Screw. You.

You worthless talking pile of human excrement.

The only reason Israel hasn't toppled your palace over your head is because they know you are too spineless to ask for anything but to be left at the helm of a rotting regime of fear and death.

I will watch your own countrymen drag you into the street and stomp your cowardly corpse into a pulp.

That day of reckoning is near.

Until then you can carry on being this guy...

Thank You

For everyone who kept reading this (or other Lebanese) blogs during this war, thank you.
For every kind comment or email, for every hateful one, thank you.
For every warm wish or sentiment, thank you.

Cease Fire, Blow Smoke

Well the boys playing war over the carcass of this battered nation have decided that the fighting was getting pretty tedious and agreed to cool it off.

And why not? March a mile in their boots and you would probably feel the same way. I fire rockets, you flatten a village, I destroy a tank, you pulverize a bridge. I call you murderer, you call me terrorist. Do that for a month and you'll find the novelty fades away quickly.

Besides, a ceasefire brings with it that exquisite pleasure of claiming victory.

So who won?

Well both. And they've both lost too.

Hezbollah won: Israel's declared objectives of destroying Hezbollah and decapitating its leadership have both failed to materialize. Rockets kept being fired till the final hour. Praise allah, we are victorious.

Israel won: The IDF knew it could never achieve either of those goals. What it really set out to do was destroy what it could get away with (i.e. mostly infrastructure and Hezbollah sympathizers) in order to get a UN resolution that would be more hostile to Hezbollah than 1559. It did.

Hezbollah lost: Yes the leadership is still alive and the rockets kept raining on Haifa, but what Israel brutally destroyed is very dear, and the loss is incalculable. And no, it's not all "fida sirmeyt el-sayyed" (translation: for the sake of Nasrallah's slipper) as some say. You'll miss that roof over your head. And that son or daughter too by the way.

Israel lost: Yes it huffed and puffed and blew the house down, but no "self-defense" argument can justify the manic stomping of a country, innocents dying needlessly on both sides. The whole world sympathized with the cause of rescuing 2 kidnapped soldiers (even some Arab ones), and Israel managed to turn all that sympathetic capital into indignant rage in just 30 days. Why punish all the Lebanese for not disarming Hezbollah when your own 'legendary' IDF was unable to do so, and then only make them look like heroes in the end. Disarming Hezbollah is going to be much harder now. And you have sowed seeds of hate that will blossom well into the future.

So who won? Both did. Who lost? Both did.

But who lost everything and gained nothing? Lebanon. And the moderate, peace-seeking Lebanese.


And that is why our Prime Minister wept.
And I wept with him.

Could it be over?

Is this it?

No more rushing to the TV live feed to see the smoke plumes?
Or seeing the reporter try to figure out if it was a fighter or warship that fired?
No more breaking-news ribbons on the bottom of the screen?
Or that cute Saliba reporter on LBCI?

I've come to expect the casuality report every morning.
I get anxious when the power cuts out, as if the massacres can't happen if I'm watching the news.
And I've come to recognize the Haifa skyline like I've actually been there.

I never expected this war and it took me by surprise.
I got angry, I cried out for peace, I had countless debates and arguments.
And now it's over just as abruptly as it started.

How can I ever trust in peace again?

It just got (more) personal

My second cousin is in the army. Or was.
He was stationed in Tyre, to man a prehistoric anti-aircraft gun that could only intimidate migrating birds.
He heard Israeli choppers flying in to drop commandos in a civilian area.

We don't know if he actually managed to get a round fired off or not.
Moments later he became a charred body in a destroyed vehicle.

In my heart, I know his death served no purpose.
He is fodder to the raging inferno of death and hate sweeping Lebanon, leaving ash and dust in its wake.

But when his toddler kids grow up, and ask me what happened in 2006, I will say he died a hero.

Would they understand the truth? Would they forgive us if they did?

شرف تضحية وفاء

BBC Interview

I was interviewed on BBC Five Live's pods and blogs show.

Have a listen.

(RealPlayer required)

Bi Beyrut

A very touching post written by fellow blogger Eve, read out by fellow blogger Jooj.

Have a fellow listen.




powered by ODEO

NB. It's in arabic. And I hate pink.

This is Lebanon - part 2

The famous Beirut theater, Masrah Al Madina, is producing a show called "Laughter under fire" (my translation) that is a comedy based on improvisation and audience participation.

It will be held on Thursday and Friday 6th and 7th of this month. 7.30 pm. Free Entrance.

Seems I'm not the only one trying to smile through this.

Candles in Lebanon

Candles are being lit all over Lebanon these evenings.
Not to complement romantic dinners, or fill rooms with heady scents.



To stave off the dark,



to garner hope,



and mourn the dead.


Everything is different in war, even candles.

To Speak Faerlie

In a post a few days ago, I suggested that you read an excellent article written by an American living in Lebanon that refused to evacuate despite the violence.

Now meet the author, Faerlie Wilson.

Sitting in Starbucks waiting for her to show up (she loves to walk everywhere, admittedly not Beiruti-like), I expected to have a cup of coffee with a wide-eyed tree-hugging bundle of excitement that in some misguided effort to express her love for the Beirut she barely knew had bitten off more than she could chew. Sure her words were really touching, but would she still feel the same way when the war caught up with her? When the reality of what she signed on for made her doubt the wisdom of an impulsive decision?

I was very mistaken.

She is certainly a stubbornly optimistic person, but not naive in the least. She definitely decided to stay because she felt compelled to, but it was a decision she made with reason and forethought, not on impulse. Listening to her speak of Lebanon, the conflict, her concerns and her anguish at what was happening, you would never for a moment think she were anything but Lebanese, born and raised. When she says "we", she means us Lebanese. She didn't end up here by chance. Everything about her stay here is deliberate and intentional. Once you realize that, it makes perfect sense that she would stay.

At several points in the conversation, I would feel as if I were the foreign inquisitor feeling for the pulse of a local Lebanese. It is then that I would suspect she may even love this place more than I do. She asked why all the Lebanese flags paraded so proudly in the past year are conspicuously absent. I had no answer. I felt ashamed.

You just know she will be there with a flag in hand when this violence is finally over.

Smart, ambitious and passionate, Faerlie is disarmingly charming, with a genuine love for this country and its people.

She is however gravely mistaken in her article when she says: "I'm not crazy, and I harbor no death wish."
Faerlie, you're just as crazy as the rest of us.