Leading Lebanon from a gilded cage

[bemildred]

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Tough talk on both sides

On a cold night, Harb paced the pavement near the line where demonstrators' tents were pitched next to the tanks and soldiers that seal off the main road to the palace. He turned up the hill, and waved an arm in disgust.

"Here somebody died," he said, referring to a young Shiite Muslim man shot and killed in sectarian-tinged street fighting, "and Siniora is still sitting right up there."

Organizers insist that the demonstration will remain peaceful. Still, some protesters speak of overrunning the palace if the government doesn't leave.

But in a tough-talking interview last week at his heavily fortified home in Beirut, Saad Hariri said that his allies would never be driven from office by the Hezbollah-led demonstrations. Hariri, the head of the Sunni Muslim community and leader of the parliament's majority bloc, said that to give up would be akin to handing Lebanon over to Iran and Syria.

LA Times

[MADem]

1. Outside the cage, the Persians and the Syrians!!!!

"We hear their voices, but we feel no compassion for them," said Fouad Saad, a lawmaker and former Cabinet minister who, in his neat suit, lingered between meetings under the glittering chandeliers of a cavernous reception room. "These people have received orders from Syria and Iran…. They are trying to drag us backward many years."

This is the kernel of a dangerous political standoff. The government stays put, refusing to regard the raucous calls from the protesters for its officials' resignations. Instead, they say, foreign powers are scheming to take over the country.