The Dominion - Hezbollah

Who is the Terrorist? A Critical Conversation on Hezbollah.

Stefan Christoff — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 21:09:43 +0000

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17th, 6:30pm

Leacock Building, Room 232
McGill University, 688 Sherbrooke St.
Montreal, Canada

A public event hosted by Tadamon! Montreal & the Quebec Public Interest Research Group (QPIRG) at McGill University within the context of the campaign to challenging Hezbollah’s listing as a ‘Terrorist’ Group in Canada…

Presentations from:

Bilal Elamine: Currently living in Beirut, originally from Southern Lebanon, the former editor of Left Turn Magazine, Elamine will outline the current and historical role of Hezbollah in Lebanon from a progressive perspective. Critical recent events in Middle East history will be addressed within the presentation, as Elamine will speak about the 2006 Israeli attack on Lebanon, the 2007 general strike and opposition protests within the context of Hezbollah’s role in Lebanese society.

Brian Aboud: Presenting on Tadamon!’s campaign to challenge the listing of Hezbollah as a ‘terrorist’ organization in Canada. Today, Canada is one of only three countries world-wide to designate Hezbollah as a ‘terrorist’ organization. The other two are Israel and the United States.

Film Screening:

A Summer Not to Forget: A film by Lebanese film maker, Carol Mansour. Using powerful and disturbing images, the film tells a story of yet another war on Lebanon: 1,200 killed, 4,000 injured, one million displaced, 78 bridges destroyed, 15,000 homes damaged, 15,000 tonnes of oil spilled on 80km of the Mediterranean coastline, 57 collective massacres and much more. Director Mansour takes you into the harsh realities of a nation devastated by war and a people caught under siege.

The Road to Nahr al-Barid: Lebanese Political Discourse and Palestinian Civil Rights

Stefan Christoff — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:18:11 +0000

070804-marcy-albared.jpg

An excellent analysis article on the siege of Nahr el-Bared by the Lebanese Army throughout the summer of 2007...

Excerpt below, however read the full version on-line at: Tadamon!

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Reuters on Hezbollah

dru — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 17:20:54 +0000

This Reuters story starts by saying...

Villagers in Shebaa were grateful to Hezbollah guerrillas for forcing out Israel. Now, some say Nasrallah's image has been damaged by the campaign he is leading against a government which they support.

...but ends by saying that "some" are religious leaders who are probably getting paid to oppose Hezbollah:

In Shebaa, some Sunni clerics and other local leaders have started criticizing Hezbollah, villagers said. "They are trying to impose sectarianism under financial incentives or ideological pressure," Ali said. "Frankly, it's political money."

Mark Mackinnon's Counter-Excerpt

dru — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 13:29:52 +0000

Mark Mackinnon sent in the highlighted article excerpt in response to the ongoing discussion about Mark MacKinnon's coverage in Lebanon.

For his remarks, read the discussion.

* * *

From "Hezbollah protestors rally against government," by Mark MacKinnon.

Published in The Globe and Mail on Dec. 2, 2006.

(snip)
The demonstrators accused the government, which has supported international calls for Hezbollah to surrender its weapons, of being run by the U.S. embassy. "Down with Feltman's government!" was a popular chant, referring to Jeffery Feltman, the U.S. ambassador.

The Manichean Middle East of Mark MacKinnon

dru — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 07:12:40 +0000

Globe and Mail coverage of Lebanon suffers from ideological interventions

When newspapers send correspondents afield to report on world events, the position is fraught with opportunity and responsibility. Opportunity to share meaningful insight into current events, and responsibility to accurately report on them.

In many cases, unfortunately, other motivations prevail. For the owners and editors of the few papers that shell out for foreign correspondents, the opportunity to shape public opinion seems too tempting to pass up, even if it comes at the expense of insight and accuracy.

The Globe and Mail's Middle East correspondent Mark MacKinnon has been publishing dispatches on the ongoing political crisis in Lebanon regularly from Beirut. It should be noted that MacKinnon's reports are often superior to the generic newswire reports carried by many newspapers. Regrettably, this speaks more to the skewed quality of wire reports and less to the Globe correspondent's capacity to promote accurate understanding of events in Lebanon.

