Today's protest and funeral for Pierre Gemayel

First off, I'd like to announce that I added a new segment to the Conspiracy post, below. I've added another reason why Aoun and Hezbollah may have done it.

Today was the funeral for Gemayel (Wednesday was the mourning). Afterwards there was a big protest at Martyr's square. There were maybe 10-20,000 people there, tops (and that's generous). 'Official' statistics said hundreds of thousands attended. I've been to many a protest, and I'd say that's an extremely stretched number. Other people in attendance felt similary.
First, let me get this out of the way: I attended the protest because I want to know how people feel about the political situation here. Second, I was there to protest the death of an innocent, regardless of political allegiance.
I went down to the protest with three other women, all middle-aged. Two from England and one from France. One, who shall be named something snazzy like Jamila, is a supporter of March 14. This is fine by my standards because I don't support anyone.
Anywho, Jamila and I got to talking. I figured that because she's from England, she'd be more open-minded and willing to talk to me as someone who likes to play the devil's advocate. I asked her her thoughts on why she supports March 14 and who she thought carried out the assasination. Then I asked her about our constitution and the national unity government.**explained below***
What should we do with it? She says that the constitution should not change and that there should be no national unity government. So I ask her why? Doesn't she think the constitution is terribly flawed and outdated? No, she replies. I then sked about the national unity government--should one ber formed, in her opinion? No, she says. Hezbollah wants to take over and start an Islamic regime. They cause a lot of trouble--for instance this past summer's war with Israel. So I said "don't you think that maybe it'd be better to talk to Hezbollah and stop avoiding them (which is what our current government, which is comprised of the March 14 party, has done). Doesn't avoiding the Shi'ites only serve to further the sectarian rift and create more of a state-within-a-state, like Hezbollah has? Then, she went beserk. Turns out that living in England, a place with a stable civil society where people deliberate, not fight, over politics, hasn't served her well. She's a lot like the many Lebanese here--you aren't supporting us 100%, then you're an enemy. There's nothing to discuss (much like my last post).
Right there, in the middle of the Kataeb protestors that are waiving their Kataeb flags while we stand on pictures they burnt of Aoun and Nasrallah, she starts accusing me of being a Nasrallah supporter, very loudly. She's asking me if I want an Islamic state.
"Well, no, I am Christian, and not even religious."
"You want Nasrallah to make an Islamic state!"
I asked her to stop putting words in my mouth, I'd never said that. She stormed off after making another ad hominem attack.
This is what I fear for the country. You are not allowed to question why people believe what they believe if you are not concurring with their opinion. How are we to move forward if we cannot talk?
Anyway, the rest of the protest went a little oddly. I found that it was really divided. The Hariri supporters (Future movement) were in this area, chanting their slogans while the Geagea (Lebanese Forces) supporters retorted with theirs, also in a separate area. And the Kataeb were a bit more spread, but also with their crosses and flags.
Oh yes, good old confessionalism.
The speakers were pretty inciteful, saying things like "If [Syria] wants war, we'll give them war," Geagea said. Maybe not the best thing to belt out to several thousand people if you claim that you're trying to keep the country stable (since they are also pointing a finger to Hezbollah and Aoun by accusing Syria).

Also, in one predominately-Shi'ite town that used to be a Sunni stronghold, leftover Sunni residents tried to hang a picture of Saad Hariri, their leader, by a Nasrallah poster the Shi'ites put up. There were no clashes, but some serious tensions that were forcefully quelled when the army came in. So yes, sectarianism seems to be on the rise, rise rise.


***{I'll put this into context: our constitution is about 60 years old and was influenced by the then colonial power, France. It stipulates that each sect recieves national power according to their numbers. So, at the time of independence, Maronite-Christians were the majority, so they recieved the Presidency. Sunnis came next with the prime ministerialship. Third was Shi'ites who recieved the speaker of the house position. And it goes down accordingly (there are 18 different sects in Lebanon, a country that fits five times into America's smallest state, R.I.). So, 60 years later, our confessional constitution remains intact based on the same consensus we had in the 1930s (no one wants to do a new head count for fear of losing power or wriling up conflict) . Obviously the demagrophics have changed--Christians are a minority and it seems that Shi'ites are probably at 40% of the population whereas before they were the minority (they pop out a lot of babies). So there is discussion now about giving the Shi'ites a more proportionate percentage in the parliament, which would lead to national unity talks and perhaps the changing of our constitution (which is terribly flawed anyway, to every sects' disadvantage.}