The University of Joseph

As I drove through the mountains above Beirut this afternoon, I was reminded of a lecture I once received, back in 1992, on the geology of Lebanon. “This is a typical karstic landscape,” the professor told me. Nothing unusual about that, other than the fact that the professor was the founder of Hamas, Dr. Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, and he was telling me this outdoors, as we were walking in between makeshift tents, in the south of Lebanon. We were surrounded by grey rock formations, half covered by snow.

In December of 1992, Rantissi was deported by the Israeli authorities to southern Lebanon with another 416 Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives, and he emerged as the general spokesman of the expellees. They had been sleeping in these tents, without proper clothes or blankets, for a good two weeks then, and he was obviously cold. But that afternoon, as the sun came out, he gave me a very interesting lecture on the karstic features of the land that surrounded the tents.

Mind you, Rantissi was not a geologist; Geology wasn’t even his hobby. He was a pediatric, an MD, and taught parasitology and genetics at the Islamic University.

But he could tell me all about the karstic landscape of Lebanon. How it was formed, how these stone formation got their odd shapes and colors, etc. I asked him of course how he knew all that. “I learned this at the University of Joseph”.

I’m on the left, Rantissi on the right. I cannot remember the name of the man in the middle. Anyone? (The scarf was something they requested before the interview; it's a common request when interviewing people that have strong religious beliefs)

I was unfamiliar with that university, so he explained it to me.

The University of Joseph is a very interesting phenomenon; It only exists in Israeli jails, and you can only attend courses if you have been arrested (or held) by the Israeli authorities. It is a system set up by prisoners and goes as follows; once you are in jail, you are required to give a course. You must teach in your area of expertise. And it really doesn’t matter if you are a carpenter, a pediatrician, a car mechanic or a geologist. You must teach your fellow convicts something that they might be able to use, or just something that is interesting. In turn, other convicts will teach you also something about their area of expertise, and you must attend their lectures.

As Rantissi explained it to me, it is a system that helps take away the immense boredom and low moral of jail time. It keeps you busy, helps pass the time, keeps those minds going, and makes the most of your time ‘inside.’ He’d done a few stints already, he said, and had learned quite a bit about car mechanics in the meantime.

Since the Israelis had dumped the 200 something Palestinians into Lebanon - most of them well educated people - they had had a few courses. One of them was a geology professor from Bir Zeit University if I remember correctly, and he had lectured them on the karstic stone formations surrounding the tents.

The story ends there.

The deportees in the snow at prayer time.

Upon his return to Israel in 1993, Rantissi was arrested, but later released. Then in 2004 he was eventually blown up by the Israelis.

But every time I drive through the mountains, and see those stone formations, I am reminded of Dr. Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, the founder of Hamas.

Odd how some things stick. He told me the name was chosen because Joseph was also thrown in jail a number of times.

I only wondered later why they had chosen a Jewish person as the model for their university, but by then Rantissi was gone, and I never had the chance to ask him. Anyone?

(Update: Anonymous wrote "sourate 12 is untitled joseph....so muslims do not consider him as a jew" and Lebanessa wrote "Joeseph is a prophet in Islam as are Abraham, Moses etc etc." Well, that solves that mystery)

The Right of Return (to Nahr el-Bared)

I did a story on the ‘double refugees’ (first Palestine, now Nahr el-Bared) but you’d need to subscribe to my paper if you’d want to read that one.The mood has changed among the Palestinians the past two years. Before, when you’d ask what their ultimate goal was, you’d always receive the standard answer; ‘Return to Palestine.’ It was the magic credo, ‘The Right to Return’.

I am not sure what caused the change, but the past month it came up trice during conversations with Palestinians of Nahr el-Bared, Bedawi and Ain el-Heloue. They all just wanted to live in peace, and get on with a ‘normal’ life. If that would be a normal life in Lebanon, than so be it , they’d be satisfied with that. “I don’t care about going back to Palestine. If the government would give me papers that I could work and live outside the camp, I would be very happy. I wouldn’t want to go back", one of them said. Others mentioned (literally) “forget about this Right to Return. It’s never going to happen. We might as well make a real life here instead of waiting for the impossible.”

In the 15-something years that I have lived here, I have never heard a Palestinian say it. They may have thought it, but they never said out loud that it was a lost cause. Like it was a taboo. But we are looking at the fourth generation of refugees now. Only the elder remember their village in Palestine, and they are dying out quickly (life has been tough on them). It’s been 59 years, after all. The young don’t even have pictures to look at, because in those these, cameras were not a common good. (Here is an interesting web site on the Palestinian exodus from the Palestinian National Authority. Check out the photo gallery, it shows you the very early camps.)

The funny thing was that one of the Nahr el-Bared inhabitants, an accountant, showed me a video of his neighborhood in Nahr el-Bared, made on the first day of the fighting. “I had the feeling that something might go wrong,” he said. “When our grandparents left their homes in Palestine, they thought it would be just for a while. So I made a movie of my house and the neighborhood, just in case.” It turns out he wasn’t wrong. It is doubtful that he’ll be able to return any time soon. If ever.

