Thursday, August 17

An other kind of beach

So yes, I was fortunate enough to enjoy pristine waters and superb dunes and costal vistas in Cape Cod last week. In the mean time up to 30,000 tonnes of oil flooded into the sea at the coast in Lebanon after Israeli jets had attacked storage tanks at the Jiyyeh power plant south of Beirut on July 13 and 15. That amounts to about two thirds of the Lebanese coast. That coast now is useles for years to come and the marine life and the ecosystem there is dead and unsuitable for fishing. Let me put this in context. In the US this would equal to a complete shutdown of the coast from Maine to Florida plus the coast from Mexico to about Los Angeles. Exxon's "Valdez" was nothing compared to this disaster.
Yes, it is one way to look at the immediate death counts in a crisis of war - but those are "silly numbers" compared to the long term implications.
If it wasn't such a sad and painful story, a cynic might sum up the present crisis in the Middle East as such:

no regard for life on earth by Israel and Hezbollah alike


Both have lost in the battle of humanity.
Both stink to heavens and above.
Both are criminals of earth existence.
Both have lost moral ground.
In the mean time the US is supporting blindly one of them and curses the other. That is not naive, that is a recipe for destruction - self destruction.
A nation on moral grounds would declare: BOTH OF YOU ARE WRONG!!!

8 comments:

_z. said...

They both swim in the same sea, mind you!

excellent post zee. I have been procrastinating posting about the effects of this war on the environment,for I prefered to hold off for quieter times. I guess now is the time.

I should have been swimming there this july.

Cynnie said...

That photo breaks my heart

Unknown said...

thank you for this post Zee :)
we'll clean it up, if i have to do it with a spoon i will.

jooj said...

zee, just becauase Hezbollah has faults, that does not make him so comparable to Israel.

Ostfen said...

Zee,
that is one step closer to the truth
(which iI don't pretend to know)

Zee said...

jooj
I do not know all the intricate fibers weaving the destiny of the Middle East, nor do I intimately know all the facets of Lebanese life and history.
But in my pragmatic approach of understanding things, I came to the conclusion that Hezbollah exists as an organization because it has weapons. That is the core of Hezbollah's existence. If you take those weapons away, Hezbollah will loose its identity. It is therefore understandable that Hezbollah is reluctant to do so because the "tool of self expression" and power would be gone.
The only thing Hezbollah would have left after being stripped of its weapons would be religious fever, and that in itself is not powerful enough, at least not in Lebanon.
So why do I say this? Yes I say this because Hezbollah might have had a function of representing and fighting for the people in the past - but that wasn't "politics" per say, that was self determination and outrage at the Israeli occupation. Granted, I do support the past. But what Hezbollah thereafter didn't get into their knuckle heads is that politics should not be their field of action.
It is this miscalculation mixed with pseudo "freedom fighter" notions mixed with "muslim arab unity" sentiments that brought about the last devastation in Lebanon, nothing else .... face it!
You see - weapons don't like to rust, they like to be used - it's an universal law! And as long as Hezbollah has weapons they will be used, it's as simple as that.
Do you understand what I am driving at? I don't care if Hezbollah has less faults than Israel ... I think actually that Hezbollah's only mistake is to even exist in it's present form. It plunged Lebanon into this very misery ... what kind of victory is that!!!!
I looked at the formula of your present constitution in Lebanon - it's a start, but it is still absurd. For now there has to be a particular amount of representatives of every religion. No good! It has to be a particular amount of representatives of each region instead. No?!?
Israel was the swine led on a dogs leash like a puppy by the US in this last disaster. I can understand that Arab nations growl at the pig and also frown at his master. The "naziism" that Israel implies on its neighbors is horrible and sick but that still doesn't give Hezbollah the right to launch a stupid campaign that only results in polarization and destruction of its own territory.

As I said in previous posts, Allah is not great - Allah is just Allah and Mohammed was his messenger - a very long time ago.
let us be religious, but keep religion out of politics - that would be a message to Hezbollah and Israel alike!

Zee said...

will money buy unity?
Here you go, more trouble in the making!
Hezbollah has set up 12 centers to organise the hand-out of cash for families who's homes were destroyed.
Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, promised the money in his first speech after the truce took hold this week.
He said 15,000 dwellings had been completely destroyed in the Israeli bombardment but the guerrilla group, which runs a large network of health, education and social centres, would also pay for repairs to houses that were still standing.

The problem with this scenario is that again Hezbollah and not the Lebanese government leads the way.
I don't even want to know where all the money comes from ...

Gary said...

Hey, you're a human rights activist dude!