Word: machmouchi
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...fields of ripe hashish in the northern Bekaa Valley. Rather than standing aside meekly while their hashish was ploughed up as in the past, the farmers this year were determined to protect their lucrative crops. "They shot at us with automatic weapons from nearby woods and houses," Colonel Adel Machmouchi, head of Lebanon's Drug Enforcement Bureau, told TIME. "RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades] were exploding above our heads and we had to leave...
After Colonel Machmouchi and his men were shot at by heavily armed fighters, the annual hashish eradication program was abandoned for fear of provoking a popular uprising against the government. But the farmers say that this year's successful harvest is only the beginning. "We are tired of being hungry. We view the government as an enemy and from now on we are going to grow hashish and we don't care what the government says or tries to do," said Ahmad, a hashish farmer. It is an argument that fails to win the sympathy of Lebanon's drug police...
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