The problem is of course that do not have much chance on a ‘normal’ life in Lebanon. My, even the Lebanese barely lead a normal life these days. The Palestinians of course lead an even less than normal life, due to the 101 restrictions that they face. There are a large number of professions they are barred from (hair dresser being one of them), and this causes an in-equality in income that basically also bars them from access to health care, education and housing. They have to do with services offered in the camp by the UNWRA. Now these services may be for free, and the UNWRA does its best, but its not your top of the line stuff. Schools in Bedawi for instance, run double shifts, in order to provide education to all the camp children.

If there were given Lebanese papers, they could live a normal life, they say, but it does not look like that is going to happen any time soon. Lebanese I talk to say it is because this would shift the confessional balance. The addition of half a million sunnis (the large majority of Palestinians are sunnis. The christian Palestinians for the most part did receive Lebanese papers a long time ago) would not be welcomed by both the christians (who’ve had an issue with the Palestinians being here for a long time) and Hezbollah (shia).

Right now, all they ask for is the Right to Return to Nahr el-Bared. It does not seem to be in the cards anytime soon.

**************************

Voor de Nederlandse lezers; hier is het verhaal over de bom explosie van 13 juni. (This is the car bomb of June 13 in Dutch. A similar version in English can be found here)

Washing Bears

T'seems to be the season to wash the bears. I saw this one last week, in the neighborhood of Sassine; 9 bears on a laundry line.

and this one this morning on http://www.bloggingbeirut.com

On Balconies and Such

After D.Kenner. advised me – for the good of Lebanon – to stay off my balcony in Beirut (previous stints on my balcony resulted in a building on fire and a massive car bomb) , I changed balcony venue, and went to a balcony in Nahr el-Bared instead. This however resulted in an upheaval in the fighting in nearby Tripoli between some more radical sunnis and the Lebanese army. It seems it is all under control this morning, they say.

So maybe it is no more balconies at all then.

These balconies in Nahr el-Bared, by the way, don’t come cheap. A night in an NBC-side apartment can cost you as much as $200. Yes, you are reading this right. And that is WITHOUT furniture, air-conditioning, bed and kitchen.

And windows, I might add. These have been shot out in the very early stages of the fighting between the army and Fatah Islam.

Rumors have it that the first week of the fighting, CNN put down a hefty fee of $400 a day for a shitty roof top. Prices have gone down a little since, due to the competition. After all, there are plenty of roof tops that have a fantastic view of the camp and the Mediterranean Sea behind it, and the Lebanese learn fast.
Some local networks have been able to negotiate the price down to a $150-a-day deal. Still, pretty expensive, that makes it more lucrative real-estate than the downtown apartments in Beirut.
There is of course a downside; as soon as the fighting is over, these journalists are gone. And then you are back to finding someone who can afford $200 a month in that region of the country.

I wonder how much I can put my balcony on the market for? Guaranteed action, I can tell you that.

Warfare 101

The Nahr el-Bared camp in Northern Lebanon

Looking at a bombardment in the company of two war buffs gives you quite a different angle of a battlefield. Today I spent a good part of the day on a balcony overlooking the Palestinian camp Nahr el-Bared (‘cold river’, in Arabic) with two (semi) military experts, while the Lebanese army on the other side of the road was busy pounding the camp.

I don’t think you can get any closer to the phenomenon ‘war tourism’ than this.

To give you an idea how odd the situation is; We are sitting on a balcony some 600 or 700 meters away from the bombardments. Now and then they get closer, but the cars on the road below us continue as if nothing is happening. You can cross the road, but you cannot get any closer than that to the fighting, because the army will stop you right there.The two 'military experts' were a French photographer, who was an ex-military man, the other an LBC reporter who has done battlefields for some 17 years now. I learned lots of stuff about attacking strategies, the reason behind certain bombardments, types of weaponry (B7, RPG and the likes), claymore mines, firing ranges and what not all.

The camp (I heard some Palestinians calling it NBC today) has changed quite a bit in appearance since I was last there, some 10 days ago. All the upper floors have been razed. There are no more sharp edges; the top of the camp has been steadily eroded.

What I also understood is that further bombardments are pretty useless as the entire camp is made of cement. The more you bomb, the more you provide shelter for the lower regions since the slabs of concrete just pile up. Which means that the men of Fatah Islam are safer and safer in their dungeons down there below.

This is not to say Fatah Islam is doing fine. The constant bombardments, day and night (and these are explosions that we - some 700 meters away - felt the blast of) must have a psychological effects on the combatants. They’ve been together now for over a month, without relief, in constant noise, not much time to sleep, in between their own dead, they must be getting sick of tinned sardines by now, and of each other, and there is not much hope for victory.

The army has been much more compliant with letting journalists take pictures. This is usually a sign that they are doing well.

Still, the battle isn’t over yet, contradictory to what the Ministry of Defense claimed earlier this week. They lost another three soldiers today, and as long as they haven’t caught the guys yet, cannot enter all parts of the camp yet and are still bombing constantly, I do not see where the victory is.
But, we were promised, the end is indeed in sight. Another 3 days, we were told. We shall see.

