An Open Letter to Lebanon's Prime Minister Fouad Saniora By Mike Whitney

An Open Letter to Lebanon's Prime Minister Fouad Saniora

By Mike Whitney

Al-Jazeerah, July 26, 2006

Dear Prime Minister Fouad Saniora,

Perhaps you will be kind enough to answer a few questions regarding the recent visit of United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, so that people around the world who have looked on with sympathy as your country has been ravaged by Israeli aggression can understand your feelings on these important matters.

First of all, why did you allow the Secretary of State to visit Beirut? The Bush administration had already made its position entirely clear and everyone who followed the issue knew that the US would continue to give Israel the “green light” until it finished its military operations according to its original plans.

Were you unaware that Rice had already stated that she was not prepared to offer a “cease fire”?

Were you unaware that the United States was “rushing a shipment of precision-guided bombs to Israel” to continue the slaughter of Lebanese civilians and the destruction of the nation’s infrastructure?

Why would you allow yourself to be photographed “smiley-faced” and shaking hands with the woman who is destroying your country and killing your people?

Haven’t you seen the pictures of the vast devastation in the south of the country where 750,000 of your people have been forced off their land and shunted into refugee camps? Haven’t you heard of the many incidents of the Israeli military intentionally bombing civilians, homes, bridges, milk factories, mosques, airports, power-plants, lighthouses, and ports? http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m25017&hd=0&size=1&l=e

Haven’t you seen the photos of the mass graves and the improvised coffins which have been laid side-by-side in long rows following Israeli bombardment? http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m24969&hd=0&size=1&l=e

Haven’t you heard the reports that Israel is using strange banned weapons in southern Lebanon including cluster-grenades, laser-weaponry, and white phosphorus? http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m25033&hd=0&size=1&l=e

Haven’t you heard the haunting shrieks of the young boy who was filmed in hospital by CNN after being incinerated by Israeli napalm? http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/VIDEO__Lebanese_

Doctor_Says_Phosphorus_0724.html

Haven’t you seen the heartrending picture of the dying Lebanese mother peering up for the last time at her blood-spattered and inconsolable child; another victim of the Israeli onslaught? http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article14180.htm

What type of man would put out the “red carpet” for his enemy while his people are still being slaughtered in the field?

A simple phone call to the State Department could have stopped the Secretary from landing in Lebanon. How much courage does that take?

If you were a brave man you would have placed the Secretary and her entire entourage under “house arrest” demanding that Israel stop its “scorched earth” campaign before releasing Rice and her people. But, we do not expect you to do the “courageous thing”, just the “decent thing”.

Earth, a planet hungry for peace

Apartheid Wall


The Israeli Land-Grab Apartheid Wall built inside the Palestinian territories, here separating Abu Dis from occupied East Jerusalem. (IPC, 7/4/04).

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, like a Python. (Alquds,10/25/03).

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