Ritual: Nahr al-Bared

One more day, bargains Scheharezade.

So it goes at Nahr al-Bared where Fatah al-Islam militants and the Lebanese Army have agreed to a short truce to provide safe passage to women and children long kept in the camp through the fighting.  Al Jazeera English reports that 22 women and 41 children will be searched, debriefed, and returned to their families [1].

Then, I suppose, "fighting" will resume, more soldiers will die, the last of the militant fighters will be martyred, and through the mouths of the spared and others, Fatah al-Islam's stand at Nahr al-Bared will be treated as legend.

Where the western mind wants to separate the notion of "glory" from the grim business and metrics of war, Islam seems to relish its poetry: Fatah al-Islam at Nahr al-Bared held off a nation's army for three months--that's going to serve the heart of some brave tale at the campfire.  Never mind:

• The displacement of some 31,000 already refugee Arabs for whom Nahr al-Bared had become home, albeit with spare comforts but all the services (and then some courtesy of various social and political service sectors) required of shelter;
• Lebanon's extraordinary efforts to spare civilian lives throughout the ordeal, especially the lives of children;
• The warrens of tunnels built as part of the Palestinian defense plan against Israel;
• The thoroughly contemporary arming and provisioning of Fatah al-Islam, from Kalashnikovs to Katyusha rockets.

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1. "Families set to leave Nahr al-Bared."  Al Jazeera English, August 24, 2007.

2. Siddiq, Nazih.  "Families of militants set to leave Lebanon camp."  Reuters, August 24, 2007.

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Correspondence and Permissions: James S. Oppenheim

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