New Year's Fever

Chatah Car Bombing 1

This new year I hoped and pleaded with the spirits that be that the new year will start and end with safety and sanity.

That the year wouldn't burn like a sickness.

On December 27, 2013 my uncle, a politician in Lebanon on the March 14 camp was killed by an explosive car bomb.

On January 2, 2014 a car bomb was detonated in the Haret Hreik, a predominantly Shiite area known to be home of Al Manar the March 8th camps leading news agency.

Haret Hreik Car Bombing 1

Lebanon's divisions have always been cause for conflict, but now it seems like the need to ignite these differences into full blown civil war is of far more interest than urging stability.

It's unclear who is behind the bloodshed. Some argue Syria planted the bomb that killed my uncle, Mohamad Chatah, and that the attacks in Haret Hreik were a reactionary response by radicalized Sunni Muslims in the country and in Syria. Others argue it was fundamentalists that did both attacks. Either side doesn't have enough evidence to place responsibility in the hands of those criminals who committed the crimes.

Haret Hreik Car Bombing 2

Receiving justice for the crimes committed against the Lebanese people whether they are March 8 or 14 is tough and the population has little control over the outcomes. Lebanon can't even form a collaborative government shared by all the sects in the country as the sects are adamantly divided on how to respond to the Syrian crisis.

This is what the new year brought us Lebanese. The gift of war which tastes bitter and salty like blood.

I want to say NO! to this sickness. But where does one person draw the line when the pencil is flat and needs sharpening? How do millions draw parallel lines when there aren't enough pencils for all? What happens when colors matter and gray is simply not enough?

Chatah Car Bombing 2

I pencil my way to trying to make sense of old and new wounds that scab and scar. So little can be said about writing when all it amounts to is another voice in a crowd of the unheard.

Its a bad start for the new year!

"It's Christmas. C'est Noel

This is one of the French-English Christmas songs sung during Christmas time in Lebanon.

Nothing about this country is singular. Even Christmas songs speak three languages. I know that singularity is a false precept, but Lebanon embellishes in its diversity.

The price is high: 

1. Christians in this country have a deep seeded fear Muslims will force them out of the region hence making the christian population in Lebanon null. This was one of the major causes of the Lebanese Civil-War. 
2. Sunni Muslims are feeling threatened by the Shiite population and its unnerving support of the Syrian regime which the Sunni's argue has stifled the economy and imperialised the Lebanese people for years. Not to forget that the hostilities between Hizballah's weapons and the Sunni's demand for a liberal economy creates clashes between the two sects. (Syria and Iran support Hizballah's anti-Israel efforts.) Christians are split between the two Muslim sects: Shiites and Sunnis. Both of which are from the same religion. 
3. Druze, Allawites, Armenians, Kurds, Leftists and Independents are all divided along the Sunni/Shiite divide. 

The country is in an utter stalemate. There is no government, because as the Syrians wage war on their people the Lebanese are divided between waging war and disavowing the Syrian government. 

Hizballah doesn't want to take part in a government that has members who are hostile to its Syrian efforts. This may result in a need for compromises they aren't willing to make. With a stalemate they can act as they please without the voice of the opposition claiming there demands. 

Sunni's and there supporters are not willing to form a government with a military force separate from that of the nations waging war in another country. 

Both realize that if a government were formed than the fighting in Syria might be spilled over into Lebanon with Hizballahs actions already creating tensions in the country.

Hizballah has already threatened the Future Movement (the Sunni bloc) with war as the Sunni leaders are not quiet about there disapproval. 

Hizballah has lost a lot of support in the region. 

All in all its a mess in Lebanon! 

In light of the Christmas Spirit, I thought now would be the right time for a little: 

falll all llalll alll la.. la.. la.. And maybe after that some peace.

Beginnings

There are so many things to begin writing about. I could start with my humble beginnings as the Saudi born Lebanese daughter of a Syrian mother. Or I could start with the fact that I am a naturalized Muslim American returning to America after over ten years of living in Lebanon. But even though those things are a part of what constitutes this blog, I want to begin with something else.