October 13/06

The destructive and satanic role played with extreme insolence by the Syrian Baath regime is hidden to no one, as it continues directly and through Hezbollah and its allies the fundamentalist Palestinian and Lebanese militias, and in total harmony with opportunistic groups which never acknowledged or believed in Lebanon as an independent entity and in its distinct identity. This Baathist-Fundamentalist -Opportunist, bug has spread regrettably like cancer throughout our Lebanese communities and regions.

Old and new Syrian-made puppets in Lebanon continue to trade demagogy and spread incitement, profiting from people’s economic needs and the absence of the state's law and order. Thanks to the Iranian petro dollars, their consciences are numbed, and their bank accounts and pockets inflated.

They only care for their positions, personal interests, and greed. They are nothing but robots and dirty instruments bent on Lebanon's destabilization, blocking the return of peace and order to its people, aborting the mission of the international forces and the UN security council (UNSC) resolutions, in particular resolution 1701. They are hired by the axis of evil nations and organizations to keep our homeland, the land of the Cedars, an arena and a backyard for “The Wars of the Others”, a base for chaos and a breeding culture for hatred, terrorism, hostility and fundamentalism.

In this hellish context come the Syrian president's statements to the Spanish “El Pais” newspaper on September 30, 2006, and to the Kuwaiti "Al Anbaa" newspaper on September 7, 2006, where he boldly interfered in Lebanese internal affairs, and challenged the nations of the Free World, the Security Council and the Free Lebanese. He declared with no shame that no international force can inhibit the arms smuggling to Hezbollah through his country's borders with Lebanon. He stated: “Neither UN resolutions, nor all the technology of all the armies of the world, can hinder this operation.”

President Assad was joined on Monday, October 3/06 by Hezbollah’s commander of Lebanon's southern region, Sheikh Nabil Kawouk, who declared: “The Islamic Resistance Jihadists remain armed in the villages of confrontation facing the Israeli border just as they were before July 12, 2006. He added: “The enemy has
used in his last battle all weapons and surprises, but in return, we, the resistance did not expose all our military surprises because we were in a position of strength”.

Hezbollah's Secretary General, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah confirmed during his “Godly victory” celebration, that his group's arsenal has doubled and that he now
possesses 20,000 missiles, and that he will only surrender this arsenal to a “Resistance State”, i.e., a “Jihadist State”, effectively headed by him.

Based on the aftermath of the last Israel-Hezbollah war of devastation, activist Lebanese both back home and in the Diaspora take the following positions:

Any Lebanese group, regardless of its political or ethnic affiliation and irrespective of its size and influence, that tries to benefit from despicable alliances while ignoring the core of the problem, namely the continuation of Hezbollah's state-within-the-state program, its holding on to its illegal weapons and the impending dangers they present to the nation, the principle of democratic coexistence, and freedom of belief, is a partner in the conspiracy against the Lebanese.

Any group that sabotages the deployment of the international forces of deterrence on the Syrian-Lebanese borders, whose mission is to inhibit the flow of arms and terrorists to the fundamentalist and terrorist organizations in Lebanon, is a partner in the conspiracy against the Lebanese.

Any group that links the disposition of Hezbollah’s weapons with a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict and its derivatives, including the Palestinian camps' (located in Lebanon) weapons and international resolutions (194, 242, 338), is a partner in the conspiracy against Lebanon and the Lebanese, especially when such position does not rest on constant principle but evolves according to the whims of personal interests and shoddy ambitions. The travesty of conditioning the disarmament of Hizbollah to the rise of a strong Lebanese state is ridiculous. The goals of those who advocate such an equation are clear, for how could a strong state rise in the midst of mini-states, private security zones, open porous borders, and the influx of illegal arms and anarchy.

Any group that fails to see that the international forces representing the will of a united international community is a lifeboat with which to bring an end to this old and bitter conflict that brought barbaric attacks against Lebanon, its demographics and identity since 1975, is a partner in the conspiracy against the Lebanese.

All those who oppose the classification of the mission of international forces under chapter seven of the UN Charter and who claim that they are forces of occupation and hegemony are compromisers and weak. The Lebanese people will have no mercy on them and history will trash them in its dustbin.

