Word: lebanon
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...first year working in Lebanon, I met with an American official at a café in East Beirut. Embassy officials can't easily leave their compound, on a hill outside the city, thanks to security procedures that treat this normally fun-loving Mediterranean country as if it were Iraq or Sudan. That's because the previous embassy was destroyed by a suicide car bombing in 1983, an attack that the U.S. blames on Hizballah, the Shi'ite Muslim Party of God that had been formed a year earlier to resist the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. But this café meeting...
...placed on the leadership council of Lebanon's Shi'ite militant group Hizballah by Ayatollah Khomeini when the group was founded in 1982. Mousavi does not recognize Israel, though he has condemned the Holocaust...
...After Israel assassinated the movement's leader, Abbas al-Mussawi, in 1992, Nasrallah took over as the group's secretary-general. Capitalizing on its growing clout among sympathetic Lebanese and claiming a spot under the ideological umbrella of Iran's ayatollah, Nasrallah entered Hizballah into Lebanon's general election that year; the group won eight parliamentary seats, solidifying its legitimacy. Meanwhile, the group continued its steady stream of attacks against Israeli troops in southern Lebanon until Barak, then Prime Minister, ordered their withdrawal in 2000 - allowing Hizballah to proclaim the achievement of their 18-year mission...
...support from Arab nationalists and the backing of Iran and Syria. Meanwhile, many Lebanese Shi'as revere Hizballah for its social and educational-development programs. Many Western governments, meanwhile, consider it a terrorist group; it was placed on the U.S. State Department's terrorist list in 1999. Lebanon's ruling March 14th coalition has also blamed the organization for destabilizing the region and unnecessarily embroiling Lebanon in a near-30-year conflict with Israel. In 2006, a second conflict exploded between Hizballah and Israel; the resulting battle killed more than 1,000 Lebanese civilians, only adding to Lebanese discontent with...
...government has continued in the runup to the 2009 election. A 2008 dispute over accusations that Hizballah was using its telecommunications systems for terrorist purposes led to deadly brawls and riots in the street. And while both groups seem poised to continue in their current roles following Lebanon's latest elections, there's no indication Hizballah will take the defeat lying down. "We consider that Lebanon is ruled by partnership, and whatever the results of the elections are, we cannot change the standing delicate balances or repeat the experiences of the past," noted Hizballah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah. "Whoever wants political...