The evening gave a fabulous sun set, but I fear that this that may have escaped the attention of the men of Fatah Islam.

We're Having a Heatwave

We're having a heat wave, a tropical heat wave.

The temperature's rising, it isn't surprising
(sung by Marilyn Monroe)

And indeed, the temperature is rising.

Was it HOT today. or what?! Yet the beaches are empty. It is summer, schools are closed (earlier, due to the situation), there isn’t much else to do in town, and the beaches are empty. I am not complaining, we had the entire pool to ourselves. Still, it is a sign of the times.

We’ve got by-elections coming up on July 5th. There are two empty seats in parliament, due to some unfortunate accidents that involve anti-Syrian members of parliament. Very hazardous occupation, these days, I say.

This shifts (although not decisively so yet) the balance of power. Another three, and the majority is gone. The government therefore would like to have these by-elections, so that these two places can be filled with ‘living bodies’. The president however, being on the other end of the political spectrum, kind of appreciates the change in balance, and refuses to call for these elections.

We’re having them anyway (Don’t you just love this country?)

Then in September, there is the presidential election. Now the Constitution calls for a 6 year term for a president. The current one has sort of ‘extended’ that one illegally. He says it is not illegally done, but it is probably as legal as these coming by-elections, so now we’re even again. And rumor has it that the current president wouldn’t mind staying for another couple of years. The perks of the job must be really amazing, if you are trying to stay in power so desperately. But someone else pointed out to me that when he is no longer a president, he loses his immunity as well, and as such can be prosecuted.

Reason enough to stay in power with all your might, I'd say.

Dutch Girls on the Beach.

Boys on the beach

On Travel Plans and Terroristic Vehicules

Travel Plans

A Dutch friend of mine, living here in Beirut, was contemplating this morning whether she should go to Holland a little earlier than usual this summer. It promises to be a hot summer, with the fighting in the north and the constant explosions in Beirut. And that is only the beginning of it. Fear is that the fighting in the camp will jump to other camps. The situation in Gaza is not exactly an indicator that things in the camps here right now are all fine and dandy.

“I don’t know,” she says,” the travel agent said there were plenty of seats available all the way til the end of June. I think I’ll wait until the next bomb before I decide.”

That, of course, was this morning.
Now the situation is a little different. Some obscure Palestinian group just fired three rockets into northern Israel. I didn’t even know that the Palestinians in Lebanon had such advanced hardware these days. And you know what the Israelis do when they get mad. They bomb everything.

Last year, she ended up getting evacuated. She couldn’t even return to her house in the southern suburbs to pick up some clothes, so she arrived in Holland without anything.
However, after this evening’s event, I bet you there won’t be that many seats available anymore.
Everyone is thinking the same; not again by boat. This boat refugee thing was not a success by Lebanese standards.

Terroristic Vehicules

On a different plan, my car seems to have acquired ‘terrorist status’ overnight. Yesterday I could still drive the stretch from Caracas to Sanayah. Today no longer. I did not pass the check point that suddenly emerged there a couple of days ago. The road passes close by the house of a rather well-known MP, who, they say, currently also provides a roof for all other worried MP's in town that fear for their lives. That's about 40, if I got my facts straight.

“Pick-up that way,” said the policeman, motioning up the hill.
“Yes, but I need to go that way,” motioning straight ahead.
“No. You go that way.”
In the meantime everyone was allowed to continue straight, even 4x4. But not my car.
“Look, you let that Range Rover pass,” I argued indignantly.
“Yes, 4x4 good, pick-up, no good. Sorry, he.”

Yes, sorry indeed, when we can no longer distinguish a terrorists from a housewife with kids in a car. Desperate housewife, if this continues. I mean, the stuff we've had to deal with lately.

Did I Say Never a Dull Moment?

Well, the funeral wasn’t even over, or the next event announced itself, quite spontaneously, through an anchor woman who did not know her microphone was still open while commenting on the images of the funeral.


Fatfat sues NBN anchor
Youth and Sports Minister Ahmad Fatfat filed a judicial complaint against NBN anchor Sawsan Safa Darwish after her comments and laughter regarding the assassination of Beirut MP Walid Eido and her statement that “Fatfat should be next.”

During NBN’s live coverage of the aftermath of the explosion that killed Eido on Wednesday, Darwish, who did not realize her microphone was on, said: "So, why did it take them so long to kill him? Fatfat should be next. I'm counting them down… we've had enough of them."

NBN, owned by pro-Syrian speaker of parliament Nabih Berry, fired the anchor, apologized in a statement and said "the comments made do not represent the station in any way.”

Fatfat meanwhile told Al-Arabiya network he is concerned for his life. He said he had hired an attorney and is prepared to sue the station for comments he interpreted as a direct threat.

Now if that’s not rich, I do not know what is. Imagine things like this happening in Holland at the same speed as they happen here. The Dutch would be overdosed in no time. You have to love this country.

For the knowledgeable among you, here is the exchange in Arabic.

