Friday, July 14, 2006

Beirut

Beirut is a city with about the same population as Phoenix or Philadelphia. It looks not unlike a combination of Miami and Los Angeles viewed from along the seafront.

As I write this, more than a quarter million Israelis and Lebanese are hunkered down in bomb shelters. There are more than 10,000 Americans trapped in Beirut along with countless other tourists. They have no escape. Usually, one Beirut journalist pointed out, the tourists have to look hard to see signs of the devastating civil war that tore the city apart--which they usually don't. Now they are eyewitnesses. The death toll keeps rising. World stock markets are plummeting.

Imagine if Great Britain had bombed Miami when that tourist was carjacked a few years ago.

They might as well hold a gun to the entire planet. I'm supposed to be practicing my detachment and meditation for peace. But I'm still too angry.


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