Who loves Lebanon!
January 16, 2021
By Ismail Shaaban
A point of view and hope that it will be useful and contain a sermon and a road map for those who claim to love Lebanon. Because the word “Love” has no limits in definition, and varies from person to person and from one society to another. That is why I want to shed light on this word, which is the essence of all humans, and the label that titles his and her humanity.
Let’s define and try to dwell into the word love! I don’t want to go to language references or to psychology, or to any religious reference. I want to say it as I understand the expression and definition according to what I have known, and lived through the long years of my life, that gave me short words in the definition of love.
Love is a feeling and performance in my concept. There may be among the minds and concepts of human beings’ other definitions that may be exalted and exalted beyond my conception of them, but I want to send them in their simple and innate sense that is understood or understood by the general public and their own.
Love: feeling and performing, sacrifice and giving: how can it be?
Love is an innate thing created by the Creator in the depths of the human soul and has two directions:
A human trend: it is the love of man for man, and the love of the land and the homeland on whose soil every member of the human family lives.
The second and most important trend is the love of your images, your universe, your creation and your creation.
What interests me in this letter or article is man’s love for man and man’s love for his homeland and the land on which he lives, and on which his ancestors and fathers have lived for thousands of years. Love that is intrinsic in its formation and authentic in its expression and dissemination, and preserved when one in us removes the garment of selfishness from him. Rather, he empties his soul, conscience and mind of them until he understands the meaning of true love.
Everyone in the beloved homeland of Lebanon claims to love this holy spot and the divine aura that Al-Wajid loved this country with in terms of beauty in nature and climate! So that we may know those who claim to love Lebanon, and those who are hypocritical in loving it and deceiving others in love with it, let us see how much they really loved it. And how did they love him? And how much do they love him?
As I said before, love is about feeling, performing, sacrificing and giving! Let’s see who gave Lebanon this innate concept, and who did not give it but took from it. I am not exaggerating when I say that he deprived him, stole and looted him, but conspired against him and betrayed the four simplest meanings and elements of love that I mentioned: feeling and performance, giving and sacrifice.
Let us go on this journey through true love and with the journey of feeling:
The feeling is the deep sense that envelops the soul and dwells in the depths of our hearts of belonging, pride and belonging to a spot of the earth called Lebanon, and we all call it the homeland. If the individual who lives on its soil does not have an emotional affiliation and a sense of pride that it is part of its soil, sky and water, then the first element of love has been absent, but rather a first step to destroy that feeling.
Feeling: It is belonging and pride to a part of the earth called Lebanon. If the individual who lives on his soil does not have a deep spiritual and emotional affiliation, and a sense of pride that he is part of his soil and that he is a cloud from his sky, and a drop of water from his river and sea. It is a first step to destroy that feeling and belonging that surrounds the principle of patriotism and belonging to the homeland of Lebanon, because without patriotism there is no dignity, and with it there is no principle and purpose. Therefore, when one of us has this sense of belonging, he makes him rise to the next steps of love: performance, giving and sacrifice.
The sensual and moral sense of patriotism of this important element of love is what makes Alfred grow up to love his homeland and be ready to pay what is in terms of material and moral taxes in order to protect and defend it by all available means from being trampled by the feet of enemies or occupied by a villain, traitor or tuck.
Feeling is an innate thing created with man and grows according to political, economic and social conditions, if these conditions are available with high specifications and self-rejection, and taming souls to kill selfishness and its valley in souls, you will see generations refined in taste and in behavior and in the concept of love.
Sectarianism are fighting this principle, because belonging and the real feeling of the homeland is no longer for the homeland and the inhabitants of the homeland, but its biggest concern in this direction of feeling is towards its sect, party and sect. This is not how countries are built if they want to be a country where justice, equality and a sense of love are enveloped by a sense of responsibility.
As for the performance factor of love: it is the one in which the individual is proven in society, and the talk is about the Lebanese society, which belongs to an Arab nationality in its comprehensiveness and essence, in which all the elements of this nationality come together, including language, heritage, customs and common history over the centuries.