Both picture and YouTube link were lifted of BeirutSpring

Silence; The Day After

Beirut usually is a busy town. It is noisy, loud, bustling with energy and traffic, yelling people, incoming airplanes and car horns, police sirens, ambulances, building sites and dust. It is a constant cacophony. Somehow the heat seems to amplify the sounds as well.

But right now, it sounds like a provincial village right after lunch time. The streets are empty, not a soul in sight. Shops are closed, and only those with urgent business venture out on the streets. The beaches are deserted; kids do not play out.

People monitor every bang, every clang in the neighborhood. “Was that a bomb?” they ask. But it is false alarm. Bombs of this magnitude do not explode that close together. There will be at least a fortnight of some peace. There may be lesser bombs. But not big ones, like yesterday’s.
A friend of mine has taken that exact same road maybe 400 times, if not more. She tried to see the positive side of it. “Well, we know that this beach at least is safe now.” After all, what are the odds they put a bomb in the same place twice? Besides, the man they targeted is dead now. And chances that other MP’s will be going to the beach anytime soon are slim, I’d say.
My son calls me; he wants to visit me at work. Shall I take the risk and let him walk? I guess it is safe today. Next week maybe not.

I hear birds, and dogs barking. I hear the humming of AC’s. But nothing else. The town is dead for the moment. I like Beirut this way. Quiet, serene (seemingly), I am the only car on the road.

Business will pick up again tomorrow. Hesitantly at first, but by Sunday it will be back in full force. People forget quickly. Until the next bomb explodes, of course.

And this is how we live.

Car Bomb Blast Site

No rest for the wicked. Just as I got home, about to sit on that infamous balcony of mine, the house shook with that now familiar and rather powerful BANG BANG. I don’t know if it is the echo of an explosion that gives you the double-bang, or whether it was a double explosion, but whatever it was, it was pretty massive. The windows bent in and out, literally. But since they were all open, nothing broke.
Outside the familiar shattering of glass indicated however that this bomb was indeed pretty close. I ran down the street to the sea-side, where black smoke was already billowing up from behind the Ferris Wheel of the seaside-Luna Park here in West-Beirut. It came from the little alley way that takes you from two popular West-Beirut beaches; Long Beach and Sporting, back to the main road.

A massive car bomb had exploded there, just as an anti-Syrian member of parliament, Walid Eido, his son Khaled and two or three body guards drove by. They came back from the beach. A massive bomb. When the fire brigade finally extinguished the fire, the wreckage of about 5 cars could be seen. Mangled masses of steel. Did I say massive?

If you live in Holland, you may wonder what goes on at a car bomb site. Well, the scene develops itself rather predictable, and in stages.

Perplexing
The first ones at the bomb site are the ones that happened to be in the neighborhood. The guy that sells potato chips and cigarettes, the coffee shop and its clientele. They are standing a little confused, looking at the burning cars. Their ears are still ringing from the enormous blast, and they cannot quite believe that they are actually alive. Just around the corner lies the immensely wrangled mass of steel, left-overs of a couple of cars that are now profusely burning. They are so surprised that they haven’t even attempted to extinguish the fire of the now 5 burning cars. They have left their water pipes, their backgammon board and the tea cups alone, and are gazing, baffled and perplexed, at the scene.
Confusion
Then soldiers from the army base next door arrive. They haven’t been given any clear orders yet, and they are not quite sure what to do. Extinguish the fire, or make sure the people do not get too close? Let people make pictures or not? Get them out of the way, or let them climb on the wall? One gives an order left, the next one gives an order right, a third one gives one contradicting the other two. As a journalist, at this time you can basically ignore them, because they do not know what to do anyway. They try to maintain some type of order, but their yelling and running around only adds to the confusion. Anxiety and Fear

The third wave are the people that come running or on scooters, even before the police. They are the ones that know that family members or friends were at or around the spot. I have friends frequenting both beaches, and by the time I arrived at the bomb blast, I saw two of them standing in the parking lot facing the narrow alleyway with the car bomb; in swimming trunks, their hands going nervously through their hair. I checked with them, it’s the first thing you do after a bomb blast. Are you fine? Did anything happen? Where is so-and-so? Is she with you? Is everyone okay? I met other friends. ‘My mom goes here, I cannot reach here. Have you see her?’ Because ‘tout Beirut’ starts calling immediately to check up on family, the mobile network is instantly blocked, and calls do not get through anymore. I ran into another friend. “Is he with his son? I know the guy. I saw him leaving with his son, is he with his son?” He was talking about the victim in the car. Some Type of Order
Sirens now sound all over the place. Policemen arrive, and the fire brigade is pulling in with its fire trucks. We are about 5 minutes into the blast now. Some big police honcho arrives, and orders that all spectators are to be removed from the scene. The Red Cross comes in with ambulances, and some type of order is created by the Civil Defense people. Numerous men in a wide variety of uniforms walk all over the place. Others just walk around with a type of M-16 assault weapon, but no uniform. I sure hope they have licenses for this. It is actually a wonder that nobody gets shot at events like this, because everyone is at an edge. The army however, is still giving contradictory orders. One moment you may make a picture, the next you may not. Press
The next wave, like a immense swarm of ants, are the press photographers. Big bellies, big lenses. They scamper over the pieces of prefab walls that have come tumbling down, climb on roofs and walls, and get the army all upset. They try and stop them, but there is no stopping these guys. So they yell a little, but after a while the soldiers give up. I am usually in this wave, but because I live around the corner, I arrived at 'confusion stage'.I also noticed that of the four pillars of the three story building next to the bomb blast, only two remain somehow intact. Maybe it was time to change venue. Spectators
By now, (we are 15 minutes later) the news is all over town. Walid Eido, his son (some reports say both sons), two bodyguards and a number of people on their way home from the beach died in the explosion. How this news gets through is a miracle, because my mobile phone cannot get through to anyone. Everyone is coming over to check this out. The entire beach boulevard is crowded, but the army has finally organized itself; they have cordoned off the area, and people can no longer get close to the cars where the red cross people are right now placing white towels over bits and pieces of meat that lie around; on the street, on roof tops, on the bumper cars field (this was next to a Luna Park)
There was not one bit of recognizable human remains. Just blobs of burnt stuff all over the place. This explosion was so immense that the bodies flew over the wall into the soccer field of the Nismeh Soccer Club next door.
It was time to go home.

