I am currently sitting at London Heathrow on our way to Beirut. This is the first connection flight and the next one is in Frankfurt. Since I never got a chance to write anything yesterday, I am going to talk a little bit about orientation and some of the people we met before our departure. With 3 hours of sleep the previous night, it was an excruciatingly long day.
I got to the NCUSAR offices around 8:30 am – right around the time everyone was finishing up introductions, so my flight situation worked well. We first got a lecture from the Founder and CEO of NCUSAR, Dr. John Duke Anthony, about the Arab world, and specifically Lebanon. Dr. Anthony spoke about the necessity that Western citizens refrain from passing judgment on Islam and the Middle East. He emphasized that we must be empathetic toward this world – we must be able to “put ourselves in the shoes, souls and situations of others.”
We then had 5 other hour-long presentations from the staff of NCUSAR, the Lebanese embassy, the US State Department, the former dean of the American University of Beirut, and the reporter Hashim Melhem at Al Arabia News. I did not mention the names of several of the individuals because in order for the speakers to talk candidly we had to promise anonymity. The speakers gave great insight into the conditions in modern day Lebanon as well as the history behind the state. It was extremely interesting to witness the different ways in which speakers presented the country. For example, Hashim spoke passionately and lovingly of Beirut, while still being critical of the faults that need to be resolved. The senior official from the State Department gave us the American “Hezbollah is a terrorist organization” talk. I found it interesting that the US cooperates with Lebanese so formally when Hezbollah now holds 2 seats in Lebanese government. Doesn’t this essentially mean that the US Government is working with individuals who are part of a terrorist organization? When I asked him this, the official said that US personnel are not allowed to interact with the Hezbollah members.
There was such a clear contrast between the American ideology and that of an Arab or Islam scholar. Although the Arab speakers were quick to condemn Hezbollah, they painted the picture of a society that has a thorough separation of the common citizen from influence in politics. Although the common citizen will speak out against Hezbollah, they have no influence on Iran funneling weapons to this organization. Hezbollah is the most powerful non-state actor on the globe, with an arsenal much larger than most countries. Westerners are so quick to say that since Hezbollah exists in this country, every citizen is associated with them and is thus a threat. This is simply not true. The common Lebanese citizen is so far removed from the spread of terror.
After all of the introduction lectures, we made our way to Washington Dulles for our flight! I was so exhausted on the plane that I passed out during liftoff and woke up with 50 minutes left of flight time. Since it was a 7-hour flight, I’m excited that I slept through it. I’ve never been able to do that before. In a few hours I will be boarding a flight to Frankfurt. From there we go to Beirut!
peace begins with a smile 