Lebanon and freedom

A great article in the Lebanon Daily Star today:

More grievous, the country's history and its vivid accomplishments were overlooked or maligned. Lebanon was held accountable for the collective violence to which it was being subjected, though the evidence showed it was no more than a proxy battlefield for other peoples' wars. There is a painful irony here: that the once vibrant republic, after decades of political subservience to one of the most autocratic and ruthless regimes in the region, should continue to be declared unfit to govern itself or to enjoy the most basic civil virtues. The only Arab country which could boast of periodic and relatively free elections has had to suffer the indignity of putting up with inept leaders not of its own choosing.

There was a time when those of us who harbor deep-seated resistance to violence and other belligerent strategies of change took heart from other troubled spots in the world. We marveled at how, often in the least likely of places, whether in Eastern Europe or China, the springtime of nations ushered in signs of change. Collective icons of defiance, voices of resistance, wrath and determination, shook the conscience of the world, reawakening it to lingering injustices.

Emphasis mine. Lebanon has been subjected to invasion and oppressive rule by nations such as Syria for decades and it seems to me they're quite sick of it. As the pictures we've seen out of Lebanon are any indication, the Maronites, Phalangists and Muslims are ready to get back to being a nation without Bashar's thugs riling things up.