On my way home, the familiar sound of shattered glass being swept together by the surrounding apartments and businesses was heard everywhere. People already started cleaning up.
Being a member of parliament, I assume being blown up is a risk that comes with the job. At least it does in this country. And although I do not agree with that, I understand that it happens. And being a bodyguard for a member of parliament that runs the risk of being blown-up, I guess that goes for the body guards too.

What I do not understand though, is that his son had to be in the car. Couldn’t they just wait and let him pass this time, because his son was in the car? This is truly a dirty game.

Ain el Heloue Story (in het Nederlands)

The Story, in Dutch (no link available unless you have a Trouw membership)

Ain el Heloue, Zuid-Libanon - Rij door het grootse Palestijnse kamp in Libanon, er wonen 80,000 vluchtelingen, dan zie je bij elke verkeersdrempel een andere organisatie. Een Fatah soldaat geeft een toer; “deze soldaten zijn van ons. Die van Ansar Ullah. Hier heb je mannen van Esbat al Ansar. Die daar zijn van Jund as-Sham,” en het rijtje gaat door. Sommigen zijn Palestijns, zoals Esbat al-Ansar. Anderen – zoals Jund as-Sham - bestaan enkel uit Libanezen, of zijn een mix van Arabieren. De Islamitische fracties zijn te herkennen aan de ‘Osama’ baarden. “Bij Fatah scheren we ons nog.” Ze vechten regelmatig met elkaar.
Afgelopen week vielen strijders van Jund as-Sham plotseling een legerpost aan bij het kamp, en doodde 2 soldaten. “Emoties, weet u,” verontschuldigt de gids zich. “Een van haar leden is de zwager van Abu Hreira (de nummer 2 van Fatah Islam), vandaar”.
Commandos van het Libanese leger vechten nu al drie weken tegen Fatah Islam in het noorden, maar ze krijgen de ruim 250 radicale moslims niet klein. “Uiterst gevaarlijke mensen,” zegt een luitenant, “ze blazen zich liever op dan zich over te geven.” Het leger is nu bezig om Nahr el-Bared plat te bombarderen.

Libanon lijkt plotseling vergeven van door al-Kaida geinspireerde radicale soennitsche groeperingen.

In de kampen ben je – een regeling uit 1969 – veilig voor de Libanese justititie. Tijdens de Syrische bezetting konden deze groeperingen ook ongestoord de kampen in en uit. De Syriers steunen het phenomeen ‘radicale Islam’ op het grondgebied van een ander graag. Sommigen hebben al een uitgebreide karriere als ‘soldaat van God’ achter de rug. “Die heeft gevochten in Irak” en ‘hij is in Chechnya geweest. ”
De Syriers zijn weg, maar voortdurende ruzies tussen regering en oppositie partijen, en een oorlog met Israel, zorgt ervoor dat deze bewegingen rustig hun gang kunnen gaan.
Natuurlijk zijn wij tegen ze, zegt Abu Ali Tanios, hoofd van de 550 Fatah politiemannen in het kamp, “Maar we moeten wel het groene licht krijgen om tegen ze te vechten.” En zo eenvoudig is het niet. Alleen Esbat el-Ansar beschikt al over 300 strijders. Het merendeel is opgeleid in de trainingskampen van Bin Laden in Afghanistan.
Maar daar wil sheikh Abu Obeida, een van de leiders, het niet over hebben. Zijn soldaten zijn moslims die hun broeders willen helpen, zegt hij. “Ze zien wat er gebeurd in Irak en Afghanistan. Dit is een gevecht tegen de Amerikanen en de Israeliers. Dit is Jihad.”
Dat de Amerikanen zijn beweging een terroristische organisatie noemen, doet hem lachen. “Wij stonden al voor Osama (Bin Laden) op die lijst.”

