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Beirut, the Incredible Shrinking City

Maya Mikdashi Beirut 12 August 2006


Before yesterday, an Israeli missile slammed into an old, unused lighthouse in Beirut, near the Lebanese American University. Debris from the attack found its way to my father’s office building. Inside it was my father. When he left his office, he found a paper on the ground that warned him that he was in danger, and it was due to Hezbollah’s, not Israel’s, rockets. All over Beirut papers fluttered down to the streets, arriving in pieces sometimes (like snowflakes, Ahmad said) - perhaps exhausted from their long journey to the ground from the heights of an Israeli warplane. As the papers neared the streets cars stopped, bodies stooped, and people read. 

Photostory: Flyers dropped over Tel Aviv

13 August 2006


On Friday afternoon, July 21, 2006, we scattered flyers from the rooftops of Tel Aviv to protest the war in . The flyers contained translated excerpts of actual leaflets dropped by the IDF in calling on citizens to leave their homes. As we enter another round in the cycle of displacement and refugeehood in our region, Zochrot calls on the Jewish public to question the aims of this war and to acknowledge the roots of the violent conflict that began with the Nakba of 1948. 

How it felt yesterday: The ultimate oppression

Mayssoun Sukarieh Beirut 13 August 2006


It is a feeling of ultimate oppression that is reigning in the streets of Beirut; ultimate oppression that turned a victory into a resolution for our colonization; ultimate oppression not only by the Israeli war machine but also by the international community that offered Israel what it could not take by force. Ultimate oppression for being witness to the defeat of the Israeli army but not allowed to live the victory. It was the quietest yet most painful morning in Beirut since the beginning of the war. It started with news about the UN resolution against Lebanon - the resolution that will end the resistance and leave us easy prey to the fully armed state of Israel. 

Russia proposes 72-hour humanitarian truce

11 August 2006


In an effort to push the parties working on the current United Nations Security Council draft on Lebanon to come to a conclusion, Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin emerged from a meeting at the British mission Thursday evening to announce a Russian-proposed 72-hour humanitarian truce. Churkin told reporters that the draft resolution would be put in ‘blue’ — council-speak for ready to be voted on — “calling for an immediate and full cessation of hostilities of all the parties for 72 hours, calling for proper humanitarian efforts and, quite importantly, calling for extraordinary diplomatic efforts”. 

Lebanese use blogs to vent frustration at war

Yara Bayoumy 10 August 2006


“I felt besieged, my movement was completely hampered, I enjoyed breaking the siege and having the freedom to write and having space to reach out to people and not feel as isolated,” said Rasha Salti, an independent curator and freelance writer, told Reuters on Thursday. She said her postings appeal to people who want to know more about the everyday aspect of living in a country surrounded by war as opposed to media coverage which generally focuses on the breaking news developments. “The media look for the breaking news obviously. They look for the stories, but when they find a story, they don’t find an ordinary story, one that appeals,” Salti said, whose postings can be seen at electroniclebanon.net. 

Unanimous UN Security Council vote for "cessation of hostilities"

11 August 2006


The United Nations Security Council voted unanimously Friday evening to immediately end the month-long hostilities between the Lebanese militia Hezbollah and Israel. Ghanaian Foreign Minister Nana Addo-Dankwa Akufo-Addo, who chaired the meeting, said he believed the resolution strengthened the hand of the international community and was “a clear signal to those involved in the hostilities that the world is united, on the way forward, and out of this crisis.” UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan told Council members before the vote he was “relieved” but summed up international frustration. 

OCHA: 971,361 displaced in Lebanon, including 16,000 Palestinian refugees

11 August 2006


According to the Government of Lebanon (GoL) Higher Relief Committee (HRC) the number of casualties now stands at 1,056 people killed. It estimates that some 971,361 Lebanese have been displaced, inside and outside the country. UNRWA estimates that some 16,000 Palestinian refugees have been displaced by the conflict and an additional 5,500 Lebanese IDPs have moved into Palestinian camps. After drops of warning leaflets on the Burj Barajneh camp in southern Beirut, around a third of the camp population - up to 3,000 people - evacuated the camp yesterday evening. 

Deepening the fault lines

Omar Yousef Shehabi 13 August 2006


Now, with the Israel-Hizbollah war a stalemate at best and the Israeli deterrence at a historic nadir, Olmert and Bush know that the Israeli public has lost its nerve and its stomach for a unilateral withdrawal from one inch of the West Bank. Twenty years elapsed between the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza and the first intifada. Eight years elapsed between the start of the Oslo process and the second intifada. The Gaza withdrawal has only exacerbated the Palestinians’ suffering, and without a diplomatic track to speak of, a third intifada is imminent, one that likely will not be constrained by the sham of Palestinian self-governance. 

As fighting persists in Lebanon, blue helmet wounded when Israeli rounds hit UN post

12 August 2006


One day after the Security Council voted unanimously for a cessation of hostilities in Lebanon, fighting continued today and one blue helmet was wounded when Israeli fire hit a United Nations position in the south. In a speech to last night’s Council meeting, Kofi Annan said he would be working with Israel and Lebanon this weekend to establish “the exact date and time at which the cessation of hostilities will come into effect.” He also welcomed the resolution but said the Council should have acted much sooner. One blue helmet was wounded early this morning when two artillery rounds from the Israeli side impacted directly inside a UNIFIL position. 

In search of a true humanity

Jeff Handmaker and Bangani Ngeleza 12 August 2006


As Lebanon and Gaza burn and the laws of war are violated with impunity, the terrible erosion of international law represents a critical challenge for the international community. Reflecting on the South African apartheid regime’s efforts to gain supremacy in South Africa and the Southern African region, Jeff Handmaker and Bangani Ngeleza argue it is imperative that we continually raise our voices against Israel’s brazen impunity until a real and lasting ceasefire is in place, war criminals are brought to justice and the Israeli regime is held accountable for decades of repression and regional destabilisation. In doing so, we will surely find a true humanity.