This must give and even generate in the Lebanese man good performance in the fields of love has shaken off the dust of sectarianism and sectarianism, and laid the rules of performance for his homeland and his people so that his society rises to the degree of credit, charity, justice and equality.
The politicians who have ruled Lebanon since its independence did not have any king or possess any of the elements of love for this country and this people. Because (what is built on falsehood is false), and it may be destructive. French colonialism left Lebanon after several years of military occupation, and left many traps in it, all far from the essence of love and its meanings.
Creating sectarian and sectarian societies that distribute the shares of the homeland among themselves and continue to be distributed for a century. He left behind leaders and leaders of parties and sects, most of whose concern was not the homeland and citizens, but how much he could loot and steal! It shall have an impact on all social, political and economic arenas. Each of these sects, parties and sects divided all of Lebanon as it wanted for them and for them France.
The Lebanese society entered the tunnel of hurricanes and destructive social tremors, which almost killed it and its inhabitants, and kept it hostage to the political and economic conditions in neighboring countries and in the region in which it was found, and in a state of constant alert for what may occur from the various regional tensions in which the Lebanese arena is the first pillar. Especially when this small country with its geography carried the great challenges and stood in front of any aggression or attempt to invade and control it.
This is why it has become a major target for penetration and an attempt to tear it apart and fragment it, thinking that the West has established in it the cancer of sectarianism and sectarianism that they may need to raise in it to cross through it to their plans and strategies to protect the entity they planted on its borders. Thinking that this country, which they thought was weak and weak, could not stand in the face of their colonial plans to destroy the region and fragment what is fragmented in it, in order to facilitate their full control over it and the great homeland, and to pass all their plans for the safety of residence and acceptance of the Zionist state, which is on the borders of the Lebanese homeland.
The performance of all sects, without exception, was a sectarian and sectarian performance injected with deadly hatred between all its sects. Any society in which you do not find the element of pure human performance and sincerity in this performance without discrimination or rejection of any group will remain a dilapidated society weak and weak in which the failed and destructive winds of change play.
If performance does not have sincerity and a sense of patriotism and a firm belonging to it with all its differences, it will not have any step towards progress, prosperity and equality among members of society, because there are favoritism, faces, and quotas allocated to each sect and each sect.
And the performance is covered by the fact of who is the enemy and who is the friend! Because in the concepts of Eastern customs and in their societies the saying that is considered about the element of performance: “(The enemy of your enemy is a friend, and the friend of your enemy is not an enemy!)” even if he is from the family of the individual and the closest people to him.
When performance is complete and based on an understanding of everything that goes on and what is happening, society as a whole is in a comprehensive and general unity in dealing with the enemy and friend. Because it is not logical that the enemy and friend in any society are equal in the performance of the individual in society on the basis of enmity and friendship.
The enemy is the enemy, and the friend is the friend until he changes or changes in his performance in the essence of love that all members of society, especially the Lebanese society, must come together on.
Performance is the interference in the paths of domestic and foreign policy and love of the homeland with all its factors, elements and components, and it is the way and behavior that politicians turn to at home and abroad in order to be great examples in performance, and so that society trusts them. If their performance is for their own benefit or the interest of their group, sect or sect, then this balance of performance, which is an important element of love, is disturbed.
Whenever the performance of politicians in Lebanon is honorable, patriotic and humanitarian, and its performance and loyalty to the Lebanese society and the Lebanese homeland as a whole, then all causes of economic, social and political destruction begin to fade and disappear, and as our ancestors said: “Justice is the basis of the king”, so how can justice be if thieves and dealers of personal interests are from within society?
Whoever loves Lebanon, this beautiful and wonderful country, will perform in any field where there is a sincere, righteous and faithful performance to all the powers given to him or entrusted to him of responsibilities.
