Please speak up

[DebiCates]

As the crisis in Lebanon escalates, we've created this new board category for your comments. (Rants, raves, fears, all that comes to mind.)

Show Lebanon she is not alone. If you are reading this, I hope you'll take a few minutes to comment here, to show our friends and loved ones in Lebanon that they are foremost in our thoughts.

As you can see, Shelley is taking on the leaders and not letting them get away with excuses! You are welcome to copy her letter and submit it to your leaders.
bhs70s.proboards19.com/index.cgi?board=LIFE&action=display&thread=1153987539&page=1#1154256559
Lebanon needs our voices. It is a horrid crisis for Lebanon, growing worse every day, but if that weren't enough, and as Shelley points out, it is destabilizing to the whole world.

Let's use that great education we got at BHS and put it into true service. Comment now. Write your leaders now.

Let our cries, PEACE SALAAM SHALOM, be heard above the political din.

And I might suggest another word to cry out, made famous by Scandar....BAS!

[shelleywebster]

Another letter, this time for the Arab World: -

To the leaders of the Arab World,

So, once more you sit by and watch Lebanon being raped by its neighbour. What do you do about it? Fancy words and pledges of money, how will that help the children lying under the concrete ruins of bombed out buildings across south Lebanon?

You bring shame to your homes by failing and abandoning the Lebanese people to the unlawful violence meted out by Israel. You speak of Arab unity, and your Muslem brothers, we hear old quotations such as “The enemy of my enemy is my friend” but as far as action goes…nothing.

You have the power to cripple the Western Nations – particularly the USA, by turning off the taps to the oil wells, or raising the price per barrel to $200 immediately and then by $100 a day until Israel stops its offensive – but do you act?

No.

Why? Don’t tell me - it comes down to money. That is a disgrace.

How many more atrocities will come to pass before you flex your political and diplomatic muscle? Call the bluff of this war mongering American President who believes he is guided by God in his mission. Millions of fundamentalist Christians in America actually believe they have to support Israel to Armageddon to facilitate the second coming of Christ. They speak of a nuclear war in the Levant as being a necessary precursor to that second coming. They are nothing short of insane, and very dangerous.

Lawrence of Arabia, a great man who loved the Arab World, as I do, once wrote: -

“All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the
dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.”
—T. E. Lawrence from "Seven Pillars of Wisdom"

Show the world that all out war in the Middle East is not inevitably going to flow from a concerted Arab movement to force the US and Israel into submission. They would not hesitate to impose economic sanctions on you – play them at their own game – boycott their goods and cut their supply of fuel.

Meet their nightmare of a dream with a vision of superior intellect and intent.

The israelis have suspended air operations for 48 hours. Please act now to save the people of Lebanon and Ghaza from this Israeli abuse that seems to have been allowed to continue for decades, and make sure that the air operations do not start again.

Yours respectfully
etc

Nawal Ammar sent me this inspirational quotation: -

" Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." by Margaret Mead


Please keep trying
Shelley

[jfkassad]

Lebanon urges RP to support global calls for cease-fire

The top Lebanese diplomat in the Philippines asked the government Wednesday to support international calls for a cease-fire in his war-torn country.

Honorary Consul General Joseph F. K. Assad also called for humanitarian aid for his country after Israeli troops stepped up offensives against Hezbollah guerillas in Lebanon.

"The world community has to step in. We want a peace agreement with our neighbors regarding the new conflict. These massacres must stop," Assad told abs-cbnNEWS.com.

"Lebanon has not fired a single shot on Israel," he added. "It is a victim in this war."

Assad said at least 800 civilians have been massacred since Israel started its offensive three weeks ago. The war erupted after Hezbollah seized two Israeli soldiers during a cross-border raid last July 12.

"The Israeli soldiers are probably still alive but the 800 are already dead," Assad said. "These are war crimes being committed before our eyes."

He said the July 30 air strike on the city of Qana, which killed 54 civilians including 37 children, echoed a similar incident 10 years ago.

On April 18, 1996, Israeli soldiers pursuing the Hezbollah bombed the headquarters of a Fijian UN peacekeeping battalion in Qana, killing 106 civilians and injuring 116 others. The international outcry over the massacre forced the United States to negotiate a cease-fire agreement to halt the bloodshed.

"[Israel] apologized for the 1996 massacre and it is doing the same thing 10 years later," Assad said, adding that "there should be real remorse by ending these killings."

Assad said his office, in cooperation with the Philippine National Red Cross, Red Crescent and SOS International, has set up a 24-hour hot line to accept cash and medicine donations for Lebanese civilians. The HELP Lebanon hot line is 633-4060.

www.abs-cbnnews.com/storypage.aspx?StoryId=46245