KHAZEN.ORG congratulates our President Michel Suleiman for Lebanese independence, Keeping Lebanon safe and Strong under his leadership.
(The Daily Star Lebanon ) BEIRUT: The Lebanese celebrate Friday the 70th anniversary of Lebanon’s independence from France despite growing fears that their country is rapidly drifting into Iraq-style sectarian violence and turning into a battleground for Syria’s war, now in its 33rd month.
President Michel Sleiman said Thursday that the latest spate of bombings, including the attack on the Iranian Embassy, have confirmed the threat of “strife and imported terrorism” as he implicitly lashed out at Hezbollah over its military intervention in Syria.
“A state of independence cannot be established if Lebanese parties or groups decide to be independent from the logic of the state, or if they accept to depart from the national consensus by deciding to cross the border and get involved in an armed conflict on the land of a brotherly state, thus exposing national unity and civil peace to danger,” the Lebanese president said in a televised speech on the eve of Independence Day.
We cannot talk about independence if the state fails to spread its sole authority over all national territory, crack down on security … violations, fight takfiri [groups] and terrorism, and unless the armed forces are the sole holders of weapons and the organizer of defense capabilities under the supervision of the political authority,” Sleiman said.
Th president added that the divisive issue of Hezbollah’s arms was a barrier to national accord. He recalled that he had presented a plan for a national defense strategy during a National Dialogue session last year that would place Hezbollah’s arms under the command of the Army.
“The problem of [Hezbollah’s] arms is an obstacle to the march of national accord unless the mission of these arms and its relationship to legitimate authorities and the government is clarified.”
Sleiman said that it was difficult to talk about the country’s independence in light of the failure to hold parliamentary elections, form a new Cabinet and for the rival factions to sit down again at the Dialogue table, and if next year’s presidential elections are not held on time.
Sleiman, whose six-year term in office expires in May 2014, urged rival political leaders not to let the country fall into a vacuum, citing controversial extension of the mandate of Parliament and the caretaker Cabinet.
“The months separating us from the presidential election should not be months for waiting and marking time, but rather for political action, dialogue and decision,” he said.
Sleiman reiterated his call for all the rival factions to adhere to the Baabda Declaration “in order to protect Lebanon from the negative repercussions of regional crises.”
In a clear reference to Hezbollah’s involvement in the Syrian fighting, he called for an “immediate withdrawal from the ongoing conflict in Syria.”
He also called for the approval of “a new, fair and modern election law.”
Separately, Army commander Gen. Jean Kahwagi pledged to fight terrorism threatening Lebanon as a result of the spillover of the Syrian war.
“We shall persist in confronting the Israeli enemy with all of its spying networks and greed, just as we will be fighting terrorism in its different forms, and hunting down every perpetrator attempting to tamper with our unity,” Kahwagi said in his Order of the Day to the military on Independence Day.
He also vowed to protect the National Pact of Muslim-Christian coexistence, saying there is no legitimacy for any authority contradicting the pact.
“It is our destiny and choice to preserve and safeguard this pact. We are investing efforts to solve our crises through this pact and not by looking for solutions elsewhere that will lead us to the unknown,” Kahwagi said.
Meanwhile, Berri warned that Lebanon was slipping into dark days similar to those of the 1975-90 Civil War. He renewed his call for the formation of a new Cabinet and for the rival factions to return to National Dialogue with the aim of resolving the monthslong political crisis.
In a speech delivered on his behalf by MP Ali Bazzi, at the opening of a photo and document exhibition in Parliament on Independence Day, Berri said: “The situation today is similar to that of 1976 when darkness engulfed our country … The nation is turning into an arena to settle Arab, regional and international scores.”
“Citizens have become subjects of tests in the laboratory of the game of nations. Our only hope hangs by the thin thread of our open dialogue and a road map to discuss all divisive issues, leaving behind our interests, slogans, and feelings as we look to the future in a responsible manner,” he added.
“On Independence Day, I affirm that Lebanon at this moment needs to form a government, draft an electoral law and to reach the presidential elections in unity,” Berri said. “It also needs a national decision to strengthen the Army in personnel and equipment, and [for us] to learn from the lessons of the past so we won’t fall victims of sectarian strife once again.”
(The Daily Star :: Lebanon News :: http://www.dailystar.com.lb)
Dear Lebanon: An Open Letter from Tom Fletcher UK Ambassador to Lebanon
November 21, 2013
This post is also available in: Arabic
Tomorrow I’ll hand a letter from Prime Minister Cameron to President Sleiman, with formal congratulations on Lebanon’s 70th anniversary.
