Hizbullah paraphernalia tops sales during Ramadan nights

Source: AFP, 11-10-2006
BIR AL-ABED: Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah may be "Israel's" prime target for assassination but he is there for all to see and hear in Beirut`s bombed-out southern suburbs, especially on Ramadan nights. "Our leader is in every home in Dahiyeh. You can find him everywhere," says Kawthar Mustapha, 18, a student in information technology who works in the evenings at a shop specializing in Hizbullah paraphernalia.
The chief of the group which battled "Israel" for 34 days has gone underground ever since the July 12 outbreak of war, except to deliver a speech before a huge rally last month.
But posters of Nasrallah`s smiling face and his taped promises of "victory forever" are omnipresent.
During the holy month of Ramadan when Muslims take to the streets for a walk after the iftar meal that breaks the dawn-to-dusk fast, Bir al-Abed comes alive with late-night shoppers.
Nearby, a Hizbullah member is on guard duty, casually seated holding a Kalashnikov assault rifle with one hand, keeping strangers at bay.
Bir al-Abed lies on the edge of Hizbullah`s one-square-kilometer security area in Haret Hreik, where Nasrallah lived and where between 300 and 400 apartment blocks were totally or partly destroyed by "Israeli" bombing.
Meanwhile, amid the dust in the air from the debris and occasional stench of sewage, Bir al-Abed shops with names such as Bint al-Houda ("daughter of the right path") and Al-Battool ("the virgin") cash in on the Hizbullah branding phenomenon.
"Our best sellers are tapes and CDs of resistance songs and Sayyed Hassan`s speeches," says young shop assistant Ali.
Behind him on the wall stands a framed portrait of another Ali, a "martyr" in combat against the "Israelis" in South Lebanon, one of the 61 fighters who Hizbullah said were killed in the July-August war.
Shopkeepers said the windows were destroyed in "Israel's" relentless air strikes on Haret Hreik but quickly replaced after an August 14 cessation of hostilities, in time for Ramadan. Even at night, workers are busy replacing tiles outside or fittings inside the shops.
"We closed for 40 days and my family went to Baalbek" during a mass evacuation before the raids, explains Mustapha, who says she has been wearing the head-to-foot hijab of Islamic modesty since the age of nine of her own accord.
"The first things people went out to buy after returning to their homes were portraits of Sayyed Hassan or a flag," she adds, in reference to the yellow Hizbullah standard stamped with an outstretched arm brandishing a machine-gun.
As young girls in headscarves and fashionable combat-style trousers and long jackets browsed through the array of Nasrallah posters and T-shirts, Mustapha expressed her admiration for Hizbullah.
"In Hizbullah, a fighter does not even tell his brother or father when he has an operation. This was the secret of our victory," she says, noting that even the "Israelis" were impressed by the discipline and professionalism of its members.
Co-worker Nasser Hamdan, 41, fondly remembers the Hizbullah victory rally attended by hundreds of thousands of its supporters.
"Of course we were all there. And you should have seen the business we did before and after. Everyone was so excited," Hamdan says, adding that no commission or royalties are paid to Hizbullah.
Glossy portraits of Nasrallah "greeting his people" at the rally and CDs of his speech have been selling fast, along with the famed Iranian dates from Bam.
Among the "made in Lebanon" mishmash of Hizbullah goodies up for grabs, pins and badges sell for around $1, a mobile phone attachment for $2, large flags for $5 and silver pendants for up to $15.
In the rubble of one destroyed apartment, the young student says, she found a love letter from another teenaged girl to Nasrallah.
"I answer your call for jihad ... We offer our soul, our heart, our body, as a gift to you," the letter reads.
A few kilometers away, at Khalde on the edges of Beirut`s international airport just south of the capital, truckers continued toward midnight to ferry rubble from the southern suburbs.
The new mountains of debris along stretches of the highway now rise as high as 10 meters into the air, blocking the view of the Mediterranean.