“The prison is open” – Impression from south-Lebanon

“The prison is open”

Impression from south-Lebanon

Thinking of South Lebanon, I thought about landscapes coined by unexciting rocks, parched fields and scruffy villages. However, it is spring and our journey to the Southern region was neither as I imagined, nor boring. Rather it was stirring, yet a trip for reflection.

Everything went well, our hospitable guide picked us up in Sidon – the permits for the border-region in his pocket – and we made ourselves comfortable in the car. On the way to Beaufort Castle, our first destination, we passed Nabatiyeh, the place where the Ashura celebration in January took place. Only a tiny road leads up to the castle, which is now a mouldered fortress, built on a huge rock in a strategical position. Little is known about the site, it was captured by Crusaders in 1139 AD, but historians assume that it was, due to the strategic position, already used in Biblical and Roman times. The view was amazing: Mount Hermon and the Anti-Lebanon mass on the left hand, Lebanese villages to the right and Israeli settlements in the distance. For what it is worth, our guide mentioned that the historical figure, called Jesus of Nazareth, was most likely walking on the hilly landscape below us – religious or not, at least a thought-provoking story.

The yellow Hezbollah flag on the top of the castle was still waving, when we left the hill and set forth to the South. Even if the whole region was occupied by Israel till 2000, not until we passed the checkpoint few minutes later, I noticed that we now entered the border region. Along beautiful valleys, green hills and majestic olive trees, we saw the first UNIFIL flags, UN-camps with white tents, white tanks and foreign soldiers. Beside these signs of “war” the area seemed almost inviting to go for a hike or just have a picnic on one of the grass-grown hill rocks. Later on I was told that there is no way for such activities because the valley was peppered with blaster mines in 2006, when the Israeli Air-Force made their last strike – although the peace negotiations where already confirmed – and the valley became a minefield. Even though the UN and the Lebanese army attempt to clean the region, it is a long and expensive process and there are still mines, in the branches of the old olive trees or near the river, sometimes masked as toys.

Through small villages, where young people tuned their scrapped cars, elderly people persuaded their daily business. We drove past old buildings where bullet-holes testify to the aftermath of the war, but the streets were well groomed and far and wide new buildings arise. Most of the money is donated by Iran or other powerful players abroad, which have god relations with Hezbollah, just one reason why the influence of the “political party” is increasing. After the tensions and demolitions of the last years, the government was not able to do the reconstruction; Hezbollah filled the gap, provided schools and other social services for the citizens of the South.

Late in the afternoon, we reached the border. Two huge safety fences, crammed with observation cameras, detached us from the state of Israel. Maybe I was naïve, maybe I was just biased from my European background, where you can travel easily from one country to another, however, it was weird and kind of surreal to sit in a café and look over to the Israeli dugouts only 20 meters away. This border is closed since a long time, and regarding the political situation nowadays, there is no hope that this situation will change soon. On the contrary this small piece of land was and is always a cause to wage a war. We drove along the fences, martyr boards and political signs on the Lebanese side, apple trees, which are in full bloom at the moment, on the other side of the fences. Up on the viewpoint we meet UNIFIL soldiers from Indonesia. The friendly guys took a picture with us, fields of apple trees and a few settlements – seemingly uninhabited – as our background.

I asked myself what this UNIFIL soldiers – coming from Spain, Indonesia or wherever – will do or more accurately, are allowed to do, if the Israeli army strikes again, for whatever reasons. Why are they here, thousands of miles away from their own country, families or friends, not able to speak the language of the local people and probably bored most of the time? I tried to make the best out of it, to trust in the United Nations, to define them as independent and strong, but Rwanda 1994 came up in my mind and idealism lost ground.

We spend he following night in the house of our friend, had a delicious dinner, short hikes in and around the village and long discussion about everything under the sun. On the next day we went to the “Khiam detention centre” where a sign with the letters “The prison is open” greeted us. Originally built in the 1930s as a French barrack complex, it became first a base for the Lebanese army. In 1985, when the civil war was in full operation and the South was under control of Israel, when it was converted into a prison camp. It remained in use for alleged torture of Lebanese civilians until Israel’s withdrawal from the region in May 2000. At least for a short term Hezbollah did revenge and tortured Israeli soldiers as well as collaborators in the same complex. Later on the camp was preserved in the exact condition as it was abandoned and transformed into a museum by Hezbollah. Although the Israeli Air Force destroyed great parts of the complex in 2006 it is still running as a museum. Some dozen people were walking through the destroyed complex, positioned tanks and rockets with Hezbollah and Lebanon flags served as a popular motif. The aim of the museum – beyond displaying the cruelties of the past – is quite clear: to demonstrate the „victory“ and thus power of Hezbollah and to scurf unity against the enemy in the South.

After all this exciting and contemplative impressions, it was time to get on the way home. On the way to the Bekka-Valley, past by tents of several nomad-communities, the landscape changed and grapevines appeared. Two ours later we arrived in Anjar, located near the Syrian border, an ancient Umayyad site. Commissioned by the Umayyad Caliph al-Walid, in the early 8th century, it prospered as a trading city, situated strategically at the crossroad former trade routes. We took a walk in city of 114,000 square-meter, surrounded by the walls, extending 370 meters from north to south and 310 meters east to west. Some 600 shops operated on these main thoroughfares, set back from the rows of columns by a 4.5-meter arcade. The columns and the red bricks of the ruins changed their colour during sunset, for us it was also a sign that it is time to leave.

We reached Beirut late in the evening, as usual the city was wrapped with noise, cars and vibrant live – an atmosphere that I got used to, a heritage where I feel home.

Thomas, 22.03.2010