The wonderful people at Rag Mag also asked me to write an open letter to mark the day. This is a tough and precarious assignment, and it will annoy or anger some people. But I’ve had a try, as I think this is an important moment for reflection.
I hope others will consider writing letters of their own.
Dear Lebanon,
I wanted to write to say Happy 70th birthday.
I know that in reality you have been around thousands of years, and were trading and writing long before my ancestors. But that moment of your birth in November 1943 was special, different – you took your first steps as a new nation founded on uniting principles rather than lines of division.
I’m proud that my predecessor, Edward Spears, was there to support that, and that we believed as strongly then as now in the idea of Lebanon.
The thing is, Lebanon, do you still believe in that idea? This is a question only you can answer. Without doubt, it has been a bumpy seven decades, with troublesome teenage years and plenty of midlife crises, to put it mildly.
You now face another tough year, and rising anxiety that regional rifts can drive you apart once again. We have been reminded this week that there are plenty of people who want that to happen.
I hope that you’ll forgive a bit of feedback, from one of your admirers.
You’re so much better than you admit. Look back at those seventy years. Your writers, musicians, thinkers and businesspeople have conquered the world again and again.
Your mountains, valleys and coasts are the envy of all of us. You have an extraordinary unquenchable spirit. You have found a way to move on from a devastating civil war, almost as though it never happened.
You are the world’s best networkers, in a century that will be run by networks. You are also the most exceptional hosts, not just to ambassadors but also to the hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees who have arrived in the last two years.
Whatever your religion, there are few more beautiful sounds than the intermingling of the call to prayer and church bells. Every day I meet extraordinary Lebanese people doing great things against the odds.
So, let’s be clear, I’m a fan.
But I’m also frustrated, and I know that many of you are.
Your politics are dynamic on the surface. Yet broken and paralysed beneath it. You talk of unity. Yet often say things like ‘Lebanon would be wonderful if it wasn’t for the Lebanese’, ‘it will always be like this – this is Lebanon’, or ‘they (insert different group) are just too different’.
You have an impressive ability to absorb hardships such as power cuts. Yet you rarely confront the causes of them. You invest more than any country in the education of your youth. Yet they feel excluded from changing the country for the better. You have been a beacon for women’s rights.
Yet only elect a tiny handful to parliament. You were the first country in the region to stand up against dictatorship and tyranny in the 21st century Middle East. Yet your voice in calling for your own rights and those of others seems to have fallen silent, and in too many cases been silenced.
So here’s some unsolicited advice.
First and most important, start ignoring advice from outsiders, including me: this is your country.
Second, celebrate the success that is all around you – yes, the talented and inspirational athletes, thinkers, explorers and activists. But also the grafters who tell me on the school run, in the street, shops, schools or hospitals – ‘this is our country, we share it, and carrying on our lives is the best response to violence and division’.
Third, why not use this 70th anniversary of independence to remember what independence meant and should still mean – that you’ll prioritise national interests, Lebanese interests, over those of foreign patrons? And demand that your leaders do too?
Fourth, maybe it is time to renew those marriage vows, to spend a moment reflecting on what you admire rather than what infuriates you about each other. You’re stuck together I’m afraid, for richer or poorer, for better or for worse.
Finally, don’t forget your collective strengths. You may have difficult neighbours and a tendency to fatalism. But your location and diversity put you at the hub between continents and cultures. Your history gives you a resilience and free spirit that others in the region would die for, and are dying for.
Many of us are rooting for you. The UK is doubling trade, increasing tenfold our support to the army’s stabilisation effort, and running our largest ever humanitarian effort to help you cope with the refugee influx. The Security Council, far from fighting their battles here, have come together repeatedly to prioritise your stability, and to provide peacekeepers, aid, political support.
For many of us you’re too important, and too special, to let fail. If coexistence proves impossible in Lebanon, how can we be confident that it will work elsewhere?
I’m still buying shares in Lebanon 2020. All I encourage, humbly, is that you do too.
You’re at a moment of jeopardy. 70 is too young for a country to retire. You can’t just botox away the cracks. Whether you make it to 75 depends on whether you can find a way to regroup, to focus again on what unites rather than divides you.
That is not something that you can leave to outsiders. You have to decide whether you’re on the side of those who are fighting over Lebanon. Or with those who are fighting for it.
Happy Birthday. Happy Independence Day. Happy One Lebanon Day. Mabrouk, bon courage, and solidarity.
Yours affectionately,
Tom
Tags: 1943, army, birthday, David Cameron, Dear Lebanon: An Open Letter, General Spears, independence, Leb2020, lebanon, London, Michel Sleiman, President, stability, Syria, uk