It's no secret that the Globe and Mail prefers certain political actors in Lebanon to others. When in 2005, hundreds of thousands of Lebanese demonstrated in response to the assassination of former PM Rafik Hariri, eventually resulting in the withdrawal of Syrian troops, amidst intense US pressure on Damascus, the Globe ran a series of front page stories, touting the "pro-Western" "Cedar Revolution" that was sweeping the country. Globe editorialists praised the IMF-mandated "free market" reforms of "pro-Western" forces, which won a Parliamentary majority in the subsequent elections.

When larger street protests hit Beirut in recent weeks, however, Globe coverage was to be found in small doses, nowhere near the front page. It is in this context that Mark MacKinnon's frequent reports are published.

MacKinnon's reporting from Beirut is dominated by a neat division of Lebanese politics into "pro-Syrian" and "pro-Western" camps, a theme that is repeated multiple times in every one of 19 dispatches that were examined for this analysis. On the other hand, MacKinnon barely mentions the summer Israeli offensive that destroyed most of the country's civil-infrastructure, and killed thousands, mostly civilians. MacKinnon mentions the offensive in less than half of the reports we examined, and then usually only in passing.

A look at the evidence shows that MacKinnon's Syria-vs-West division is erroneous, while Israel's summer offensive is the defining factor in the current political situation on the streets of Beirut.

MacKinnon cites Gen. Michel Aoun, the Christian leader of the "Free Patriotic Movement" party, as one of the key supporters of the Hezbollah-led protests, which he constantly characterizes as "pro-Syrian." Overlooked by MacKinnon is the fact that Aoun was driven to exile in France by Syrian and allied Lebanese factions in 1990, and returned only with the withdrawal of Syrian troops in 2005. As a result, it is awkward to characterize Aoun as simply "pro-Syrian."

Hezbollah, on the other hand, maintains a strategic alliance with the government in Damascus, though this is far from the central focus of the current protests.

Why do these unlikely allies find themselves demanding a greater share of cabinet seats? Because, as MacKinnon mentions in passing in one article (but does not mention at all in 17 out of 19 reports on the subject), "recent opinion polls suggest Hezbollah and Gen. Aoun would combine to win more seats than the government in a snap election."

Why is this? It has everything to do with the Israeli bombing of Lebanon that killed 1,100 people, displaced a full quarter of the country's population, and systematically destroyed its key infrastructure, including roads, airports, power stations, hospitals, schools and refugee shelters.

During the assault, Hezbollah led fierce counter-attacks, ultimately limiting the Israeli army's ability to maintain a hold on the ground in southern Lebanon, and winning massive support from the Lebanese for their resistance.

The relatively well financed government and state institutions of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora--the leader of MacKinnon's pro-Western camp--by contrast, did almost nothing to provide aid to many affected by the war, and offered no military defence against the Israeli attacks despite multiple bombings of Lebanese military bases.

At the height of the Israeli bombings, Ghassan Makarem of the grassroots relief organization Samidoun, told CKUT Radio that the "internally displaced Lebanese support for the resistance hasn't wavered due to the level of aggression on the part of Israel."

"Until now, there has been no action from the government or by the government agencies," Maskarem added, "while many people in regions of Lebanon who are traditionally not supportive of Hezbollah are shifting their support towards the resistance."

In stark contrast to the silence of Lebanese state powers during the war, the Free Patriotic Movement, Gen. Aoun's political support base, mobilized hundreds of volunteers to provide frontline medical and humanitarian relief for internally displaced refugees from southern Lebanon, while thousands more opened their homes as impromptu shelters in the heart of East Beirut, a traditionally Christian area.

According to a broadly reported opinion poll conducted throughout the country in late July 2006 by Lebanon's main polling institute, the Beirut Center for Research and Information, 87 per cent of Lebanese supported Hezbollah during the war.

While widely recognized in Lebanon, this reality doesn't fit with the Globe and Mail's image of the region. MacKinnon in particular goes out of his way to warn readers that despite the specific political demands [which his reports do not mention], clashes between demonstrators in the streets are "an ominous sign that efforts by the Shia Hezbollah movement to bring down the Sunni-led government... could rapidly devolve into all out sectarian conflict."

The warning would have been tempered had MacKinnon mentioned that in addition to Gen. Aoun's Christian party, some significant Sunni and Druze political parties are also supporting the demonstrations. Could the message of demonstrators in Lebanon be driven by something other than religion given that parties from all religious sects in Lebanon are on the streets with Hezbollah?

It's not even clear from MacKinnon's reports what motivates Hezbollah's demands, or what motivates the thousands of demonstrators to remain in the streets of Beirut. Further inquiry revealed that the reason for this is that he did not ask.

