Two memorial ceremonies in Lebanon

Four chimes marked the exact time Rafik Hariri was assassinated. A crowd stood in Martyr Square where Hariri is buried. The talk today was conciliatory and focused on unity and democracy. The main attraction was Hariri’s son who was greeted like a rock star. There is increasing disagreement over who’s to blame for futile attempts to elect a president. The ruling coalition led by Hariri openly suspects a group of Shiites but including some Christian politicians of holding up the election of a president in order to grab power, but the Shiites say the ruling bloc is trying to force their choice which isn’t the way things work here. The problem is right now, no one is pleased and the sides have warned of violence with small gun battles breaking out in various places. Some say this is the tensest time since Lebanon’s civil war ended in 1990. But supporters of Hariri are confident they’re not heading back to those times. A few miles south the Other Lebanon was having a memorial of its own, Hezbollah for Mughniya who was killed in a car bomb. Another Hezbollah leader put the blame squarely on Israel and promised a day of reckoning for the Jewish State, another issue which divides this country.