Beirut, Jan 14 (DPA) The slogan ‘I love life’ is currently covering billboards around the Lebanese capital as the government and the opposition compete over who loves life and Lebanon more. It is a campaign used by the March 14 Coalition and has been countered by slogans from the opposition that read: ‘We love life without debt or outside interferences.’The billboards represent the competition between Lebanon’s government and its allies, and the opposition to show their love for Lebanon.’We love life with pride,’ reads a billboard for the Lebanese Shia movement Hezbollah. A few metres away, a large billboard pasted up by the forces that support the government of Premier Fouad Seniora says: ‘We want to live. We love life.’
Since Christmas, red-and-white posters were pasted up around Beirut proclaiming ‘I love life’ in Arabic, English and French in an apparent reaction to Hezbollah’s culture of martyrdom. ‘There is a group in Lebanon who advocate death and love war and they put the idea of military confrontation above any other consideration,’ said a follower of the government. ‘We are telling them not all the Lebanese back your views and we love to live.’ Said Hezbollah’s Zuheir Safieddine: ‘This is silly. The government forces think only they love Lebanon and they love life, but we tell them we love Lebanon to be free from political, social, financial debt.’Opposition follower George Aoun remarked: ‘We tell them (the government forces) that advertising never bought the trust of the people. Go invest in building constitutions and show goodwill in boosting the economic cycle.’
However, the billboards have angered some Lebanese who consider themselves neutral in the political crisis dividing the country. They criticise both sides for pulling the country into civil strife. One such critic is Najwa Baydoun, a Lebanese social worker.’Who are they (opposition and government forces) kidding? Human minds can be limited and blind sometimes, but they should not use the word ‘love’ in their political war,’ said Baydoun.
By Michael Hirst in Beirut, Sunday Telegraph, Talking politics is normally a favourite pastime in Lebanon. But after a summer of war and an autumn of government in deadlock, Beirut’s shops, cafes and barbers have drawn a line under the heated national dialogue by banning all talk of current affairs on their premises
الإنفراج على صعيد الأزمة الحكومية لأنه حريص على الأمانة التي أولاه إياها الدستور اللبناني وهذه الأمانة تخوله الرجوع إلى الدستور في كلّ خَطوة يخطوها مما يجري فضلاً عن قلقه على الأوضاع الإقتصادية والمعيشية التي تطاول كلّ المواطنين بلا إستثناء. 
BAGHDAD, Dec. 30 (Xinhua) — Iraq’s ousted president Saddam Hussein was defiant and calm, refusing to have a hood pulled over his head while he was led the gallows shortly after 6 a.m. (0300GMT) on Saturday. Iraqi state-run television, al-Iraqia, released videotape of Saddam final moments before execution. The video showed Saddam, wearing a white shirt without a tie and a dark overcoat, being led to the gallows with a calm and defiant face and was chatting with his two masked hangmen who placed the noose around his neck. The Iraqi television later showed footage of Saddam in a white shroud lying with his neck twisted to one side at an awkward angle, with what appeared to be blood or a bruise on his left cheek. Before the rope was put around his neck, Saddam shouted: "God is the greatest. Long live the nation and Palestine is Arab," Sami al-Askari, the political adviser to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, told the Iraqi channel. The execution took place at an Iraqi army base in Kadhimiya, once was Saddam’s main military intelligence headquarters. 
By Maroun Khoury, Daily Star, BKIRKI: Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Butros Sfeir said Thursday that the protests currently taking place in Lebanon can very easily engender chaos. Speaking during a meeting with a delegation of residents from the Bekaa regions of Baalbek and Deir al-Ahmar, Sfeir said that "protests like these are unfortunately allowed in Lebanon and if we look around us, we can see none of the countries allow their citizens to do what the Lebanese are doing these days." 
The New York Times, By HASSAN M. FATTAH, BEIRUT, Lebanon, Dec. 28 
By MARIA SANMINIATELLI, Associated Press Writer, VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI marked Christmas with a call for an end to violence around the world and urged people everywhere not to lose sight of their need for God in an age of technological marvels. 
BEIRUT, Lebanon: A Lebanese judge filed charges Wednesday against three journalists accused of breaking into the Beirut apartment of a witness in the assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri, a judicial official said.Investigating Judge Elias Eid filed the charges against reporter Firas Hatoum, who works with the local New-TV station, as well as a cameraman and assistant, for breaking into and "tampering with criminal evidence" at the apartment of Mohammed Zuhair Siddiq, who is wanted in Lebanon in connection with the Feb. 2005 assassination of Hariri.