De populariteit van de fundamentalistische groeperingen is niet een nieuwe fenomeen, aldus Ali Mohammad, Fatah’s tweede man in Libanon. “Dat is in 1991 begonnen, tijdens de Golf Oorlog”. De Amerikaanse kruistocht voor democratie door het Midden Oosten zint velen niet. “Wat zoeken die Amerikanen op islamitische grond?” vraagt een lid van Esbat al-Ansar mij.
Ali Mohammad is het niet eens met Abu Obeida dat Palestijnen zich spontaan voor de Jihad aanmelden. “Achter al die bewegingen zit Al-Kaida geld. Hier in het kamp ook.” Volgens hem zijn het boeven en criminelen. “ze gebruiken drugs en kijken sex films.” Ook de Syriers betalen mee. “Die chaos komt ze goed uit.”
Ahmad Khattib, een Palestijnse journalist meent dat geld, en niet religie, de grootse rol speelt. “Jongeren hier hebben geen werk, geen geld en geen toekomst. De afgelopen week kon niemand het kamp uit. Je kwam niet voorbij de legerpost.” En als iemand dan $500 per maand biedt voor een interessante carriere tegen de Amerikanen – “want iedereen is tegen de Amerikanen” – is de beslissing snel genomen.
Maar volgens verhalen van Libanese soldaten die tegen Fatah Islam vechten, zijn ze wel degelijk gedreven. “We hadden er een te pakken voordat hij zich kon opblazen. Boos dat ie was! ‘Je hebt me mijn ontmoeting met de profeet verhinderd.” Palestijnen binnen Fatah Islam, die tekenden vanwege het salaris, hebben zich inmiddels overgegeven aan de Palestijnese autoriteiten. De rest gaat door tot de dood.

Ahmad Khattib is somber. “Men wil een einde maken aan de islamitische bewegingen in Libanon. Zodra de gevechten in Nahr el-Bared over zijn, is dit kamp aan de beurt.”

The Bitterness at Ain al Hilweh Camp (An interesting story on Shark al-Awsat. Not mine)

They're still fighting in Nahr el-Bared

“We were on that list before Osama”

Picture this: I am sitting in Sheikh Abu Obeida’s office in Ain el-Heloue, a Palestinian camp in Southern Lebanon. The charming sheikh runs a faction of some 200 Esbat el-Ansar members. Abu Tarek runs the other, 900 men strong, contingent. They are on the US list of world-wide terrorist organizations (scroll down to Lebanon), and have been for quite some time now.
I ask the sheikh if it doesn’t bother him, being on that list. He tilts his head backwards, and smiles. “We were on that list before Osama,” he says.

Palestinian boys playing cards at the entrance of Ain el-Heloue. (Are they playing on a prayer mat?)

I spent my day in Ain el-Heloue, a Palestinian camp down south, working on a story on the ‘sunni Islamic revival movements’ in Lebanon. (Ain el Heloue in 1953)
And I am now literally wallowing in a plethora of radical sunni groups, as numerous as the people they strive to eliminate. They are all somehow connected to one another through family ties, friendships struck in Bin Laden’s training camps, jail buddies in Syria, a sheikh in a mosque in Germany, neighbors in Dinnieye, class mates at the UNWRA school in the camp, or just room mates at Cal Tech. Some are Palestinians, some are Lebanese. Many of them are from other Arab or muslim countries. And through it all, they all seem to link to the (in)famous Osama Bin Laden.

I had brought a list of all the different movements that are supposed to have ‘installed’; themselves in the camp. My interpreter, a Fatah soldier, and sheikh Abu Obeida of Esbat al-Ansar thought this quite interesting. They studied it, and were discussing it among themselves as they went down the list.
“Those, yes, we have, those as well, and those too. These no, only in Nahr el-Bared, those yes, but just a few. And these guys, who are they? Never heard of them. You recognize the name? and they showed it around.
“Nah, these we don’t know. Are you sure they are here?”
My translator excused himself. “We’ve got so many, we kind of lose track.”

Traffic jam at the entrance of Ain el-Heloue (soldier is from Fatah, not Lebanese Army)

A drive through the biggest camp in Lebanon – some say 80,000 Palestinian refugees live here – will introduce you to a different faction at every speed bump. In one street, five different parties are taking care of security. Fatah on one side, Esbat al-Ansar on another side, Ansar Ullah somewhere in the middle. And in between there are some other groups such the Ansar al Usba and the Jamaat al Islamiya. In the end, even my (Palestinian) translator got a little confused. “So you are with who?” he asked at yet another speed bump/checkpoint. “This is a shared point,” they replied.

We passed some bearded guys (mind you, all the Islamic faction sports the famous Osama beard these days), whom I was not supposed to smile to, because those were the ‘bad boys’ of Jund as-Sham, who had attacked and killed two Lebanese soldiers earlier this week. They are now encircled by the other factions, and kept in check.

Not for long though, according to a Palestinian journalist I spoke with. “They killed two soldiers here. The army does not forget. Once they are done with Nahr el-Bared, it is our turn.”

If you find all these different factions confusing, then check out this list; a compilation (I do not know by whom) of groups that are not working in coordination with the US government. If this does not give Bush sleepless nights, I do not know what will.

