JC Helary wrote:
>
> What I saw from a trip to South Lebanon in summer 98 is that the population
> itself is not fundamentalist,
Interesting and sounds about right to me. The pop. in SL is Shi'a.
and now that SL is freed from Israel I am not
> sure there will be a lot of support to the fundamentalist groups.
Maybe not, but they are the group that has a monopoly on the use of force in the area, and can enforce their hegemony that way.
Same when I
> talked to people in the Baalbek area, they all agree that Hezbollah is doing a
> necessary job,
Baalbek was the birthplace of Hezbollah in Lebanon. opinion might be different in the traditional PLO-leftist zones.
but they all know that Hezbollah is here only because SL is
> occupied.
Yes that is what Hez says and it certainly didn't exist there before the Israeli occupation, it remains to be seen what will happen now. Much depends on the Syrians. Hezbollah may even turn their guns on the Syrians given the brutal smashing of islamic resistance in Syria.
The people I talked to (who may be a minority though) felt deceived
> both by the PLO and by Israel when they successively occupied SL and, at least
> for them, Hezbollah was credible as a resistance force.
Sounds right. Both the PLO and to a much greater extent the Israelis acted like brutal occupiers.
Plus the biggest
> problem seemed not so much supporting armed resistance, but getting
> investments from the state to rebuilt the infrastructure in the Bekaa valley
> and the area close to the SL 'border'.
The Bekaa was for a long time one of the leading producers of hash and heroin in the world but I've read that production has ended completely, due to eradiction programs under Syrian control. Do the Syrians still have a large presence there? If the area remains under Hezbollah control, the needed investment may come from Iran or even Saudi Arabia.
I was shocked to see most of the
> tourist areas in Beyruth re-constructed with huge 5 stars hotels and Bank
> buildings while the areas far from the coast (and even parts of the city) are
> left totally abandonned. People in Baalbek tolb me that what the state was not
> doing here, Hezbollah was doing it, by creating 'social security' networks,
> running hospitals for the poors, providing education etc...
Hezbollah does have a lot of money, supposedly from the Iranians. They deny this: http://www.hezbollah.org or http://www.moqawama.org
I do not endorse the contents of these websites but there is some good info in them..
Sam pawlett