All those who trade with the rights of the Christians are living an illusion if they believe that their society in Lebanon and the Diaspora is naïve, amnesiac or unaware of the unfolding of events. Those who think they can manipulate the Christians' fears and suffering through speeches and assemblies and by opening past issues and wounds are fantasizing politicians who resort to the language of ethnic rights and religious incitement only to slide from the back door to their false banners of secularism and emancipation.

Any group that is not serious in its demand for a just election law compatible with the background and rights of each and every Lebanese community is a partner in
the conspiracy against Lebanon and the Lebanese. This point is the scale on which to judge the honesty of all participants in the nation's affairs.

Meanwhile, we were not surprised with the denial of the Syrian regime, a couple days ago, of the existence of Lebanese prisoners in its jails. We are used to this inhumane and immoral style. But what saddened and shocked us was the silence of those Lebanese leaders and parties who were part of the Sovereignty current, but who in their pursuit of personal gains, changed their skin and negated promises.

What truly saddens us is the continuing suffering of our refugees in Israel since 2000 despite all the recent developments. This is due to the stark servitude of those Lebanese Leaders and politicians on whom we held our hopes for a courageous resolution to this humane problem. Instead, they shed their responsibilities and voided the cause from its humane content, and furthermore, in order to satisfy their alliances with fundamentalists and radicals, they betrayed their own people and the cause of Lebanon by agreeing to label our heroic southern refugees as criminals. Our refugees in Israel are the ultimate Lebanese patriots who did no wrong, but who simply suffered for 30 years trying to defend their land, their homes, their children and their dignity against Syria and the hordes of Islamic fundamentalists,
outlaw Palestinian militias, and even renegade battalions of the Lebanese Army itself that seceded from the government to fight alongside the outlaw organizations and militias against Lebanon, the Lebanese State and the Lebanese people.

On October 13, 1990 the Syrian Army savagely invaded the last remaining free regions of Lebanon, killed and mutilated hundreds of Lebanese soldiers and innocent citizens in cold blooded murder, kidnapped tens of soldiers, officers, clergymen, politicians and citizens, sent the legitimate government into exile and erected a subservient and puppet government. Since then, we commemorate the painful event each year on October 13.

In this year's commemoration for the passing and disappearance of hundreds of our people, civilian, military, and religious personnel who gladly sacrified themselves on Lebanon’s altar in defense of freedom, dignity and identity, we raise our prayers for the rest of their souls and for the safe return of all our prisoners held arbitrarily in the dungeons of the Syrian Baath. We ask for consolation to all their families, hoping that their grand sacrifices were not in vain, now that prominent leaders and politicians of that era changed sides and joined the killers after the liberation of the country. Those Pharisees were in positions of responsibility to safeguard the nation and its dignity, and were entrusted to defend the identity, the homeland and the beliefs.

Our martyrs, the living and dead alike, must be rolling in anger in their graves and in the Syrian Baath dungeons as they witness these leaders today, upon whom they laid their hope, fall into the gutter of cheap politics. The leaders who reversed all their theses and slogans and joined the same powers that invaded the free Lebanon region on October 13, 1990. They forgot who they are and who their people are, and negated everything they advocated and lobbied for.

On October 13, on the sixteenth commemoration of the Syrian invasion to Lebanon's free regions, we shall pray for the souls of all those Lebanese comrades who
fell in the battles of confrontation, for all our citizens who are arbitrarily detained in Syria's notorious jails, for the safe and dignified return of our refugees from Israel, for the return of peace to the homeland, and for the repentance of Lebanon's leaders and politicians who for personal gains have turned against their own people, negated their declared convictions, downtrodden their freedom and liberation slogans, sided with the Syrian Baathists and forged an alliance with Hezbollah whose ultimate aim is to replicate the Iranian Mullahs' regime in Lebanon.
Long Live Freedom

*Elias Bejjani
Chairman for the Canadian Lebanese Coordinating Council (LCCC)
Human Rights activist, journalist & political commentator.
Spokesman for the Canadian Lebanese Human Rights Federation (CLHRF)
E.Mail phoenicia@hotmail.com
 LCCC Web Site http://www.10452lccc.com
CLHRF Website http://www.clhrf.com