The strong parents are still keeping up the faith

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Parents of Lebanese prisoners in Syrian jails demonstrating in front of the ESCWA house of the United Nations in downtown Beirut.

For over three weeks now the parents of the Lebanese detainees in Syrians jails have been camping outside the UN house in Beirut. The large ESCWA building has been the scene for this painful side of the problem between the Syrian regime and the Lebanese common people.

All the parents have got news about their sons from different sources through the years.

They have got news from former prisoners; they have documents from the Syrian regime and from the Syrian jails. Some of them have even seen their sons inside the jails.

The Syrian and the Lebanese regimes has for the last 15 years been saying that there are no Lebanese prisoners in Syrian jails. During those 15 years we have seen some Lebanese men getting out of the Syrian jails and some being sent to their families in boxes.

Still today we have around 200 Lebanese men with facts about their fate being hold inside the Syrian prisons with everything this word can mean. The bad conditions of those jails are horrible and torture is something as common as eating and drinking.

S.o.l.i.d.e. and S.o.l.i.d.a. are the twin organisations working the most for those people.

The head of S.o.l.i.d.e, Mr. Ghazi ´ad is very active in this issue and he is sleeping in the tents with the parents. It is worth mentioning that he is paralyzed and I sitting on a wheel chair. 

The new established coalition for resolution 1559 went to those people to show them their support for their cause last week in a car convoy of nearly 30 cars. This new coalition is made by many smaller organizations coming together for this purpose.

Last week, the Syrian interior minister said that there were no Lebanese in the jails but there were some Lebanese terrorists in Syrian jails. This move is very diplomatic and he could later show us that there were all the time Lebanese in their jails but they were classified as terrorists. Anyway, I think no matter what they call them, the most important thing for those poor parents is to have their sons back home.

Let us keep fighting for our sons and sometimes daughters in the jails for their quick return to the mother land and to the arms of their crying mothers and the waiting fathers.

Like my friend Daoud Aoun who has a son in the Syrian prison told me: My faith is big and it will only die when I die. We will continue to fight until we see our sons in our arms.

Daoud´s son was taken 23 years ago when he was 15 years old.

Daoud is standing now in front of the UN building with a picture in his hand and a tear in his eye. Everyone that listen to his story start to cry and he end up his story with the sad words:

¨kharaboule baite, bi kaffe ba`a¨, meaning: They have destroyed my house, it is enough now.