MASSACRE at DAMOUR, 1976: Anniversary 29

Cedarland.org ^

[abu afak]

Damour lay across the Sidon - Beirut highway about 20 km south of Beirut on the slopes of a foothill of the Lebanon range. On the other side of the road, beyond a flat stretch of coast, is the sea.

It was a town of some 25,000 people, containing five churches, three chapels, seven schools, private and public, and one public hospital where Muslims from near by villages were treated along with the Christians, at the expense of the town.

On 9 January 1976, three days after Epiphany, the priest of Damour Father Mansour Labaky, was carrying out a Maronite custom of blessing the houses with holy water. As he stood in front of a house on the side of the town next to the Muslim village of Harat Na’ami, a bullet whistled past his ear and hit the house. Then he heard the rattle of machine-guns. He went inside the house, and soon learned that the town was surrounded.

Later he found out by whom and how many — the forces of Sa’iqa, consisting of 16,000 Palestinians and Syrians, and units of the Mourabitoun and some fifteen other militias, reinforced by mercenaries from Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and a contingent of Libyans.....

Father Labaky telephoned the Muslim sheikh of the district and asked him, as a fellow religious leader, what he could do to help the people of the town. "" can do nothing,’ he was told ‘They want to harm you. It is the Palestinians. I cannot stop them.'" While the shooting and some shelling went on all day, Father Labaky telephoned a long list of people, politicians of both the Left and the Right, asking for help. They all said with apologies and commiserations that they could do nothing. Then he telephoned Kamal Jumblatt, in whose parliamentary constituency Damour lay. ‘Father,’ Jumblatt said, ""I can do nothing for you, because it depends on Yasser Arafat."" He gave Arafat’s phone number to the priest.

[......] [Big snip]

""...In all, 582 people were killed in the storming of Damour. Father Labaky went back with the Red Cross to bury them. Many of the bodies had been dismembered, so they had to count the heads to number the dead. Three of the men they found had had their genitals cut off and stuffed into their mouths.

The horror did not end there, the old Christian cemetery was also destroyed, coffins were dug up, the dead robbed, vaults opened, and bodies and skeletons thrown across the grave yard. Damour was then transformed into a stronghold of Fatah and the PFLP (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine). The ruined town became one of the main PLO centres for the promotion of international terrorism. The Church of St Elias was used as a repair garage for PLO vehicles and also as a range for shooting-practice with targets painted on the eastern wall of the nave.

The commander of the combined forces which descended on Damour on 23 January 1976 was Zuhayr Muhsin, chief of al-Sa’iqa, known since then throughout Christian Lebanon as 'the Butcher of Damour'. He was assassinated on 15 July 1979 at Cannes in the South of France..."""

Ex From 'CEDARLANDS' and READ THE REST AT

[MarshallDillon]

He was assassinated on 15 July 1979 at Cannes in the South of France..."""

Wow! I am glad you posted this. Thanks, MD

[Coleus]

Maronite ping

Our Lady of Victory pray for us.

[dennisw]

And this is part of the reason the Maronite Christians settled accounts at Sabra and Shatila. But only part of the reason since there were many other Muhammadan atrocities during the war in Lebanon.

[abu afak]

Yes DW...

(I post this Every year on whatever boards I'm on (Including at least one other posting last year here.. maybe 2)

Sabra/Shatila were but a payback for many Damours.
(The list is Very Long, if not all as big as Damour.)

Christian Lebanon was Raped and remains so.
The Pre-1975 "Paris of the Middle East"/Beirut is no more.

1 Million Maronites have been purged; many live in North America; they have many Websites with much Info.
I may post more on this.. or links to their sites.

The Lebanese Civil War Happened.. or was in Great Part Catalysed, when Arafat and Co entered in 1970 ... after being thrown out of Jordan for trying to overthrow King Hussein.. (see "Black September")

Arafat and his 'merry band' was on the Damour Mission and as well as other groups named above.

Lebanon remains occupied by the Syrians and the puppet govt they installed, and the Christians there second class citizens, as they are in all of the Arab World.

[Always A Marine]

What a beautiful country. Lebanon will always occupy a special place in my heart...

[dennisw]

Every Christian Lebanese I have met have been good people. I met quite a few in Massachusetts and some in FL.

[abu afak]

There's much to be found from the Many Expatriot sites like:

http://www.clao.com/

http://www.clhrf.com/

http://www.10452lccc.com/

[jungleboy]

book marked

[NYer]

Constituting the largest Catholic Christian group in the Middle East, the Maronites of Lebanon are the devout followers of Saint Maron (d. 410) of Antioch. The Maronites were particularly influential in the creation of the modern state of Lebanon and its independence from the French in 1948. Despite various instances of oppression and persecution throughout their history, the Maronites have managed to remain a dominant force in Lebanese political and cultural life.

* * * * *

Father of Truth

(The Last Prayer of Saint Charbel before he died)

 

Father of truth,

Here is your Son,

The sacrifice in which you are well pleased.

Accept him for he died for me.

So through him I shall be pardoned.

Here is the offering.

Take it from my hands

And so I shall be reconciled with you.

Remember not the sins that I have committed

In front of your Majesty.

Here is the blood which flowered on Golgotha

For my salvation and prays for me.

Out of consideration for this,

Accept my supplication.

I have committed many sins

But your mercy is great.

If you put them in the balance,

Your goodness will have more weight

Than the most mighty mountains.

Look not upon my sins,

But rather on what is offered for them,

For the offering and the sacrifice

Are even greater than the offences.

Because I have sinned,

Your beloved bore the nails and the spear.

His sufferings are enough to satisfy you.

By them I shall live.

Glory be to the Father who sent His Son for us.

Adoration be to the Son who has freed us and ensured our salvation.

Blessed be he who by his love has given life to all.

To him be the glory.

 

from the Maronite Liturgy.

[Siobhan]

Just makes me weep all over again.

And for the present deliverance of Lebanon from the Syrians: Our Lady of the Cedars, pray for us. St. Maron, pray for us. St. Charbel, pray for us. St. Rafqa, pray us. St. Nimatulla, pray for us.

[VOA]

bump

[SJackson]

If you'd like to be on this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.

[Mr. Silverback]

The blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church.

Personal Prerogative Ping!

If anyone wants on or off my ProLife Ping List, please notify me here or by freepmail.

[M. Espinola]

New York Times correspondent David Shipler visited Damour, a Christian village near Beirut, which had been occupied by the PLO since 1976, when Palestinians and Lebanese leftists sacked the city and massacred hundreds of its inhabitants. The PLO, Shipler wrote, had turned the town into a military base, "using its churches as strongholds and armories" (New York Times, June 21st, 1982). When the IDF drove the PLO out of Damour in June 1982, Prime Minister Menachem Begin announced that the town's Christian residents could come home and rebuild.

Returning villagers found their former homes littered with spray-painted Palestinian nationalist slogans, Fatah literature, PLO, and posters of Yassir Arafat. They told Shipler how happy they were that Israel had liberated them.

The next liberation must be to free Lebanon from Hizballah killers and Syrian troops!

[wizr]

Thank you.

[NYer]

Bless you, Siobhan! May the prayers for your fellow christians, be answered.