Tuesday, March 08, 2005

Evidence of Lebanese Divisions: Washington Post reports: "In a Zogby poll of 1,250 Lebanese conducted in November, 58 percent of those surveyed said they opposed the U.N. resolution, engineered by the United States and France. Nearly half also said Syrian-Lebanese relations needed "improvement or restructuring outside American and French interventions." Other findings: "On the critical matter of who they hold responsible for the assassination, there is a deep division. About one-half of Maronites and Druze feel that either Lebanese or Syrian authorities were involved. On the other hand, only 14% of Shi’a Lebanese point their accusing finger in that direction, while more than 70% claim that either Israel or the United States were involved. Hariri’s own Sunni community and Orthodox Christians are divided, with equal numbers pointing to Syria/Lebanon and U.S./Israel as the suspected culprit."