By Chelsea Sheasley, Staff writer / May 28, 2014

Clinching months of tactical victories for the Syrian regime, next week’s presidential election kicks off today with advance voting for Syrians living overseas. 

Leading the ballot is President Bashar al-Assad, who has led the country through a three-year civil war that has killed an estimated 160,000 people, caused an exodus of 3 million, and displaced internally many more.

The official election date is June 3. International observers have criticized the vote as illegitimate and impossible to hold during a civil war, The New York Times reports.

Mr. Assad is seeking a third seven-year term after taking over from his father, Hafez, in 2000. Neither of his little-known opponents, Hassan el-Nuri and Maher al-Najjar, is considered to have any chance of winning. The United States and the Syrian opposition have dismissed the election as a sham which, analysts said, is apparently intended to impart a sense of legitimacy to a government that tolerated no real dissent before the uprising and has cracked down unrelentingly on its opponents since the first stirrings of revolt in March 2011.

That hasn’t slowed the momentum. Today thousands of Syrian exiles in Lebanon jammed the streets outside the Syrian embassy in Beirut to cast their ballot on the first day of expatriate voting. Most of those gathered said they were voting for Assad. “My blood type is Bashar,” Ahmed al-Ali, a restaurant worker from Aleppo told the Times. “I eat bread Bashar brings to Syria. Every country has mistakes.

By Chelsea Sheasley, Staff writer / May 28, 2014

Clinching months of tactical victories for the Syrian regime, next week’s presidential election kicks off today with advance voting for Syrians living overseas. 

Leading the ballot is President Bashar al-Assad, who has led the country through a three-year civil war that has killed an estimated 160,000 people, caused an exodus of 3 million, and displaced internally many more.

The official election date is June 3. International observers have criticized the vote as illegitimate and impossible to hold during a civil war, The New York Times reports.

Mr. Assad is seeking a third seven-year term after taking over from his father, Hafez, in 2000. Neither of his little-known opponents, Hassan el-Nuri and Maher al-Najjar, is considered to have any chance of winning. The United States and the Syrian opposition have dismissed the election as a sham which, analysts said, is apparently intended to impart a sense of legitimacy to a government that tolerated no real dissent before the uprising and has cracked down unrelentingly on its opponents since the first stirrings of revolt in March 2011.

That hasn’t slowed the momentum. Today thousands of Syrian exiles in Lebanon jammed the streets outside the Syrian embassy in Beirut to cast their ballot on the first day of expatriate voting. Most of those gathered said they were voting for Assad. “My blood type is Bashar,” Ahmed al-Ali, a restaurant worker from Aleppo told the Times. “I eat bread Bashar brings to Syria. Every country has mistakes.

By Alice Fordham – NPR NEWS 

The Beirut Holiday Inn rises behind the man who built it, Abdal Mohsin Kattan in 1975. The Holiday Inn was one of the leading hotels in Beirut at a time when it was the most glamorous city in the Middle East. But when the Lebanese civil war broke out in 1975, the hotel was fiercely contested by rival militias. Lebanese are still debating what to do with the building. Thomas J. Abercrombie/National Geographic/Getty Images

To check into Beirut’s Holiday Inn these days, you need a permit from the army and the stamina to climb 26 flights of decaying stairs to the concrete carcass of a restaurant at the top that used to rotate.

This towering edifice may not look it today, but it was once the toast of Beirut, the most glamorous city in the Middle East before the 1975-90 civil war turned the Lebanese capital into a byword for urban dystopia.

Unlike the U.S., where the Holiday Inn chain has a reputation for value, the one that opened in Beirut in the early 1970s quickly joined other upscale landmarks in the city, which lured the rich and powerful from throughout the Middle East and Europe.

Millionaires would sail their yachts through the shimmering Mediterranean waters and dock at the St. Georges Yacht Club. At the hotel, they would sip fine wines in a luxurious French restaurant. The chandeliers sparkled in the wedding hall. There were velvet seats in the cinema next door.

Now, standing at the bottom and craning your neck up, you’re confronted with a ravaged, pockmarked shell of a building.

Lebanese Maronite patriarch visits Holly Land, first since 1948 to welcome Pope Francis

Cardinal Patriarch Rai said Monday that his journey is celebrating the roots of Christianity in the region. In a veiled response to his critics, he says he was misunderstood and that his journey is purely spiritual. He was cheered by several dozen faithful as he arrived at a Maronite parish in Jaffa, today part of Israel’s second largest city, Tel Aviv.

