moussa, the head of the Arab League, who said Arabs were "losing confidence in the US role" as a peace broker.
And my friend Rami Khouri, who is one of most balanced journalists in the Arab world, warned that a broad popular front is emerging to challenge American hegemony. Iraq "discredits what America tries to do in the Mideast," he said. Khouri explained that Arabs admire Hizbullah because it represents "the end of docility, the end of acquiescence."
You don't have to agree with these critics to recognize that the anger they express represents a serious national security problem for the United States. That's what Bush seems not to understand in his surge of troops into Iraq, his bromides about democracy and his strategy of confrontation with Iran. It isn't a tiny handful of people in the Arab world who oppose what America is doing. It's nearly everyone.
To get out of the ditch, America must change its Iraq policy, soon. That doesn't mean pulling out of Iraq quickly, as many Democrats in Washington seem to favor. I found few people here who thought a quick American pullout made sense. But it does mean shifting the American focus - so that we are talking with Iraq's neighbors, and negotiating with the Iraqis a timetable for withdrawal of US troops. Tellingly, the one American who got loud, sustained applause here was Chris Kojm, a senior adviser on the Iraq Study Group report.
And to get back on the road, for real, America must broker a settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. I winced when I heard Olmert say last weekend in Jerusalem that "the American and Israeli positions are totally identical" on the terms for recognizing a Palestinian unity government. The Israelis are right in insisting that Hamas must recognize Israel's right to exist. But how to get there? What if US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had responded: America is a mediator in this conflict. Its positions are independent of either side, and it is willing to talk to all parties to achieve peace. I would have loved to see the looks of astonishment from the America-bashers here.
**Syndicated columnist David Ignatius is published regularly by THE DAILY STAR.

Keeping Lebanon Away
Hassan Haydar Al-Hayat - 22/02/07//
Plagued with infighting, division, fragmentation, sectarianism and the diseases of occupation and guardianship, that have used up their youth and their limited capabilities; the Lebanese have paid, and are still paying, their share of the national and regional debt at the expense of their sovereignty, stability, wealth and the future of their generations through their solidarity with the Palestinians, unity with the Syrians and the alliance with the Iranians.
As to the united Lebanon, it has always been absent every time a Lebanese sect chose to give priority to an external cause over the national interests to win the favor of a regional power.
Instead of learning the lessons from the successive crises that have befallen Lebanon since the Arabs' defeat in 1967 to fortify to the Lebanese internal situation, subjugation to external powers has become bigger and deeper. The stage of solidarity with the Palestinian resistance, which resulted in a decade-long civil war and ended with Israel invading Beirut, correlated with the stage of Lebanese-Syrian unity which led to 30 years of 'brotherly' Syrian military presence in Lebanon despite the Taif Agreement. Finally, there was the cross-border stage during which the small country became full of rockets and the Mujahideen. Adding to the suffering of this country, Lebanon then entered a recent confrontation with Israel, whose justifications do not rule out the external agenda.
Every time, the Lebanese packed their luggage and left the country. Every time, they lost their lives: a few willingly and the majority unwillingly. Since the Cairo Agreement in 1969, the Lebanese have been waiting in queues in front of foreign embassies. Generations have perished; yet, the fate of the nation is still up in the air due to a disagreement, or rather an agreement, between two regimes or axes that have nothing in common with the Lebanese except geography and the easily-crossed borders.
This is not the fault of the Lebanese alone. It is the fault of all the international powers, without exception, that preferred to protect their interests and make agreements at the expense of the Lebanese's independence and unity.
When the late Raymond Edde called in the late 60s and early 70s for international forces to be deployed in Southern Lebanon to protect its borders and regional waters from Israel's greedy intentions and hostility, he was aware that someone wants to sacrifice Lebanon and turn it into a passageway for exchanging messages and an arena for negotiations. Of course, many accusations were leveled against him at the time; and he was the target of many assassination attempts. After four disastrous decades for Lebanon, the troops he called for were deployed on the southern borders.
Today, some are calling for neutralizing Lebanon so that it becomes able to restore its national unity and use all capabilities for reconstruction, after it became certain that the arsenals and the fighters, although many in number, can not protect the country as long as it is fighting and shouldering the burden of nationalism alone and as long as there is no collective Arab front which it can join. Instead, Lebanon has been turned into a mere buffer zone that wards off any threats to others, yet not allowed to ward it off itself.
Keeping Lebanon away form the regional conflicts does not imply stripping off its Arab identity or canceling its national responsibilities, it rather aims at strengthening its distinguished and leading role in its culture, educational system, diplomacy and openness. This is what the Arabs desperately need at this stage in which the world has been turned into a microcosm of which they remain the least developed part.
This will also restore the status of Lebanon as a modern example that confutes the Israeli illusion of supremacy, consolidates the Lebanese efforts for internal developments, gradually makes their national affiliation prevail over their association with sects and communities, and protects them against costly adventures, dependence on and waiting for the consent of other states and axes