Thousands unite to mourn Lebanon's martyr

Dec. 5—Thousands came to Beirut’s Martyrs’ Cemetery today to lay to rest Ahmed Mahmoud, 20, the first martyr of the new struggle for democracy in Lebanon. Mahmoud, a member of the Amal Movement, was gunned down two days ago as he returned home from a huge protest rally outside the nation’s parliament.

The killers were believed to be members of Saad Hariri’s Future Movement, which supports U.S.-backed Prime Minister Fuad Siniora. Informed sources say the army has promised not to act against protesters. But the U.S. is reportedly helping build up Lebanon’s Internal Security Force to suppress Lebanon’s democratic opposition.

U.S. State Department spokesperson Tom Casey denounced “threats of intimidation and violence ... aimed at toppling Lebanon’s legitimate and elected government.” He was speaking not of Mahmoud’s assassins but of the massive popular protests against Siniora’s regime. Nearly two million Lebanese—half the country’s people—ringed parliament Dec. 1 to demand the government resign. Tens of thousands remain camped today in central Beirut, vowing to stay until the regime steps down.

The Bush regime is joined in its “concern” by the apartheid state of Israel, the Saudi royal family, King Abdullah of Jordan and Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak regime. Not to mention British Prime Minister Tony Blair and French President Jacques Chirac. All have expressed alarm at the people’s movement that is sweeping this small Arab country.

In an interview Dec. 4, Adnan Kasseir of Hezbollah’s international relations committee charged that the U.S.-backed regime is trying to divert the people’s movement by provoking sectarian war. “They have tried this in Iraq and throughout the region. But we are aware of what is going on. We will not fall into this trap,” he said. “You can see we are here together, people of all communities. We will stay united and we will achieve our goal.”

After Mahmoud’s funeral, sound trucks drove through Beirut’s working-class neighborhoods urging people to stay united and not be provoked into a sectarian struggle.

Tonight in Beirut’s Martyrs Square, thousand of people—Shiite and Sunni Muslims, Maronite and Orthodox Christians, Druse and Armenians, religious and secular—waved lighted candles in Ahmed Mahmoud’s honor. It was an eloquent answer to the Western corporate media, which cast the struggle in Lebanon as one about religion. It was an answer to those who want to divert the Lebanese people’s struggle into a religious civil war.

“This is not a Lebanese dispute,” said Kasseir. “The Siniora government is striking the people’s movement on behalf of the U.S. and Western powers. They are trying to achieve through the back door what the U.S. and Israel could not achieve by war in July. The Lebanese people know this is a fight for independence, against U.S. domination of the region. We are one with struggling people all over the world.”