Peace Holds at Beirut Demo

February 14, 2007 3:38


The demonstration in Beirut on the second anniversary of the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was quite calm. Lebanon's army and police were out in such force that one checkpoint was being run by the Judiciary Police. Clearly, the government was taking no chances and put every available man on the street.

The major concern was that the pro-goverment coalition that has formed around Hariri's followers and other anti-Syrian groups would clash with the Hizballah-led pro-Syrian opposition that is camped out not far away.

Downtown Beirut has become contested space. Hariri is buried besides the huge Amin mosque, which he himself commissioned. Hariri was murdered on Valentine's Day 2005 in a massive car bombing that his supporters blame on Syria. (A preliminary report by the subsequent UN investigation implicated top Syrian officials.) The demonstrations that followed his death took place in the adjacent empty lot, coincidentally known as Martyr's Square. The biggest protest, on March 14th of that same year, helped push the Syrian army out of Lebanon, an event dubbed the Cedar Revolution by the US State Department.

So naturally, the March 14th forces -- as the US-backed anti-Syrian coalition is now known -- wanted to demonstrate today in the same place. This was practically asking for trouble, however, considering that the opposition has been living in tents just a stone throw away for the past two months. They accuse Hariri's followers of collaborating with an American-Israeli plan to re-make the Middle East through military aggression.

So the solution for today was a dense no-man's land of barbed wire and armored personnel carriers between the two sides. Though the turnout at today's event -- wire services said that the crowd numbered in the "tens of thousands" -- was less than the million-strong marches of the past few years, it was still impressive that so many people weren't scared off by the threat of violence. Two bombs that exploded yesterday in a mountain town north of Beirut were probably meant to keep people at home. Yet many families showed up today with all generations represented.