In a recent interview with CKUT Radio in Montreal, MacKinnon was asked whether he had interviewed any of the leaders of the demonstrations.

"Since it began... No," MacKinnon responded, "because they are quite busy people and in the specific case of [Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan] Nasrallah he hasn't given any interviews since the summer war with Israel."

However, Hezbollah political leaders have been regularly speaking with the Western press at the Beirut demonstrations. Just this week Mahmoud Komati, deputy head of Hezbollah's political bureau gave a widely published interview to the Associated Press.

"Now we are demanding it [greater government share], because our experience during the war and the performance of the government has made us unsure. On several occasions they pressured us to lay down our weapons while we were fighting a war," Komati told the Associated Press on December 15th, presenting a political argument against the current government, not a sectarian one.

Despite the readily available Hezbollah spokespeople and hundreds of thousands of demonstrators clogging central Beirut, MacKinnon did not quote a single Hezbollah representative about the reasons for the demonstrations. He mentions the reasons for calling the demonstrations twice, and only in passing. MacKinnon, however, did manage to secure an interview with Sheik Sobhi Tufeili in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley.

Sheik Tufeili, a former secretary general of Hezbollah no longer associated with the party, has been comparatively absent from Lebanese politics in recent years. Living in a compound and flanked by bodyguards, Tufeili is wanted by the Lebanese authorities. Through fragmented quotations, paraded as confessions extracted by MacKinnon, Tufeili denounces the current Hezbollah leadership.

Highlighting Sheik Tufeili without featuring any of the hundreds of thousands of Lebanese on the streets of Beirut is puzzling.

It's not clear that the poor quality of his coverage is entirely MacKinnon's doing, though it is difficult to imagine that he is not aware that his coverage does not match the facts on the ground.

Indeed, MacKinnon's writing is more in touch with reality in his online diary than it is in reports that appear in print.

Shortly after the UN-brokered ceasefire in August, MacKinnon visited southern Lebanon. "No picture or 1,000 words of mine can ever capture what these places look like. In towns that once weren't much different from some places in Greece or Italy, there's simply nothing left standing," wrote MacKinnon. "Just piles of rubble where people's homes and lives used to be."

Today, a responsible journalist--or a minimally competent one--would have to ask why residents of the very same villages bombed by Israel and described by MacKinnon above are now demonstrating for political change in Beirut.

It's hard to imagine that MacKinnon is ignorant of this direct connection between the current demonstrations and the recent Israeli attack. A more likely explanation is that he is conscious of the interests of his own career, knows what his editors want to hear, and is willing to severely compromise his own journalism in service of both.

If MacKinnon were to be replaced, his successor may have a slightly different journalistic style. The ideological and political exigencies of the Globe and Mail's editorial board, however, would remain. We predict the result would hardly be an improvement, regardless of the skill of the correspondent.

In a recent op/ed in Montreal's La Presse, Fabrice Balanche took reporters to task for simplistic reporting along the same lines as MacKinnon's.

"Manicheanism is de rigeur," Balanche writes. "Certainly it is difficult to understand Lebanon and to explain it in a few minutes to [an audience], but all the same, lets stop the caricatures."

Balanche cites facts that show the story of pro-Syrian battling pro-West forces to be bogus. But while Balanche's modest appeal to pay attention to reality is compelling, corporate media like the Globe have long-standing and equally compelling reasons of their own to ignore it.

* * *

CORRECTION: A previous version of this article stated that "Despite the readily available Hezbollah spokespeople and hundreds of thousands of demonstrators clogging central Beirut, MacKinnon did not quote a single Hezbollah representative while he was there." As written, this passage was inaccurate. The Dominion regrets the error.

Opposition Protests

Bombed Building, Beirut

Opposition Protests

dru — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 07:02:59 +0000

Opposition demonstrations gather in Martyrs' Square in Beirut on December 1. [source].

Montreal groups call for objective look at Lebanon

Tue, 19 Dec 2006 09:12:29 +0000

MONTREAL, QUEBEC -- On Wednesday December 13, three Montreal organizations called on Canadian media and the Canadian government to look at the situation in Lebanon objectively. Tadamon! Montreal, Al Hidaya Association and the Council of Lebanese Canadian Organizations (COLCO) held a joint press conference explaining the situation in Beirut.

