AYYAD AMMAR moved among the rescuers clawing through the ruins of a Beirut apartment block yesterday morning, holding up a photograph of his 14-year-old grandson and asking if anyone had seen the boy.
Ahmed Kanj had gone to play computer war games in the internet café at the foot of the seven-story building minutes before an Israeli missile struck.
A fireman told the old man finally that he had found the teenager’s broken body at daybreak. Mr Ammar bowed his head and began to weep as the crowd around him swore vengeance against Israel for the massacre on Hajjaj Street. The walking wounded and families searching for missing relatives began chanting the name of Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader, even though most who live here support Amal, a rival Shia group.
Diaa el-Husseini, 34, a market trader, who lived in the adjoining tower block, said: “We thought we were safe here so we stayed. We are not fighters. We are families who only want a peaceful life, but Israel wants to terrorize us all into leaving the southern suburbs of Beirut. Today we all feel part of the Hezbollah resistance.”
If Israel thought that by slowly strangling the life out of the Lebanese capital, by blockading it from land, sea and air, it would turn Christians against their Muslim neighbors it appears to have miscalculated. The tragedy on Hajjaj Street, which killed at least 31 and wounded 60, was Beirut’s single biggest loss of life since the war began, bringing the total to more than 1,000. It hardened the public mood. Even those in the Christian half of the capital, who were beginning to call for a ceasefire at any price, spoke yesterday of their disgust at what Israeli warplanes were doing to their city.
George Serrin, 42, a businessman, has no love for Sheikh Nasrallah and his militia, but said: “Of course I care for my family’s safety and want this war over now. But I am sickened at the needless ruination done to my city, our city.”
The blockades, fuel rationing, rising prices, power cuts and shortages in the shops affect all Beirut’s citizens.
There is a conviction shared by every community that Israel’s agenda is not solely to crush Hezbollah but to dismantle Lebanon, and particularly Beirut, just as the capital was starting to enjoy an economic and political renaissance.
...there's more
Duh! You bomb innocent citizens and ruin their country, what does Israel expect? A thank you?
Israel has always had a problem with the Arab/Muslim world since it's inception as a nation, but what they are doing today is only forcing more and more Muslims into the arms of "the enemy."
Israeli policy today is making the world see them, more and more, as the enemy of peace and as the Nazis of the Middle East.
No comments:
Post a Comment