One man’s opinion, but important to hear

Lebanese Catholic expresses solidarity with Israeli soldiers
TEL AVIV, Israel (CNS) — Sharbel Salameh, a Maronite Catholic and Lebanese refugee living in Hadera, Israel, grew up thinking Israeli soldiers were the good guys. Salameh said he remembers his father’s stories about when his family was still in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1982, and Israel was trying to evict the PLO. “We brought the Israeli soldiers flowers, threw rice on them, a symbol of blessings, and sang them songs,” he told Catholic News Service in a telephone interview Aug. 3. Later the family moved to Klayaa near the south Lebanese army base in Marj Uyun. The army worked to prevent Hezbollah outposts from growing near the Israeli border, but things changed in May 2000 when Israeli forces withdrew from Lebanon. Pressured by Syria and Hezbollah, the Lebanese government endorsed Hezbollah’s claims that Israel still occupied Lebanese land even after Israel’s withdrawal. Salameh and his family of five, along with 7,000 Maronites, other Christians, Muslims and Druze, fled Lebanon, seeking political asylum in Israel. Salameh, 24, said he doesn’t agree with a Beirut Center for Research and Information report that said 80 percent of Christians in Lebanon support Hezbollah, as reported July 28 by The Christian Science Monitor. “There is no way. This makes me angry,” Salameh said. “None of my friends in Lebanon support the Hezbollah.