Speakers for the groups stressed that contrary to most media coverage, the popular uprising is not a coup, but is an attempt to form a national unity government, which would accommodate different factions of Lebanese politics. Moreover, the protest is not a Hezbollah-only enterprise, with Hezbollah representing approximately a third of protesters.

"We hear about Hezbollah demonstrations, but Hezbollah makes up only a fraction of opposition forces. One of the major forces in the opposition coalition is the CPL which is a secular group largely supported by Christians," said Ziad Najjar of COLCO.

The groups denounced Canada's unambiguous support of the Siniora government, saying Canada should stay out of Lebanon's internal politics and let Lebanon decide its own fate. May Hayder of Al Hidaya spoke of a double standard vis-à-vis Lebanon, comparing the movement in Lebanon to the Rose Revolution and the Orange Revolution of recent years. "On Sunday the 10th... 2 million people clogged central Beirut and all the roads and bridges that lead to it," said Hayder. "Over 40 percent of the population was on the streets -- much larger than the ones which toppled their governments in Georgia and Ukraine."

Finally, Tadamon! Montreal made available a poll commissioned by Lebanese daily Al-Akhbar, which indicated that 73.1% of the Lebanese population desire a national unity government.

Dmitri Marine

Selectively Terrified

Thu, 02 Nov 2006 12:27:05 +0000

How Hezbollah became a terrorist organization in Canada

A Hezbollah flag hangs in Baalbek, Lebanon. Hezbollah enjoys popular support in much of the country. photo: moogdroog

Throughout much of the Arab world, Hezbollah is being celebrated as the champion that was, at long last, able to establish a victory over invincible Israel and its omnipotent western backers. In the Middle East, Hezbollah's victory has energized movements against imperialism and its system of client regimes.

In Canada, Hezbollah is a terrorist organization. It is thus illegal to "participate in or contribute to, directly or indirectly, any activity" of this Lebanese political party or even to urge anyone to act in a way that could be construed as benefiting Hezbollah.

Some explanation for the distance between these starkly different approaches to the same organization can be found in the story of how Hezbollah's political wing came to be placed on Canada's list of terrorist organizations in December 2002. Examined in detail, this brief history provides insight into how key Canadian foreign policy decisions are made.

Hezbollah's ideological roots lie in the 1970s "movement of the deprived," which advocated for the rights of Lebanon's historically marginalized Shi'a population and for all oppressed groups. In 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon, killing as many as 14,000 and wounding another 20,000–the vast majority of whom were civilians–in the first two weeks alone. Hezbollah emerged out of the popular Shi'a militias resisting the Israeli occupation and participating in the civil war, formally announcing itself in an open letter to "all the oppressed in Lebanon and the world," published in 1985. The letter endorsed Khomeini and the Iranian revolution and proposed an Islamic state for Lebanon "which, alone, is capable of guaranteeing justice and liberty for all." It was stipulated that this should be achieved only through the will of all the people, however, and not by force. "Confessional privileges [the domination of one religious group over others] are one of the principal causes of the great explosion which ravaged the country," the letter noted. Since 1992, when the party first ran for national elections, Hezbollah's leadership has publicly endorsed the importance of co-existence and pluralism within a multi-religious, diverse Lebanon and the vision of an Islamic state has faded into the background.

Today, Hezbollah is at once a political party with 14 seats in the Lebanese Parliament, the main provider of social welfare throughout the poor areas of Lebanon, a social movement voicing the aspirations of the Shi'a, and a fighting force. It receives financial and logistical support from Iran and political support from Syria and, lately, Venezuela. Its ideological underpinnings blend Lebanese nationalism, Islamism, social justice and pan-Arab nationalism.

It would be a serious challenge to substantiate the claim made by Canadian Minister of Public Safety Stockwell Day; that the "stated intent of Hezbollah is to annihilate Jewish people." An examination of official texts and speeches indicates, rather, that Hezbollah's opposition to Israel is based on Israel's history as a European colonial movement that occupied Arab lands, established an exclusionary state at the expense of the original inhabitants and has subsequently pursued a persistent pattern of settlement and expansion.

Hezbollah's military operations wound down in 2000 with the end of the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon, but a military wing was maintained on the grounds that Israel continued to violate the "blue line" established by the UN, illegally held Lebanese prisoners in their jails and occupied a tract of what Hezbollah considered to be Lebanese land in the Golan Heights.

By 2002, Canada had arrived at a typically Canadian, middle-of-the-road position: Hezbollah's armed wing–the Hezbollah External Security Organization–was classified as a terrorist group, while its political wing was not.

