Beirut Security Crackdown Shows a City Divided

BEIRUT, Lebanon -- "Here's my schedule: sleep, eat, go to the bathroom, pray, and stand guard. I've been here five days now," says a Lebanese youth encamped in front downtown Beirut. He, like the many others living in the now semi-deserted tent city, is demanding that western backed Prime Minister Fuad Siniora's government step down before the next elections in 2009. The tents, which sprung up in December 2006, used to hold thousands. Now, protesters move in and out of the camps in shifts, keeping the numbers in the hundreds. However, Hezbollah's leader, Hassan Nasrullah claims to be able to call upon thousands to refill the camp at a moment's notice.

Directly in front of the tents, separating them from the government buildings, government supporters, and the rest of downtown Beirut, is a razor wire and metal fence barrier manned by Lebanese army troops and armored vehicles. The downtown area just beyond both groups is largely closed. Most every business in the once thriving part of the city now closes hours earlier than usual and heavy concrete barriers line the sidewalks in an effort to prevent car bombings. The endless droves of pedestrians shopping and dining well into the night in the soft orange glow of the down town street lights have almost completely disappeared. Barbed wire and army soldiers clash with the sheek and stylish boutiques and restaurants that once attracted Lebanon's elite.

These few square kilometers of city are largely representative of the rest of Beirut. It is now, a city divided under armed guard. Sunnis, Shias, Christians, and Druise all live in largely segregated neighborhoods throughout the city. Turf is marked with different signs, flags, and posters. For example: Shias, with Hezbolla or Amal Movement flags and Sunnis, with white flags that read "Future Youth."

Most school children are largely ignorant when it comes to the details of the 1975-1990 Lebanese Civil War. In schools, where logistics force different sects together, the discussion of such a topic is highly discouraged for fear of raising old hatreds and racisms in Lebanon's youth. A whole chapter is missing from the history books. The curse words and racist slurs banned in western schools have found their equivalents in Beirut with the old military slogans and songs of the Lebanese Forces and Shia militias. The tension is so high in fact, that something that seems as every day as a minor car accident warrants police and army personnel with assault rifles when they happen in places where different factions meet to insure the peace is kept.

Army check points, already a common sight in the embattled capitol, are becoming an ever more frequent eye sore. They have also been given a boost in firepower, with tanks and APCs springing up in front of foreign embassies and in highly frequented roadways. In front of police and army stations, metal barricades are put up in the road in such a pattern as to force traffic to slow down, swerve left, right, and then left again. These barricades are put up in order to deter drive by bombings and shootings. Even random vehicle searches are conducted from time to time - jamming busy city streets - in order to uncover weapons.

With Lebanese troops and Fattah al Islam militants still fighting in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli, the army is stretched tenuously thin. Also compounding the dangers is the recent uncovering of an extensive network of Al Qaeda operatives in the country, who claim to have been present as sleeper cells for years. The question on everyone's mind seems be: is there another war on the way?