As for the third element, which is giving: this cannot be in a person unless his soul and psyche are instilled on him, and giving is the most important element of love because it is the proof of sincerity and loyalty to the homeland and its inhabitants. The more the individual or the recipient of the responsibility, no matter how big or small, the more this individual will be the focus of the attention of the whole community and the title of their love, appreciation, reverence and respect. Giving has many faces, including material, moral, and commando, which can only be by oneself for the sake of society and its defense.
Material giving: It is for the individual to invest in his homeland and build cultural, health, industrial and agricultural institutions, build various factories and try to feed his people from his agricultural crops, wear his products and industries, and raise his own capabilities in every field. So that society has the ability to adapt to the matters of living life and in equal opportunities in all fields, and raise the standard of living and eliminate poverty and ignorance, and this can only be done by giving. It cannot be by stealing people’s money and buying their money with the money of the corrupt and opportunist who underestimates people’s things or steals the land of people in need. It is about giving them everything they need to survive in their land and property. It is not by fueling people’s feelings against each other, so he takes a team of people to enter them under his cloak and under his responsibility to be false martyrs for him on the day when faces are whitened and faces prevail. Rather, it is just and equitable, not a tool of the outside, and it has been financed by those who do not love the good of their country in order to tamper with people’s lives and livelihoods. Giving cannot be nepotism and opportunism, such as the one who buys with his money various goods, stores them and keeps them in his warehouses until demand for them comes and increases, then takes them out and sells them at the price he wants.
Giving is not to hoard millions and send them to the banks of different countries as foreign investments that may generate huge amounts of money for the investor, but they are outside the borders of his homeland and his people do not benefit from them. So how can this be giving! Giving is to spend what you have been given of material capacity on the society in which you live and belong to it, and start investing it by creating job opportunities and sources of livelihood for members of your community and getting rid of the cases of poverty and destitution that Lebanon and all the communities around it suffer from the surrounding countries. The Sykes and Picot conspiracy between them put artificial borders and wanted each of the countries of the Arab Mashreq to be a private entity independent of each other, and this still exists and is even encouraged that the pain of one nation be several nations! As is the case in Lebanon, there are several states and sects, each with almost every one of the sects with its capital, its independent entity and its leader, from whom the sect or party receives its orders and pensions.
Giving cannot exclude anyone, no matter what! And in any sense! Or in any direction!. Sincere giving is blind and sees only the path of goodness, truth, righteousness and well-being for all. He who has money and has palaces and men who follow his order is not a giver, but an opportunist and a monopoly of what he has, using it to serve his own interests in order to attract or buy with it some consciences of people who are extreme in poverty and need.
If the owner of money, prestige, authority, nepotism and opportunism remember that the one in his hands may be taken from him at some point, and may be taken away from him of the glory and prestige if he looks around him and through history, full of sermons and lessons for those who were like him, where are they and how did they become? Then preach! He gave an unyielding giving, and made everyone in his community happy and justified because he invested in his homeland, raised the capabilities of his people, felt what they felt, and saved them from poverty and disease. Then he is a human being who carries love between the folds of his soul, mind and conscience.
As for the fourth element of love, which is sacrifice: this is the highest element of love, which is found only in a few members of societies and in Lebanese society in particular, and Arab societies in general. The loss of this is what made his pain walk at the tail of the nations and became a scattered nation and scattered and consumed countries because they did not understand the meaning of sacrifice and the reality of giving.
The owner of the sacrifice is the one who protects the members of society and the country as a whole, and sacrifices his soul and blood for the sake of the glory of the homeland, its pride and dignity and the defense of its protectors and its people, it is true to be in the highest ranks of honor, redemption and heroism. Because courage in sacrifice is an instinct carried by a few segments of society and there are many examples of this type of sacrifice of blood and soul in the Lebanese society, the Palestinian society and other Arab societies.
In fact, sacrifice encompasses all the elements and factors of immortal love that is not equal to anything in this life. Whoever sacrifices himself for me and for you so that the members of his society and homeland are in pride and that his soil is not trampled by a colonizer or an occupier, is the highest, deepest and noblest sign of human love since the human being wrote the history of his existence on this earth.