Nicoletta es una persona muy especial para mi; las personas que han leido este blog desde su inicio no me dejaran mentir. Mi percepcion de la guerra en el oriente cambio totalmente cuando, sabiendo con anterioridad que se encontraba ella trabajando en Beirut por el verano, veia como esta ciudad era destruida por misiles israelis.
La incapacidad de comunicarte con un ser querido en medio de una guerra es de los sentimientos mas desesperantes que uno puede encontrar. No sabes si el siguiente misil esta apuntando a esa persona. La espera se vuelve un fantasma que baila al ritmo de los sonidos de las manecillas del reloj.
Sin embargo este sentimiento no es nada comparado al estar en medio del campo de batalla, y creo que no hay mejor persona para contar la historia que la persona misma de la que hablo. A continuacion les presento su relato.
Diario de LaNico:
From Beirut, 1st day of the Israeli unjustified attack to the Lebanese sovereignity
Primera Carta:
July 13th, 2006
So for the one who are worried for me, for Lebanon, for the Middle East...or just curious, here is the full story, minutes by minutes, of what is going on here...
yesterday, in support of the Palestinians who had already kidnapped one Israeli soldier, and with the excuse of wanting back the Lebanese militants held in the Israeli prisons, Hezbollah (The Party of God) bombed 2 tanks which were near the "blue line", the official border between Lebanon and Israel traced out by the UN in the 80s, and took the 2 solders still alive who were inside.
Nasrallah, the secretary of Hezbollah and official member of the parliament, said in a press conference yesterday, that they will give the soldiers back only in exchange with some of the thousands lebanese who are still in the Israeli prisons.
This caused an escalation of tensions and violence and bombing in the south of the country (which, since Lebanon is so small, it means 40 km from Beirut!!).
Roads, bridges, power plant stations were the principal targets. The connections with the south have been interrupted since yesterday.
The situation became even more tense because of the delayed response of the Lebanese Government, which arrived only yesterday night.
In the late morning of yesterday the Israeli tanks and troupes crossed the Lebanese border, action pretty tough, since it didn't happened since 2000, when Israel had definetly left the lebanese territory, starting in this way the process of peace.
So, at 11,30 pm the Labanese government took the distance from the Hezbollah action, but their statements were not very coherent and either strong. They basically condemned Hezbollah actions, but the problem s that Hezbollah is also a strong party in the Government, and the Lebanese political system at the moment is not strong enough to take a complete stand against them, or against Israel either...
In the night the situation worsened more.
Israel bombed the airport (all three landing strips are destroyed now, they talked about one week at least to fix them) and they proclaimed the martial law on all Lebanon, via see, air, land.
So we are basically stuck here now.
But actually it is very cool to live this situation from inside the embassy, and from the diplomatic point of view.
I got at the Embassy this morning, and I've assisted to the meeting the Ambassador had with the diplomats, military and technicians.
The Tv is on all the time, but only Al Jezeera is covering the facts minute after minutes, so I basically don't understand anything, and I just see the images...which are not very happy...
Now we are setting all the emergency actions in case the situation get worst: booking the buses that eventually will take the Italians who are here to Damascus, buying water and food to store....and then a common words formulation has to be agreed to reassure all the people that are calling, also because the telephone lines are down pretty much all around the country now, so people are getting nervous...
So, the situation at the moment is that:
- in the south the war started, all the connections are down (roads, electricity, telephones) and the population is getting very much involved. In fact the south is pretty much all Shiite, and it is where Hezbollah has the highest support (since it s the only one giving to the populating basic services that the state doesn't provide, similar to Hamaz in Palestine).
- Israel (strongly supported by the US, whom as usual-sorry for the americans who are reading- doesn't have any diplomatic capacity, and has only business goals) is pretending to be deaf, and even though the Lebanese Government took the distance from Hezbollah actions, is bombing the crucal points and strategic locations of the country,
- the Lebanese government has been completely destabilized by the last events. They in fact demonstrated the weakness of the political system, the lack of unity in the Government, and moreover, I have the feeling that what happened cancelled completely the slow process of reconstruction (economical, institutional, and within the civil society), which had been in place since 2000, after the 25 years of war...
this is the first part...probably very confused but don't have time to read it through again...
I'm ok anyway, the embassy is a safe place because the conflict now is between Israel and the Muslims, and I live in the Cristian area...which is definitely not a target for the israleli, so no worries.
Anyway 'll get back to you all as soon as possible...
your corrispondent from beirut,
Nico
My dear friends,
again a collective email, and in english as well, I apologize myself with the italians but the things are getting hot here and I don't have time to write single emails to everybody...