A campaign to list the Hezbollah political party started in July 2002, when the government failed to include the party in an expanded list of designated terrorist organizations.

Pressure to list Hezbollah came from the Canadian Alliance Party (the precursor to today's Conservative Party), senior Liberal politicians Irwin Cotler and Art Eggleton, B'nai Brith (a Jewish human rights organization, staunchly pro-Israel in orientation), and the Canadian Jewish Congress.

A series of articles by Stewart Bell published in the National Post–replete with terms like "terror suspects," "clandestine cells" and "masterminds," and based largely on information obtained from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), dating from the 1980s–documents the campaign. The National Post at the time was owned by ardent Zionist Israel Asper. Stewart Bell himself has been questioned about his role in CSIS's practice of selectively leaking information to the media.

Denis Coderre, Minister of Immigration at the time, recently claimed to have played a role in the campaign as well. Indeed, the arrest and deportation of a supposed Hezbollah "agent" took place in October 2002, with accompanying media fanfare.

Interestingly, both Jean Chretien and Bill Graham, then Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs respectively, resisted placing Hezbollah on the terrorist list. Chretien met with Hassan Nasrallah, the secretary general of Hezbollah, in Beirut in October 2002. On November 28, a new set of groups was banned–and Hezbollah was still not among them. Irwin Cotler denounced the omission as "inexplicable and, given their [Hezbollah's] murderous ideology, unconscionable."

B'nai Brith responded the next day, on November 29, with a press conference in which they announced a lawsuit against the government, brought on the grounds that the government was failing to protect Canadians by refusing to ban Hezbollah.

The following day, November 30, the National Post picked up a story from the Washington Times claiming that, at a Beirut rally, Nasrallah had condoned and encouraged suicide bombing. Nasrallah was alleged to have said: "Suicide bombings should be exported outside Palestine"; and "I encourage Palestinians to take suicide bombings worldwide, don't be shy about it."

Two weeks later, after going to Beirut to investigate, CBC journalist Neil MacDonald exposed the story as a fabrication.

MacDonald traced the story to journalist Paul Martin. Martin had previously been accused of writing a false report about Palestinian militants under an alias in the same journal, the Christian-right Washington Times. MacDonald said that Martin, when challenged, "came up with three quotes [attributed to Nasrallah], one of which, to be charitable, was a gross mistranslation, and the other two were never even uttered." Martin named his source for the quotes as Lebanese ultra-nationalist and pro-Israel Walid Phares, currently a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), whose board and advisors is composed of well-known neo-con Zionists. Phares has also contributed policy briefs to the publication of Daniel Pipes's think tank, the Middle East Forum.

MacDonald reported on CBC on December 11 that, "Ottawa now knows that the Nasrallah quotes in the Washington Times about exporting suicide attacks were almost certainly never uttered."

However, the alleged comments by Nasrallah had already received enough attention to force the government's hand; a special Cabinet committee meeting was held the evening of December 10, 2002, in which it was decided to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. The Canada Gazette, official newspaper of the government, reported, "The change has been made on the basis of the close connection between the organization as a whole and the Hezbollah External Security Organization, and the recent statement by Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, the secretary general of Hezbollah, encouraging suicide bombings."

Curiously, the decision came the same day as the high-profile arrest of "terrorist suspect" Mohamed Harkat under a security certificate, a top news story across the country which heightened public fear about terrorism. The security certificate was signed by Immigration Minister Denis Coderre on the recommendation of CSIS. The decision to arrest Harkat at this particular time may well have been taken independently of any other considerations. However, the timing of the arrest does not appear to have been linked to any exigencies in Harkat's own case.

The political significance of labelling Hezbollah a terrorist organization is extensive: it is an act of tangible alignment with the apartheid state of Israel and its American backers, both regionally and in Lebanese internal politics; it is a stand against the right of Palestinian self-determination and the Palestinian right of return; and it is an affirmation of the double-standard under which Israel's habitual disregard for international humanitarian law is tolerated. In Canada, the designation helps obviate the possibility of meaningful discussion about the causes of oppression and war in the region–witness the media storm around the visit by three members of Parliament to Lebanon in the aftermath of the Israeli assault, and around the participation of Quebec politicians in Montreal's August rally against the attack on Lebanon. It also eviscerates the political potential of the large Lebanese diaspora community in Canada by threatening them with the terrorist label should they dare question the official line themselves.