Organizing your Life around Bombs

How miserable the Iraqis must feel; after all, their bombs are more frequent, more violent, and more destructive than ours. We shouldn’t really complain; our bombs explode at night time, when there aren’t many people on the road, and in places that are often not frequented by many people. True, we got a bomb near the ABC mall and the Verdun shopping district, but nobody shops at 10 o’clock in the evening.

We get them in empty buses, and industrial districts, so the human cost is minimal.
The Iraqis have them at noon time, in crowded market areas, near schools, and in mosques during Friday prayer times, where they inflict as much damage as possible. So all things considered, we are the lucky ones. Still, it is disconcerting to have to organize your way around bombs.

Some schools have taken the drastic step of starting the summer break earlier. Great if you are a kid, but a royal pain if you are a working mom. Restaurants and bars in Monot and Gemayze, two popular districts, have seen their attendance drop to a virtual zero. After all, can you predict where the next one is going off? Wouldn’t it be a waste to survive 15 years of civil war, massive Israeli bombardments and a Syrian occupation, and than die because of a stupid car bomb planted by god knows who? Some say it’s the Syrians. Others say it’s Fatah Islam, or related organizations. Whoever orders them, someone must be planting them. My guess it’s someone with (some) Lebanese blood in his veins, due to the minimal damage policy of the current bombing campaign.

But they cannot be ignored, so we organize our way around them. Graduation parties are cancelled, or moved indoors. I heard from someone else the unlikely fact that house parties should end now by 11 o’clock (couldn’t verify this odd ‘party curfew’). Dinners are held earlier anyway, because we’d like to be indoors by ten if possible.
Play dates are now assessed based on the neighborhood where the play date lives, and what road needs to be taken to get there.
People monitor everything and everybody, trying to predict what might happen. A friend of ours, close to people in the government, mentioned that he had been looking for an apartment in Feraya. (Feraya is a resort town in the mountains, some 50 km above Beirut). And suddenly everyone was wondering; ‘if so and so is looking for a place over there, right now, that means he knows something that we do not,’ and they all started calling him for advice on what to do for the summer.
People go to the beaches in the city (concrete slabs around rectangular pools), rather than the sandy beaches down south and up north. What is a bomb explodes while you are at the beach? Better to be close to home.

The fact is, we are still able to continue to do what we usually do, albeit with some minor organizational changes.

Question on everybody’s mind is: will it stay that way?

Sietske

While I am working on a story, some entertainment (as if we need it in Lebanon.) from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Sietske (variations include Sytske) is a Frisian girls' name, which is mostly found in the northern regions of the Netherlands.
Sietske is based on the stemm "Siet". It is possible that it derives from Old Frisian "side", meaning "morale" or "sîth" meaning "companion". It is also possible it is a shortened form, or nickname for older Germanic starting with "sigi-" or "sî-" meaning "victory"
The name Sietske is a girl's name, while Sietse is a boy's name. Outside the Dutch province of Friesland this convention is not well known. Therefore the greater part of the Sietskes from provinces outside Friesland are wrongfully addressed as "Sir" in written correspondence.

Happy Birthday

Omdat ik mijn moeder zaterdag had moeten bellen om haar te feliciteren met haar verjaardag, maar ik het niet gedaan heb, (heb een goed excuus, zat in een oorlog) zet ik haar maar even in het beeld. Deze foto dateert overigens uit 1956 als ik het wel heb.

Hartelijk gefeliciteerd ma, nu wordt je ook nog eens beroemd op je oude dag!

In the Meantime; See a Need, Fill a Need

3 painters from Nahr el-Bared who have had to leave their camp because of the fighting, and are currently stuck with family at the nearby Bedawi camp waiting for the fighting to stop, have decided that they should try their hand at shaving and cutting hair. They offer their services for free.
“I’ve always wondered what it is like to do this job,” said one, and so they decided to open up shop out in the open. He actually enjoyed it quite a bit. Back in the Nahr el-Bared camp he has a paint shop, although he already knows that the paint shop no longer is. “Bombed by the Lebanese army.”
Depending on who you speak with, you get a different version of who this Fatah Islam groups is, and who bankrolls them. I’ve heard like 7 different versions now. I guess we’ll have to wait and see what the army is going to show us.

So for a free shave and hair cut in the Bedawi camp, on the sidewalk near the baker, and it is for Nahr el-Bared residents only.
He mentioned that Hamas was paying for the operation. I somehow doubt that.

And the Beat Goes on

I had planned to go to Ain el-Heloue today, to talk to some people of Esbat el Ansar. I decided against it, because these days (since May 20) you need - as a foreigner that is - army permission to get into that camp. It takes a couple of days to organize it, and I did not have time for that.

Gone are the days when I just would barge in, get the Fatah guy out of his bed and have him walk me, in his payamas and slippers, to the Esbat Ansar guys who were exchanging graphics with each other for their mobile phone about airplanes crashing into twin towers.

In retrospect, I think maybe I should have gone anyway. No story as bad as a missed one. Here are some updates on that story.

