|
A.C.N - Aid to the Church in Need Italian Office |
Religious Freedom in
the Majority Islamic Countries |
|
Lebanon Population: (est.
’97) 3,000,000
The last 50 years of Lebanese history have been characterised by a progressive disintegration of the political and social unity, leading finally to the outbreak of a veritable civil war between Maronite Christians and Muslims in the middle years of the 1970s. The years which followed saw Lebanon ever more exposed to the designs of surrounding countries (Syria and Israel above all) and torn apart internally by an endemic state of conflict and by powerful tensions with the large Palestinian community. Finally, the country witnessed a double occupation of its territory - in the south by Israeli forces in the so called "security zone" and by the Syrians in the Bekaa Valley. In 1982, Israel proceeded with a general invasion of Lebanon under its operation "Peace in Galilee" which aimed to eliminate the Palestinian threat on its borders. Its relative military success ended up by finally consigning Lebanon to Syria, which today exercises a sort of protectorate there and has replaced the guerrilla warfare of the PLO with that of Islamic fundamentalism. The bloody war that engulfed Lebanon has in practice critically endangered the model of inter-religious cohabitation upon which Lebanon had prospered. Following the creation of the state in 1920 it was above all the so-called "national pact", laid down in 1943 by the principal religious communities within Lebanon, which enabled the Christian Maronite and the Islamic communities to live together peaceably for many years. This national pact provided for a division of the political and public powers proportional to the size of the different communities; it involved a system of reciprocal guarantees aimed at preventing the predominance of one community over the other. Although the pact is still theoretically in force, the defeat of the Maronites in the civil war, the Syrian military occupation and the exodus of thousands of Christians from their homes have brought about a worrying situation. With the defeat of the Christian faction in 1983, the situation for the Lebanese Christians has gradually grown worse, above all through their abandonment by the West. Over three quarters of the victims of the war, according to Didier Rance, were Christians. Along with these must be included not only the victims of the military bombardments and of the terrorist attacks but also those who were deliberately killed for their Christian Faith. Among them there were a number of priests, over 30 male and female religious, and lay people, adults as well as children. We record here just a few of those cases listed by Didier Rance in Chrétiens du Moyen-Orient. Témoins de la Croix. Between the end of August and the 2nd of October 1983, over 1,200 Christians were massacred in the Chouf mountain regions and around a thousand more disappeared without trace. Added to these deliberate massacres was the systematic destruction of every trace of a Christian presence. Walid Jumblatt, the leader of the Druze militia and then vice president of the Socialist International, boasted of having had 4,000 Christians massacred, and to those who visited him he would show off the booty from the raids carried out by his men, which included the bells of looted churches. In December 1984 a Lebanese seminarian, Ghasibé Kayrouz was assassinated. Before this three friends of his, with whom the young man had taken part in a spiritual retreat, were also assassinated. Ghasibé was murdered as he returned to his village of Nabha on December 22. A few months after this it was the turn of Father Nicolas Kluiters, who had accompanied Ghasibé on his spiritual journey. On March 14 1985, as he was returning from Beirut where he had gone to renew his passport, Father Kluiters, a Jesuit priest, was kidnapped. His lifeless body was found on April 1 at the bottom of a 300-ft deep gorge, close to the village of Nabha. The situation grew worse with the abandonment of the country by President Michel Aoun and the military victory of Syria who, with the Taif Agreements at the end of the war in October 1989, imposed its own rule over Lebanon and forced the country to adopt a purely quantitative criterion in its political system, without taking account of the historic civil contribution made by the Christians to the construction of the nation. The Islamist parties of the Hizbollah, moreover, demanded the establishment of an Islamic state and the application of Islamic law to the Christians and Jews. A further crisis occurred following the dynamite attack on a church in Zouk Mosbeh, near Juniyah on February 27 1994 which caused the deaths of nine people and injury to another 55. This was followed by the dissolution of the Party of the Lebanese Forces and the life sentence on its leader Samir Geagea, on June 25 1995. Dozens of Christians were arrested in December 1996 during the Christmas period. They were accused of being Israeli agents. The arrests followed a number of terrorist attacks against Syrian workers in Lebanon serving the 35,000 soldiers of the Syrian army. Many of the 60 persons arrested belonged to the Maronite community and were involved in nationalist political movements which were demanding the withdrawal of the Syrians from Lebanon. Many of those arrested were subsequently released, although some of them were still facing charges by a military tribunal. One of these, the journalist Pierre Atallah, was accused of having had contacts with Israel and having distributed pamphlets in some predominantly