No revision of the decision appears to have been made in light of the exposure of the Washington Times' story.

Mary Foster tracks the history of Hezbollah and examines how it became a terrorist organization in Canada.

"Everything in my life is destroyed now, so I will fight them."

Fri, 28 Jul 2006 22:45:52 +0000

Dispatches from the war-torn Lebanese capital

A car carrying a family and children is hit in Southern Lebanon. photo: Kodak Agfa

"I am in Hezbollah because I care," the fighter, who agreed to the interview on condition of anonymity, told me. "I care about my people, my country, and defending them from the Zionist aggression." I jotted furiously in my note pad while sitting in the back seat of his car. We were parked not far from Dahaya, the district in southern Beirut which is being bombed by Israeli warplanes as we talk.

The sounds of bombs echoed off the buildings of the capital city of Lebanon yesterday afternoon. Out the window, I watched several people run into the entrance of a business center, as if that would provide them any safety.

The member of Hezbollah I was interviewing—let's call him Ahmed—has been shot three times during previous battles against Israeli forces on the southern Lebanese border. His brother was killed in one of these battles. It's been several years since his father was killed by an air strike in a refugee camp.

"My home now in Dahaya is pulverized, so Hezbollah gave me a place to stay while this war is happening," he said, "When this war ends, where am I to go? What am I to do? Everything in my life is destroyed now, so I will fight them."

That explains why earlier in the day, when driving me around, he'd stopped at an apartment to change into black clothing—a black t-shirt and black combat pants, along with black combat boots.

A tall, stocky man, Ahmed seemed always exhausted and angry.

"I didn't have a future," he continued while the concussions of bombs continued, "But now, Hassan Nasrallah is the leader of this country and her people. My family has lived in Lebanon for 1,500 years, and now we are all with him. He has given us belief and hope that we can push the Zionists out of Lebanon, and keep them out forever. He has given me purpose."

"Do you think this is why so many people now, probably over two million here in Lebanon alone, follow Nasrallah?" I asked.

"Hezbollah gives you dignity, it returns your dignity to you," he replied, "Israel has put all of the Arab so-called leaders under her foot, but Nasrallah says 'No more.'"

He paused to wipe the sweat from his forehead. The summer heat in Beirut drips with humidity. During the afternoon, my primary impulse is to find a fan and curl up for a nap under its gracious movement of the thick air here.

Earlier he'd driven me to one of the larger hospitals in Beirut where I photographed civilian casualties. All of them were tragic cases… but one really grabbed me-that of a little 8 year-old girl, lying in a large bed. She was on her side, with a huge gash down the right side of her face and her right arm wrapped in gauze. She was hiding in the basement of her home with 12 family members when they were bombed by an Israeli fighter jet.

Her father was in a room downstairs with both of his legs blown off. Her other family members were all seriously wounded. She lay there whimpering, with tears streaming down her face.

I think I won Ahmed's trust after that. I walked out the car, got in and sat down. He asked me where I wanted to go now.

Ahmed put his hand on my shoulder and said, "This is what I've been seeing for my entire life. Nothing but pain and suffering."

A photographer from Holland who was working with me was able to respond to Ahmed that maybe we could go have a look at Dahaya.

Ahmed had told me that it was currently extremely dangerous for a journalist to try to go into Dahaya. Before, Hezbollah had run tours for people to come see the wreckage generated by Israeli air strikes. All you had to do was meet under a particular bridge at 11 a.m., and you had a guided tour from "party guys" (members of Hezbollah) into what has become a post-apocalyptic ghost town.

A couple of days ago I went there, without the "party guy" tour. A friend and I were driven in by a man we hired for the day to take us around. I was shocked at the level of destruction—in some places entire city blocks lay in rubble. At one point we came upon the touring journalists, all scurrying to their vehicles. Everyone was in a panic.

"What's going on?," I asked our driver. "A party guy who is a spotter said he saw Israeli jets coming," he responded, while spinning the van around and punching the gas as we sped past the journalists lugging their cameras while running back to their drivers.

While driving we were passed by several Hezbollah fighters riding scooters. Each had his M-16 assault rifle slung across his back and wore green ammunition pouches across his chest.

Ahmed told me he'd captured two Israeli spies himself. "One of them is a Lebanese Jewish woman, and she had a ring she could talk into," he explained as new sweat beads began to form on his forehead, "Others are posing as journalists and using this type of paint to mark buildings to be bombed."

