A colleague sent me this:
"As if you need one more account but let me share this with you in agreement with your latest update "Israel's False Assumptions.." I left Lebanon on July 13th. I come from Qab Elias in Central Bekaa. The town has Sunni and Christian population only (my brother's wife being the only Shii there, I guess). On the 12th and the 13th, everybody I met was very mad at Nasrallah, cursing him and the Party. I was in CHtoura on those two days as well and there was a similar mood. My driver who took me to Syria was from Bar Elias (mainly Sunni) and he too was mad as hell at the Party. The Party had earned respect in those towns until the events following Hariri's assassination. I phoned my family on July 15th and I got a totally different reaction this time. Israel's vicious reaction turned the clock to pre-Hariri's assassination time. I heard no word of criticism of the Party and the Party's ability to damage the Israeli battleship elevated Nasrallah to his previously high stature. Qab Elias is now housing Shi'i refugees, 40 of them by my family. The help the refugees is getting from the town is formidable. There is a sense of solidarity that was very lacking before July 14th. People there are doing their best to help the refugees and no one I have talked to (land lines in the Bekaa too are still working), no one wants to level any criticism against Nasrallah and the Party now. So, yes, the Party's ability to show Israel the red eye, Israel's brutality, and equally important, the US's blind support to the bombing campaign have created a sense of defiance among many and haven't produced the results Israel would have liked."