The Middle East & Edith Piaf

Yossi Beilin… I liked him during Oslo…I adored him afterwards…then I was disappointed with him…till a friend of mine explained to me accurately his motives and position regarding all the confusing issues in the Middle East…

Nowadays, I listen to what he has to say with respect and with my friend’s diagnosis of him in my mind…

He is an academic not a politician…So I let you understand it the way you want…

Today I read something he wrote and I kept in mind these few words of him:
“Those who pay the price of these mistakes are Israelis and Palestinians, who see peace moving further away, and meanwhile are forced to live with lack of security
and concern over the next war, which is facing them from newspaper headlines.”

We in Lebanon are living the same situation: lack of security and concern over the next war which is facing us from newspaper headlines…

Another friend of mine called me two days ago to tell me she cancelled her wedding in Beirut and she will do it somewhere else maybe in Qatar…because of the information or rumours that there will be another war this summer in Lebanon…

We are all talking about the coming war…Investors, businessmen and entrepreneurs are all freezing their activities waiting for the summer war…

Is that a normal life? Well it depends whom you are asking…If you are asking someone outside the Middle East…you will get a pale, outraged face…

If you ask a person living in the Middle East… you will get a nonchalant person…saying to you coldly: “God help us”…

Well the secret is that even though you keep on hearing bad news coming from the Middle East, there are beautiful lives being lived everywhere from the Mediterranean sea to the Gulf…

And this secret got to me yesterday while I was watching “La Mome” (the French movie about Edith Piaf’s life)… Edith Piaf the great French singer had a miserable life from the day she was born till the day she died in 1963…But despite all the sadness, misery and disasters she was able to become that great world-known singer…She was able to excel and produce "greatness"

The Middle East is like Edith Piaf… Despite all the destruction, sadness, and misery…you can see the love of life in people’s eyes… You can see their "greatness"