Have a Nice Day

This place is so surreal. I just got back from Nahr el-Bared, where the army has re-opened the main road that runs alongside the Palestinian camp. You can now drive along the entire east side of the camp, separated from the main road with less than 100 meters of orchards and farmland, while the army is inside battling with Fatah Islam. You cannot just hear the rockets’ impact, you can see and feel them as well. Great bursts of dust, sometimes white smoke, sometimes black smoke (I’ve been told there is a difference in impact, but I forgot what it was). Constant machine gun fire accompanies the heavy thunder of the 155 millimeters. You wonder whether it is actually really safe. After all, the rockets explode about a 100 meters from your car. What if they miss, and hit the road? Does anyone even notice there is a war going on on the side of the road? But everybody else seems to be driving that road, and they’re not going at breakneck speed, so it must be safe.

Anyway, while I got back to Beirut, and just sat down on my balcony, about to relax from my workday up north, I hear a strange crackling sound. I look around, and sure enough, at the back of the building facing my building, the famous Yacobian building (although this one is in Beirut, and not Cairo), at the ground floor, something’s burning. It must be electric wires, because I see white sparks, as if something short-circuits. Thick black smoke billows up.

‘Doesn’t anyone else see this’? I wonder and I search for my camera.
By the time it reaches the 3rd floor, it is clear to me that the residents of the Yacobian building are unaware that their building is on fire.
I want to call the fire department. But no phone book, remember?
So I call 112. I have no idea what 112 is, but it is written on police cars.
Now may not be the moment to use my Arabic ‘ta’abein’, I decide. After all, if I am going to direct them to a fire in my Arabic, god knows where they might end up.

So I ask if they have someone who speaks English.
“Eh, bas, shoe fie. Ya’ani, shoe andik?’ request a man on the line (‘yes, okay, but what is it, what do you want?’)
Well, I want to speak in English, and I want to report a fire. You know, ‘na’ar, fie na’ar.” (fire, there is a fire)
‘lezem techke Arabi’ (you should speak Arabic).
Anyway, he’ll look for someone who speaks English.
The fire reaches the fourth floor.
The fire reaches the fifth floor.
‘Hello.”
No one.
‘Fie hada ehke Englesi,” (is there someone that speaks English?) I hear them ask?

The fire is in the 6th floor.
Someone gets on the line.
“There is a fire!”
“Where?”
“In Caracas, at the back of the Yacobian building.”
“Okay.”
“Well, shouldn’t you come?”
“Who’s calling?”
“Me? Mrs. Xxxxxx. But I don’t live in the building.”
Okay. Have a nice day.”
“What do you mean, have a nice day, there is a fire!”
“Yes, have a nice day,” and the guy hangs up.

Have a nice day.
Well, 3 fire trucks showed up. In less than 4 minutes, I might add (Pretty fast, no?)
The Yacobian building did not burn down. But the residents will be without electricity, phone, Internet and cable for a while.

Slow on the South Side

It sounds poetic. Life was slow on the south side of Nahr el-Bared today. Nobody going in, nobody going out. It seems Fatah (which is a different faction than the Fatah Islam) is helping the Lebanese army in that part of the camp. The rest of the camp now lies under a slow, but steady bombardment of 155 mm shells.

A soldier looking in the direction of the camp, which lies right between him and the sea.

One thing that never ceases to amaze me about war is how life behind the front line goes on as if there is no war. Less than 3 kilometers always from the camp, which is now completely off limits to journalist, you cannot even reach the northern entrance anymore, people are going about their daily business. Under the cracking of the cannons (shells make an odd cracking sound when they are launched, like lightning strikes) kids play soccer in the streets, friends lounge on an assortment of benches in the garden while playing cards and smoking argileh, cars are being repaired in the garage and the baker bakes his bread.

I read in soldiers’ accounts who were serving on the frontline during WWI (1914-1918) that they felt that life behind the frontline was almost surreal. They were dying by the dozen in muddy trenches, and when they’d be pulled out of the line for a week, they’d be stationed at farms some 5 kilometers away from the front line, and see farmers work the fields, and housewives hang the laundry, and the war simply would not exist anymore.

The camp from a distance. Todays was a 'quiet' day.

People in the vicinity of Nahr el-Bared also seem to be totally oblivious to the fact that fthree kilometer down the street an entire camp is slowly being pulverized, now that it is clear that Fatah Islam members are not going to have themselves extracted that easily.

Well, they hear the pounding of the mortars, and sometimes you can even hear the rockets whistle overhead.
The army lost up to 45 people (of which 7 today), Fatah Islam is looking at over 25 dead, or that’s the number that we can somehow confirm, whereas the number of dead civilians is unknown. There was talk of a cease fire between 3 and 7 in order to get the wounded out, but it never materialized.

The Wikipedia Revolution

Has anyone noticed that this Wikipedia thing is slowly inserting itself in Lebanese life, just like Facebook? I will happily boycott Facebook, but this Wikipedia thing is interesting. Every time a bomb explodes, we can look it up in an encyclopedia now. Great propaganda machine. I think I’ll open an article of myself.

Look at these entrees
Conflict in North-Lebanon
Nahr el-Bared
Fatah Islam