A1 Team Lebanon brought its national flag-liveried car home in eleventh place at Estoril, Portugal today, the best finish for the team so far in this inaugural A1 Grand Prix series.  It was the first A1 Grand Prix race start for driver, Basil Shaaban, while team mate Khalil Beschir supported Lebanon from the Al Jazeera commentary booth, assisting with the live broadcast to the Arab world. In the first race Shaaban started from 23rd place and by the end of the first lap had improved to 18th .and gained two further positions to run much of the race in 16th place. As the 18 lap race reached its closing stages Shaaban came under pressure from 17th placed A1 Team Austria and in the ensuing battle Shaaban used all his skills and the PowerBoost button to keep the Austrian at bay until being pushed wide and into the gravel, losing two places and finishing 18th .

The second race for A1 Team Lebanon, with a standing start, saw numerous track incidents which brought out the safety car a number of times. Many teams opted to take early pit stops, but Lebanon stayed out on track and made positions. Shaaban steadily progressed through the field from his 18th place start to be running within the top ten at mid distance, with a highest position of fourth before the team brought its Lebanese driver in for the tyre change pitstop. Shaaban rejoined in 13th and once again drove consistently moving through the field, and finally crossed the finish line just outside the points in 11th place.

JACKSONVILLE – Every day on her way to work, Ruthann Bland drives alongside the column of pear trees, past the memorial and its solitary bronze Marine.Every day, she remembers her husband, the pictures on the television and the knock at the door.A 58-year-old Hubert resident, Bland lost her husband, Lance Cpl. Stephen Bland, on Oct. 23, 1983, a truck packed with explosives crashed through a barricade, past a sentry post and into the lobby of a Marine compound – 241 U.S. troops were killed, most of them Marines and sailors from 1st Battalion, 8th Marines. Stephen Bland was one of them."I was actually asleep, and I got a phone call," Ruthann Bland said. "It was my neighbor across the street asking me how my husband was. She said to go turn the TV on. That’s when I saw the building had been bombed."It was days before she was told her husband had died in the blast. "The whole time I’m thinking, I just got a letter from my husband," she said. "I’m really optimistic that it’s not him. I got the knock on the door, I was totally blown away."The bombing that killed Bland’s husband and his comrades remains the worst terrorist attack against Americans on foreign soil. Here in Jacksonville, it’s nearly impossible to forget about the Beirut tragedy. The pear trees lining N.C. 24 represent the lives lost, and a somber memorial sits close to the Camp Johnson gate.

By Barry Schweid, Associated Press  |  October 22, 2005 WASHINGTON — President Bush yesterday said the UN should deal quickly and seriously with a report implicating Syria in the assassination of Lebanon’s former prime minister, a killing that led to protests and the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon after nearly 30 years as overlord.”The report strongly suggests that the politically motivated assassination could not have taken place without Syrian involvement," Bush said.In Damascus, Syrian leaders dismissed the findings and the government of President Bashar Assad prepared to fight growing Western sentiment to punish it with economic sanctions.Imad Moustapha, Syrian ambassador to the United States, said the report was baseless and the Bush administration was motivated by Syria’s opposition to the war in Iraq.He said of the report, in Washington, ”It will only help fuel anti-American sentiment around the world."The report was likely to worsen the divisions between Lebanon’s pro- and anti-Syrian groups. Syria’s opponents in Lebanon welcomed the findings as the long-awaited truth about the assassination and about Syrian interference in Lebanese affairs. Pro-Syrian politicians vigorously criticized the findings.The United Nations investigative report, which Bush called ”deeply disturbing," made a link between high-ranking Syrian officials and their Lebanese allies in the car bombing that killed Rafik Hariri and 20 others in February.

 UNITED NATIONS Oct 20, 2005