February 14 and the Rebellion against the Assassination
Walid Choucair Al-Hayat - 15/02/08//
As days pass by, the gigantism of Rafic Hariri mounts, while people's attachment to him seems to have never waned even though time generally erodes memory.
The third anniversary of his martyrdom showed an increase in the scope of his presence as compared to what it was before the crime with the massive explosion that sought to erase any trace of him and the ensuing attempt to efface the leads of the crime and to oblige those who loved him to simply bury him, forget his memory then return to a servile and submissive life under a repressive regime that rests on coercion and deception and imposes false political balances through violence and intimidation, under various types of deceptive and resounding slogans that have been always brandished to blind public opinion and cover untruth.
Although the 2005 attempt to prevent the Lebanese masses and the Hariri fans from mourning his loss and showing political and emotional anger at his assassination failed and produced the exceptional demonstration of March 14, which indicated an upsetting of the balances, those who made light of the stored-up rebellion against the accumulated injustice that befell Hariri then his public with his assassination, stopped at no limit, but rather assassinated him over and over again and killed more than ten leaders and Lebanese national symbols in order to subjugate the Lebanese. They did not even care about the innocent citizens who fell martyrs in their bid to push the Lebanese to the abyss of despair and surrender.
The third anniversary presented Hariri fans and adversaries with an occasion to remember his smile, which combined innocence, shrewdness, and intelligence. It was an occasion for them to recall his pure intentions, nationalism, and Arabism, his moderation, forbearance, and relentless efforts to settle domestic and Arab disputes. On this occasion, they recalled his deep commitment to develop his country and unleash its promising potential, let alone his unwavering attempt to restore Lebanon's constituents of independence, by strengthening its institutions in the first place, so that the accession to power by whoever it may be would take place with a minimum of dignity.
As the struggle over Lebanon persists, the Hariri fans become more convinced that he was a giant, a conviction that gets even more engraved in the minds of the populace whenever those who decided to eliminate him attempt to erase his memory. As the ranks of the Hariri supporters have swollen now more than in 2005, the Hariri family must show political and popular commitment to the political, development and national symbols this giant man has come to epitomize.
In this case, it is not right for some of Hariri adversaries to regret the loss of the martyr PM and to say, amidst the great division over Lebanon's regional choices and domestic balances, that if he were alive, he would have acted differently than the current leaders.
This talk solely aims to downplay the post-Hariri political leaders, in particular his allies, family and successor Saad Hariri. It is a new attempt to nullify the political effects of the rebellion against the assassination. The renewed leadership of the Hariri family, which is assumed by his son, was born in the womb of the assassination itself. Whoever holds against Saad Hariri the fact that he is less interested in bargaining than his late father, wants him to accept as fact that Rafic Hariri was killed in a traffic accident, just as the key figures in the 2005 regime and Damascus's allies believed that the sadness would last for one week at most and the case would be closed. Yet, his adversaries are getting acquainted with a new face, more intransigent than they thought and more insistent on facing the effects of the assassination directed at Lebanon's independence and on reaching an honorable settlement, the reason behind which Hariri the father was eliminated.
Far from this debate, Lebanon's celebration of two tragic events yesterday poses a comparison of another type: If it were not for the suffocating political crisis in Lebanon, with the assassination of Hariri constituting a principal turning point therein, the funeral of the resistance leader Imad Mughniyeh would have been different. A big part of those who commemorated Hariri would have bidden farewell to the symbol of resistance to the Israeli occupation, a symbol who summarizes the life story of thousands of patient Hizbullah militants. The tragedy was doubled by these two scenes.
|