I doubt the ring part, and also wonder about the feasibility of paint used for targeting, but there are no doubt spies crawling all over Beirut. In Iraq, mercenaries often pose as journalists, making it even more dangerous than it already was for us to work there.

Nevertheless, war always fosters paranoia. Whom can you trust? What if they are a spy? What are their motives? Why do they want to ask me this question at this time? These types of questions become constant I my mind, and so many others in this situation where normal life is now a thing of the past. I think they are some sort of twisted survival mechanism.

We drove back near my hotel and parked again. People strolled by on the sidewalks. Ahmed said, "I will never be a slave to the United States or Israel."

Dahr Jamail's daily dispatches from Beirut are being posted on the Mother Jones website.

Dahr Jamail tours the war-torn Lebanese capital of Beirut with a member of Hezbollah.

'Measured' Misery?

Tue, 25 Jul 2006 17:41:10 +0000

Canada and the war between Israel and Hezbollah

A mother tries to comfort her child in Bourj Hammoud High School in Beirut. photo: UNHCR/C.Lau

As missiles from Israeli F-16s rained down upon Lebanon, Fredericton resident Yousseff Nakhale was trying desperately to make contact with his wife and daughter who are living in the country.

"I tried to call them yesterday (July 18th) and today (July 19th) and the phone didn't ring, there was no line. I tried on a cellular and a regular phone," said Mr. Nakhale, who was born in Lebanon and has worked in New Brunswick's restaurant business since 1998.

His wife has Canadian citizenship, and may have been shuttled out of the country by the time of publication. Mr. Nakhale's daughter and her three children do not have foreign passports. "My daughter is in more danger. She took her kids and her mother and went to the mountains."

Fighting between the Israeli army and Hizbollah guerrillas based in southern Lebanon began on July 12, when Hizbollah - a Shi'ite political organization who elect legislators, run hospitals and launch attacks - captured two Israeli soldiers from an outpost, and demanded they release Lebanese prisoners held in Israeli jails.

As of July 23, Israeli air attacks had killed 362 Lebanese, while Hizbollah rockets fired into Haifa and other Israeli cities have left 34 dead. The majority of casualties on both sides have been civilians.

"There is a deepening humanitarian crisis that needs immediate international attention," said Nathan Derejko, Atlantic coordinator of humanitarian issues for the Canadian Red Cross, which is supporting an international call to raise $9.07 million to help fund the materially strapped Lebanese Red Cross.

Although Lebanon's infrastructure is being destroyed, it is not Lebanon's government or military that is fighting with Israel.

After Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war ended with a treaty, the government was divided upon ethnic lines: Christians, Druze, Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims each control a percentage of the legislative seats.

Hizbollah, which translates into 'Party of God,' is a multifaceted social, economic, religious and political force. It was set up in 1982 to resist Israeli occupation of Lebanon during the brutal civil war. The group declared a political existence in 1985 and now controls 18 per cent of seats in Lebanon's parliament.

Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmaert called Hizbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers and killing of up to eight on July 12 an "act of war" by Lebanon. But with 50 000 soldiers, the Lebanese government doesn't have the force to shut down Hizbollah. Moreover, any attempt to do so would plunge the country back into civil war and shatter its fragile democracy.

Israel's disproportionate destruction of civilian infrastructure including bridges, water treatment facilities and roads, amounts to collective punishment against people who are guilty of one thing: being Lebanese.

Before descending into vicious sectarian civil war beginning in 1975, much like the one currently tearing apart Iraq, Lebanon was considered the 'Paris of the East.' Its capital Beirut was a glamorous modern city with a well-educated, religiously diverse population. Prior to Israel's latest bombardment, things were on the up and up for Lebanon: the economy was growing and the country's tenuous democracy was starting to work.

In Ottawa, Stephen Harper called Israel's attacks "measured," putting Canada at odds with almost the entire international community and - consequently- in perfect harmony with the Bush regime.

Israel has one of the world's most advanced armies and receives $3 billion dollars in US aide every year, more than any other country on the planet.

At his home in Fredericton Yousseff Nakhale isn't interested in talking about politics or religion. "I don't have any idea what happened with Isreal or Hizbollah or the government. Nobody likes this war. It's no good for anybody. Everybody is scared."

Prime Minister Harper called Israel's attack on Lebanon 'measured.' Chris Arsenault talks to a father who hopes his family is still safe.