Ironic that after 33 days of air and sea bombardment you would celebrate a ceasefire with fireworks and anti-aircraft fire. But there it is – the skies over Beirut are filled with explosions again tonight. This time, it is friendly fire. It wasn’t at 6 this morning when a few blasts rocked the southern suburbs – parting shots by Israel two hours before the ceasefire took place I went out today to a school I’d visited the first day I arrived here. Within hours of the ceasefire, many of the people living there were already packing up. Battered cars and vans were loaded with foam mattreses, tied tight to the roof, and driven off to wards the rubble of the south. It remindds me so much of the return to Kosovo in 1999. People don’t wait for resolutions or promises before they head home. Many are there as I write this tonight. And even though this ceasefire is tentative at best – like chaining two pit bulls together and telling them to be good until someone gets home to watch them – it was nice to see smiles today on the faces of those who have been suffering here.
August 14th, 2006 | by David in Humanitarian Aid, Travel
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