On Monday morning, Rai left Jerusalem, visiting a monastery outside the city on his way to Jaffa. He is to join the pope again in the afternoon for Mass at Jerusalem’s Cenacle, the room where Christians believe the Last Supper was held.

Francis’ trip ends Monday, but Rai’s will continue. He is scheduled Tuesday to return to the West Bank for a visit to Beit Sahour and is slated to return to Israel Wednesday and Thursday, touring the north, including the Galilee region, Nazareth, Acre and Haifa, where many of the country’s Arab Christian minority live.

He will celebrate Mass with the Lebanese community living in Israel and is slated to return to Lebanon via Jordan Thursday.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rai (C) visits the Latrun Monastery, near Jerusalem May 26, 2014. Rai joined the Pope Francis on his tour of the Holy Land, drawing criticism in Lebanon which remains in a formal state of war with its southern neighbor Israel. REUTERS/Nir Kafri

Pope continues historic visit in the Holy Land

Pope at Yad Vashem: Never again, Lord, never again!

Pope Francis offers prayers at Israeli separation wall in Bethlehem

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) – Arriving at Israel’s Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv, Pope Francis was greeted by Peres and by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The pope repeated his invitation to Peres using exactly the same words with which he had invited Abbas. He also urged Israel to stay on the "path of dialogue, reconciliation and peace," saying "there is simply no other way. Starvation never takes a vacation —

"The right of the state of Israel to exist and to flourish in peace and security within internationally recognized borders must be universally recognized," the pope said. "At the same time, there must also be a recognition of the right of the Palestinian people to a sovereign homeland and their right to live with dignity and with freedom of movement." Pope Francis likewise condemned the previous day’s shootings at the Jewish Museum in Brussels, where three people, including two Israeli citizens, were killed.
 

  The Pope’s three-day visit to Jordan and the Holy Land was under threat of being overshadowed by fears for his safety as he prepared to begin his programme in Amman. In keeping with his determination to meet ordinary people, the Jesuit Pope has refused to travel in bullet-proof vehicles during the visit to Amman, […]

  Telecoms Minister Boutros Harb Friday unveiled Lebanon’s first unlimited broadband Internet plan, while cutting prices and increasing speeds on existing DSL services. Harb said the price of the new 2 Mbps, unlimited download plan would be LL75,000. Previously, for LL75,000, consumers could get a 2 Mbps plan with a 20 gigabyte data limit, paying LL6,000 […]

khazen.org Thanks Lebanese President Michel Sleiman for unique and outstanding Leadership. Presient Sleiman keept Lebanon Strong and Safe under his mandate while the region around Lebanon is boiling.

Lebanon will Miss you! 

(Reuters) – Outgoing Lebanese President Michel Suleiman said on Saturday that dialogue was the only way to overcome deep divisions in the country, which is struggling to cope with political and security spillover from Syria’s civil war.

Suleiman made his remarks during his farewell speech hours before his six-year term ends and two days after parliament failed for the fifth time to choose a successor. The impasse highlights the stark political divisions in the country.

With his departure, Lebanon enters a presidential vacancy with no clear sign when it will end.

BEIRUT: Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt said Saturday that he would miss the political approach of outgoing President Michel Sleiman.

“We will miss President Sleiman and the political line he established,” Jumblatt said during the farewell ceremony for the president.

Prior to the ceremony, Sleiman presented Jumblatt with the National Order of the Cedar Medal “in appreciation for his national role and political moderation and his call for dialogue among political rivals.”

Sleiman expressed hope that the PSP leader would continue to play such role “to preserve the political stability in the country.”

Both Sleiman and Jumblatt classify themselves as centrists amid the sharp political divisions in the country, mainly between the March 8 and March 14 camps

  Lebanese Prime Minister Tammam Salam sought Saudi Arabia’s help on Tuesday to deal with the influx of Syrian refugees into his country during his meeting with Crown Prince Salman, deputy premier and minister of defense. “We have discussed crises faced by the Lebanese government, including the influx of Syrian refugees and the impact of […]

  Lack of a breakthrough in Lebanon’s presidential election was a foregone conclusion ahead of a parliamentary vote scheduled for Thursday with a majority of March 8 lawmakers pledging to boycott the session again. The lack of quorum will bring Lebanon ever closer to presidential vacuum as President Michel Sleiman’s term ends Sunday.   But despite […]