Segunda Carta:
July 13th, 2006
I'm connected real time in Internet, since the telephones are not working properly and since in the tv I just get the images, which sometimes are hard to interpret right! So I try to understand the situation putting together the visual infos, the written one on the press and the one I get from the people in the embassy.
the latest evolutions see Hezbollah bombing pretty hard on Israel, and Israel has promised to respond hardly, in order to punish for what happened. Of course everybody think they are right, and they have been attacked first...but the worst problem is the international interests that back up the actions of both parties, and the as a result leave the Lebanese government with little power and possibilities of action.
We have been actually expecting a rocket attack in the south Beirut (already bombed this night) but so far nothing happened. In the south of the country on the contrary the victims rose to 52.
The embassy is on a low mountain, which dominates all Beirut, and it is on the same street (few hundreds meters before) of the Presidential Palace, so from here I can see all the city, hear the aerial raids on the city, and the tanks that continuously go up and down the street...
Our Ambassador went to a meeting with all the other european ambassadors, to decide a common strategy to use in case the situation worsen and the civilians need to be evacuated. So far the decision is to wait and see how things develop. As I said before the Airport is out of order, and Israel declared the block of the naval traffic and the one on land. The strategy I think it would imply the common request from the european countries representatives, of a ceasefire in order to allow the expatriation of the civilians who are in the country. But at the moment this move has not been decided yet.
At the moment we can only wait and see...as they said, but actually all the statements coming from the powerful countries (see Iran and US) are very destabilizing and make me very upset.
I'll try to give to the interested ones a brief overview of the background that led to this situation (and this is of course only my own interpretation of the historical facts):
- Israel was waiting for an excuse to bomb the country and extinguish the Hezbollah army for ever. Their relations in fact, since 2000 when they were forced to leave the country, have been very tense. They have been facing each other at the southern border for 6 years, shooting at each other some times, but nothing more. Hezbollah, from its side, justifies the fact that they keep being armed because of Israel occupation of lands that are Lebanese (the Cheeba farms) and that, above all, have many natural resources (lumes docet!). Israel on the other side pretends that it is only protecting its sovereignty and security, but they are the first ones fling without permission above Lebanon, bombing places where they believe Hezbollah members are hidden ecc.
- This situation creates a dual reaction in the Lebanese population:
- part of it (namely the Shiite side and the Palestinian) strongly support Hezbollah and its actions, because the see t as the only entity protecting them, providing basic services, work, schools...and, I think, something in which to believe...
- the other part reject completely this party (which is also in the government!!) and this situation contributes to create instability, internal hate, prevents any process of reinforcing of the state, which as a consequence falls under the attack (or influence) of whoever (Israel, syria, iran), within only one day...
While I write it seems that the situation is getting worst. The other 2 military airports have been bombed very bad, out of order as well. The street for Damascus is also not available...so no flight into Syria!
I'll probably go home now...
I leave in the place where, in case the situation get very hot, all the Italians are supposed to go, because it is closed to the port and top the airport . Hope I can keep you updated...
Don't worry for me!!
Nico
Ciao a tutti!
Tercera Carta:
July 14th, 2006
I've been wandering what was the war...I have seen it so many times, in the movies, in tv, in the news. I've been reading this simple words "WE ARE IN WAR" so many times that I thought they didn't make any effect on me anymore....
I have been repeating them so many time yesterday, we are in war...we are in war?? we are in war!!! No effect!
Then tonight I started to hear the sounds, booooooooooooom...and the vibrations. So that is the war, the real one...
It was 3,45 a.m. We had been reading the news, discussing, trying to be rational, understand the israel strategy...but isn't it crazy?? trying to understand and anticipate something so non sense, so meaningless as the war can be. Trying to feel safe because no, they cannot bomb here, here we are safe, here is the christian zone...but is there really a strategy behind all this? something rational that can be understood and therefore forecast??
For the first time I felt the fear, and it was something so huge and heavy that I never experienced before...it was not only a physical fear, for my own safety, it was more a feeling of global despair, for the future, for the people....the death of the idols, the Nietzsche death of god
And everything seemed so crazy bacause the images of fire and bombing, the sounds that we, I (MYSELF CAZZO), were hearing, the lights burning in the sky, all this comes together with this arabic music that since yesterday had invaded the tv stations ...they show the images without commenting on them, and they put as a background of arabic music, that to me sounds so terrifying...
Now the light is coming, and with it the calm, the calm of insanity...
I-ll try to sleep a bit now, here they say that Beirut is ready for another business day, that everything we'll be calm today...
I hope to be out before tonight...
Don't be scared for me, I just wanted to share with you some thoughts...
Hugs,
Nico
I haven't slept all night. While I write the images of the huge fire coming form the reserves of fuel of the beirut airport pass in front o my eyes. They bombed it tonight again. And with it, they bombed all the southern part of Beirut...1km? 2 km from me?
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