World Events in a Month

This corner is edited by: Ziyara Ammad

And suddenly the center of international gravity shifted to Lebanon; for its recent events have occupied world public opinion and overshadowed all the other international problems, intractable and otherwise — some of them standing between East and West, others the subject of negotiation and deliberation among numerous parties. The question of convening a summit conference among the great powers, the questions of Africa and Asia, and Algeria, and the white coup that is carrying General de Gaulle, with unparalleled speed, to the presidency of the French government — all these questions have come to occupy second place in world and international circles, in view of the emergency situation in Lebanon.

We are not now about to recount the details — all the details — of the developments of the Lebanese events; but in the light of the government's statements, documents, and proofs, and of the opposing front's replies, declarations, and accusations, we come away with an idea in which there is no ambiguity and no obscurity: that the hand which reached out from beyond the borders, across Lebanon, has played a principal role in stirring up the disturbances, the strikes, and the bloody incidents in our beloved country; and the matter is not a question of the renewal of a term of office, or the amendment of a constitution... nor of the presidency of President Chamoun, nor of the survival of Premier Solh's government...

Yet Lebanon, when it finally decided to have recourse to the international Security Council and to the Council of the League of Arab States, went, on the one hand, to the utmost depths of the end, and drew near, on the other, to the middle way — out of concern for the Lebanese interest, and for the Arab interests themselves. And these two things had of necessity to be adopted.

And if recourse to the Security Council, or to the Council of the League of Arab States, vexes some people, or complicates in their souls what they call an internal political struggle — which in reality it is not — nevertheless this recourse, from the broader standpoint, is a thing to be welcomed, because it shows the world the destructive means that were used before in Jordan, the Sudan, Libya, and Tunisia; indeed this very recourse may provide a solution to them.

It is our conviction that Lebanon, the beautiful country — commanding by its position the meeting place of the world's civilizations, trades, and cultures, and in the light of its history in the fields of thought and learning and the highest values — must remain the country of peace and tranquility, and the sacred home of liberty, outside whose regions the free men of the world will find no refuge, should the skies darken and the winds of injustice blow.

However that may be, it is to be hoped that the cloud which has blackened the skies of the Arab East will pass away, and that the light of serenity, tranquility, and peace will spread over the lands of the East.