Word: baalbek
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Hizballah decided to change its image two years ago. It opened a press office and vaunted its large, modern hospitals in Baalbek and Beirut and social programs that had created widespread Shi'ite loyalty. Last year eight of its candidates won seats in Lebanon's 128-member parliament. Symbolizing the new look, groups of Hizballah supporters lined the main road between Beirut and southern Lebanon last week, holding out plastic boxes to collect relief contributions from motorists...
...Task Force 160 may have actually attempted but failed to free the hostages," says Wheaton. He points out that North had precise intelligence on the hostages' location. Five of the six Americans were being held in Building No. 18 in the Sheik Abdullah barracks in the Baalbek region of Lebanon. "Very possibly," adds Wheaton, "North ordered the raid after irate Iranian officials threatened to retaliate for a shipment of the wrong Hawk missiles." In fact, three days before the Gander crash, North revealed both his determination to continue the Iranian arms shipments and his concern for the hostages' safety...
Lest anyone doubt it, the main road into Baalbek bears a sign saying "Martyrs of Islam Street, the road to Jerusalem." A 15-ft.-high replica of Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque stands in the middle of the highway. Nearby, the side of a building is painted with the face of Ayatullah Khomeini and the words ISRAEL MUST BE WIPED OUT OF EXISTENCE...
...despite these good works, the people of Baalbek resent the Iranian accents affected by their local sheiks, the ban on alcohol and the isolation of their economy. "Lebanese Shi'ites are a joyful people," says Hussein, 40, a shopkeeper. "We don't mind Hizballah fighting Israel, but they're not fighting Israel from Baalbek. Whenever there is an Israeli attack anywhere in Lebanon, they turn on the air-raid siren. It's a good way to politicize people. But if they hear people are dancing in the park at Ras-el-Ain, they also turn on the air-raid siren...
...late afternoon, as the sun god worshiped here by the ancients transforms the acropolis to a glowing pink, visitors clamber beneath friezes of grapevines and laughing fauns. Zeinab, 26, a Shi'ite woman from Baalbek, trudges down the dusty road past the temple of Venus carrying a bag of bread and an empty bucket. She is eight months pregnant and wears a long, loose- fitting dress. "The tourists should wear what they want to. I like to see them," she says. "Since they started coming, it feels a lot freer...