Christian towns inciting the Lebanese troops to disobey orders. Another Christian, Ghassan Bardawil, was accused of having "disturbed the relations of Lebanon with friendly countries", though there was no explicit reference to Syria. Cardinal Nashrallah Sfeir, patriarch of the Maronite Church in Lebanon, has expressed serious doubts as to the legality of such detentions, and in general concerning the behaviour of the security forces. Human rights violations in Lebanon have been denounced by the International Federation of Human Rights Leagues. In July 1998 the situation of the refugees from the Civil War was still a grave one. The displaced people from the Lebanese war, numbering some 400,000 people - most of them of Christians - once again saw their hopes of returning to their own homes dashed as a result of the rivalry dividing Walid Jumblatt, the Socialist leader of the Druze community and Minister for the Affairs of the refugees, and Rafic Hariri, who is responsible for the "central fund for the refugees". As a result of this political struggle, the wounds of the refugees are destined to remain open for some time still. According to the most reliable estimates, just 15 per cent of the refugees have returned to their villages of origin. The continuing crisis has now obliged many families to settle abroad, thus further swelling the ranks of the Lebanese emigrants, according to a report by the agency Fides of July 24 1998. The Maronite Bishop Bechara Rai, of Byblos, speaking in an interview to KNA on May 13 1998, described the visit of Pope John Paul II to Lebanon in 1997 and the publication and release of the document New Hope in Lebanon as having made a great impression on the Church and on the country and ushered in a new era. The Lebanese people had been given the possibility of showing all their affection for the Pope who, in his turn, made clear his spiritual closeness and human solidarity. Through all the misunderstandings and adversities he showed himself a friend to the country, affirming that Lebanon is a "message" for the East and the West. He reawakened the memory of a great past and gave the young a sense of hope for the future. At the pastoral level the Church must face the moral and religious consequences of the years of war and of a powerful wave of secularisation. Nevertheless she tirelessly supports and promotes the religious revival in many families and among the young, with a growth of the apostolate even among the laity. The universities, the hospitals, the religious centres and the schools are very active. The situation is such that the Christians as a minority are experiencing a general uprooting which is leading to impoverishment or emigration. Christians and Muslims are now suffering the consequences of the economic and political crisis that has followed the war, the occupation of southern Lebanon and the reinforced presence of non-Lebanese armed forces. The Christians feel themselves politically marginalised, they face resistance to their hope for a just political and social system, to say nothing of democratic freedoms. There is a fear that Lebanon is losing its identity and that a wave of Islamic fundamentalism is threatening the co-existence of Christians and Muslims, even though in the past this represented the model of a pluralist society. The Christians ask themselves anxiously what will be the future of the Lebanese state among the nations and wonder when the violations of their national integrity, sovereignty and independence will come to an end. The consequences of this state of affairs are corruption, violation of human rights and the neutralisation of the constitutional organs of the country. The dialogue between Christians and Muslims is an experience of life in common. It expresses itself on three levels - in everyday life, in culture and in the national life. The structure of Lebanese society is very stratified; the Arab culture is at the base of their common heredity, the national pact provides for the common interests of Christians and Muslims in the political forum and in public administration. This dialogue, which is normal at the level of the ordinary people, is becoming more difficult at the political level because the politicians are not free to make the decisions which affect the good of the nation. With the election in 1998, albeit still guided by Syria, of General Emile Lahoud as President of the Republic, the Maronite bishops have expressed the hope that the country may be renewed, hoping that the new Head of State "can guide this people, who have such need of national reconciliation at every level, putting an end to the corruption of the administrative system and making possible the return of the displaced and the repatriation of those who have emigrated". With the phenomenon of emigration - largely Christian emigration in fact - at least since 1978, there has been a marked fall in the number of schools, of Christian secondary and university students, and also of qualified professionals, businessmen and the young work force. At the same time there is a growth in the Islamic educational and social institutes, which are taking the place of the Christian ones, closed partly as a result of the forced population movements within the Lebanese borders which, from 1975 to 1986, have affected an estimated 670,000 Christians and just 157,500 Muslims. One sign of hope is to be seen in the reopening for worship in November 1998 of the Church of St Michael, in Beirut, at one of the hottest spots on the former Green Line which used to divide the Lebanese capital into two sectors. |
|