I just came from the south of Lebanon. I went to Tyre, to Hannaoui, Qana, Siddiqinne, Srifa, Bint Jbeil, Aitaroun, and Ein Ebel and many villages on the way. I so want to write but I still have no words. This was Tyre after all, the lovely city and its beach that I always wanted to call home. These were the villages at which I made friends, aided in tobacco harvesting and drank the best tea ever. I still haven’t cried, I feel I am not entitled too — if I were to cry, what would I leave to the people that have lost loved ones and houses full of memories? Read more about South Lebanon: I still have no words
Coming into consciousness of, or bearing witness to, a massacre only a few kilometers removed from one’s being (or home), feels very much like the experience of being in the proximity of a very powerful explosion only at an extremely, extremely slowed motion. Taking stock of the information on time, place, and the toll of victims, watching televised transmission of rescue workers piling a kindergarden in rigor mortis, is identical to the astounding sensation of the air being sucked from all around, that typically precedes the explosion. And at some point, it all sinks in … Read more about "There was a massacre at Qana"
Just got home … was driving like crazy. Word on the street is that Israel is threatening to hit Beirut now. I feel so helpless. I called Maya, she said that if she dies today that i could keep her DVDs that I’m borrowing. I told her the same. I called my husband and told him to come home right away. If I die, I want to be in his arms. My little brother is here with me. He is 20 years old. He is making some tea now. He believes it is going to be ok. We are supposed to be discussing a plan he has to make t-shirts with slogans on them to raise money for the relief shelter he is volunteering at. Read more about I refuse to say goodbye
There is a black dust that is filling the air. We are breathing it in … constantly. It has settled on my clothes, in my kitchen — it is everywhere. We are guessing it is from the Jiye power station that was bombed. It is still on fire. It is the power station from which the oil spill originated from.Today I had my first experience at queuing for gas. The shortages have arrived. So many gas stations have shut down. The few that are left have long queues. I waited for 40 minutes, and when my turn came, I was give $10 worth only. I only have a few minutes left before the electricity gets cut. we are running on generator now and they usually turn it off at midnight. Read more about Every time I think that things can't get worse, they do
Three of my colleagues went to Tyre today. I will spare you the details of what they saw and wrote. There’s only one thing that I need to share with you. Saada went to Jabal Amel hospital where she found a four year old boy, Hassan Chalhoub, who had spent the previous night in the morgue between the dead. He had been sleeping next to his sister, six-year-old Zeinab, in the shelter in Qana. There with him were his mom and his dad, who’s confined to a wheelchair. Many of the people of Qana are survivors of the 1996 massacre, when 110 people were killed and more than 100 were injured when by Israeli raids on civilians who had sought shelter in a nearby UN base. Thus, many of the people of Qana have special needs. Read more about Four-year-old Qana survivor's night between the dead
We visited Qana six weeks ago. To get there from Beirut, you pass through Tyre and then head southeast. The village clusters about a hilltop less than eight miles from Lebanon’s southern border, and about thirty miles from Nazareth. There is a scholarly debate about whether this was the site of the Wedding at Cana, where Jesus is said to have performed his first miracle, creating wine from water. The Roman historian Eusebius and St. Jerome both believed this was the place. There is no doubt that Qana was an early Christian site. For those schooled in Hollywood movies and religious picture books, this is a Biblical-looking landscape that exceeds all expectations. Read more about They Have No Wine
My love affair with Lebanon began when I left America in 1969 to settle in Beirut with my Lebanese husband, Michel, and our two small children, Naim and Nayla. In Beirut, I found my place to grow. My commitment to stay there through the first eight years of the civil war was a consequence of that deep love affair. I had married into a family that was loving and accepting. It was exciting to wake up every day as a foreigner embraced by a Lebanese family. This is the kind of love which develops a loyal Beirut heart, one which never dissolves. When war began in 1975 I chose for practical reasons to stay and fight. When I say ‘fight’ I mean fight in a way a housewife does. Read more about A loyal Beirut heart
I have been feeling numb for a while; the overwhelming news in the past few days has focused on the displaced, the searing stories of people who fled in fear and left all their possessions behind. Calls on TV stations and on the radio of people who lost their loved ones … Stories of their anxiety about homes they left behind … Scenes of people murdered on the roads as they fled … And stories of the destruction they saw on those roads. I get confused: Am I seeing and hearing the stories of Palestinians who fled their homes in fear in 1948? No: I am in Beirut, it is 2006, and these are the stories of the Lebanese who have been rendered refugees, but by the same perpetrators of the 1948 displacement: the State of Israel. Read more about We have lost our faith
Salaam a’laykum - peace be upon you. The greeting used by Arabs and Muslims all over the world - and for the people of Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq, a poignant reminder that peace is a precious thing. Seeing the images of massacre at Qana today I don’t know where to begin - or how to stop crying. I feel I can only convey fragments - perhaps because my heart is breaking. I’m trying hard not to seem melodramatic, because I know how it is there - you read this in the midst of a long, exhausting, busy day and too many of these and it’s too much to bear, it feels so far away. Read more about A night at the symphony in Damascus
It is mid-morning here in Nablus and the sound of bullets are ripping through the air from somewhere very close by. Sirens are wailing in the distance. Yesterday, around midnight, special Israeli forces assassinated two activists near the old city of Nablus. The scattered volleys and the sound signatures of different caliber bullets are tell-tale signs of a funeral procession. But what I see in front of me on the television screen is much more disturbing. Videos of little boys and girls, all dead, being pulled out from under the rubble of a building. It is much too painful to look for more than a few seconds at a time. Read more about The recurring scenario of death at Qana
