Resist.

I asked Selim today what he would do if Israeli tanks rolled into Beirut.

In spite of trying to focus all of my energy on envisioning non-violent resistance, I have to admit that last night when the airstrikes resumed on Beirut I actually got stuck in a fantasy (in anger) about the moment that perhaps I'd get to see a line of tanks ...walked through all sorts of scenarios in my head...imagined how difficult it would be to NOT throw rocks. I smiled when I imagined the absurdity of the images you'd see on the news...a bunch of scrappy Lebanese tossing rocks a la Palestinian resistance - and there, in the middle of it, in the middle of the dust and the noise, throwing stones alongside the citizen resistance would be this tall, lanky white dude in cargo shorts and an American Apparel short-sleeved collared shirt. Baby blue.

After last night's strikes on the suburbs (I think they've moved to bunker-busters now), I spent some time on the balcony, trying to breathe through the anger. They've effectively cut off the city, now - meaning less aid to the displaced, meaning less fuel for the cars, meaning that Beirut now has a noose around its neck. Should the attacks continue tonight, HBLah has threatened to attack Tel Aviv (adding too, that should Israel pull back that this all will be over...). Should Tel Aviv come under attack...well, we'll just have to see.

There are a few new faces at Talal's - two traveling young men from eastern Europe (one, his arm has been mangled...I've avoided asking them directly where they're from until I know them both better, thinking that the conversation will come back to 'home', come back to the story of that arm); two fifty/sixty year old, leather-faced taxi drivers with scratchy, cigarette burned throats. They have decided to temporarily make Talal's their home and to work their routes in the downtown area until it's completely safe to be driving around the roads south of town. Where they're from.

The two Europeans once woken skipped to the balcony giving me a pang of nostalgia for the Poles, for the American, the Canadian and the Norwegian - for when we used to run up to the roof during the first days of the war. I roll over now, no longer morbidly curious.

Once they'd come back to bed and fallen asleep I had to get up, had to walk. I couldn't shake it, couldn't shake the feeling of knowing, knowing that I would throw a rock. At that moment, had I a tank in front of me, there would be no peaceful stand, there would only be attack. I stared off towards the faded sounds of the bunker-buster explosions biting my lip and trying to just...let it go.

Although I'm too exhausted most days to really investigate the questions, I have them all written down in my notebook:
1) Obligation of State to Citizen? To other states? To citizens of other states?
2) Obligation of Citizen to State? To other citizens? To citizens of other states?
3) Obligation of human being to human being?

When deciding to come back, I often asserted (to myself, mostly) that I would be a one man American Foreign Policy. I thought then that given how I disagreed with the politics of the situation, that I would simply be the politics. I argued to myself that as I was an American citizen and that as America is a democratic state (where, ideally, the act of the government is representative of the popular will of the people - where the people are culpable for the acts of the government, where we are all responsible directly for 'America') that it was my very job to be here, to be doing on the ground what the representative officials were not. America. I was, to my mind, just one of the team (granted, actively working against what seemed to be the intentions of the State).

Two days ago, I had an webpage forwarded to me and after reading it I was reminded that this idea that 'the citizen of the United States (again, democracy) can and should be held just as responsible for the acts of the state as the elected officials, official bodies, military etc' was and is the exact logic that Bin Laden uses to justify killing civilians.

In combination with how quickly I saw myself getting tripped up, getting sucked into this conflict in a way that blinded my own logic, I spent hours staring into the black of night wrestling to find some more valid way of explaining why I was here. What was it, I asked myself, that supported my actions if not an argument based out of the direct connection between the citizen and the democratic state. I liked the idea, I realized, of feeling empowered, of thinking of myself as an equal to the gov itself, just as capable, just as effective. But liking an idea doesn't make it valid. And I'm lost now - or at least I've given up on looking to define this 'thing' that I have done as some extension of my responsibilities as a citizen. It isn't true. It's deeper, I believe - it's personal. It's more about what I've perceived as the simple obligation of people to people.

Though here, in the realm of 'personal', of 'subjective' is where things get particularly dangerous. I have made the argument, too, that I came here as I simply had to live by my own principles. Incredibly dangerous. Some of the worst things in the world have come as a result of people living by their principles, their 'misguided' principles.

It's at that moment when you find yourself looking at yourself in a different way. You don't actually understand what you have done or why - at least not in any way you can substantiate with anything but trite turns of phrase. You need to look deeper and just ask yourself: why? And, more frighteningly, in spite of the story-value, is what you are doing right? Is it helping or hurting? What is your reasoning, here, kid?"

I had the courage to do this, to take this introspective look as by most accounts what I'm doing is actually an incredibly positive and constructive thing. Still, in this moment of weakness on the balcony I knew that I needed to go a lot deeper.

For a moment you let all of the lines disappear, let all of the categories and borders evaporate - the 'definitions' that you have heard applied to other people that you thought might also apply to you. You forget them. You unlearn for a moment every characteristic that you have ascribed to yourself that is based upon how you size up against other people. You imagine yourself floating in space. Then, you look to see what you are made of: what traits remain at the ready when you are not antagonized by some outside force?

What are these principles you speak of? Are they universal? Can they ever be wrong or, better, depending upon the circumstances applied as easily for a campaign of hurt as help?

Biting my lip, I could not imagine dropping the rock, could not imagine not fighting. I realized that I had to adjust the principle, had to adjust myself ...that it would not be enough to know that I could stand and would 'simply' stand only 99% of the time - that it would have to be 100% of the time...and that that last 1% would be the hardest to secure.

I got this email from a friend, which I rely on a lot these days:

(excerpt) : Ah, reading about your moral and ethical dilemma brings back fond memories of my favorite courses in college - philosophy and ethics. I was particularly fond of Immanuel Kant and his piece on the Ethics of Duty - an action has moral worth if it is done for the sake of duty; an action is morally correct if its maxim can be willed as a universal law; we should always treat humanity, whether in ourselves or other people, always as an end in itself and never merely as a means to an end. And the reason why I love having these discussions? Because they really make you open your eyes, to see things differently, to shake us out of our self-centeredness.

I realize that this has been a healthy exercise, that I have found new dimension to my own character - have found that the parts of myself which I had once considered underexercised to be surprisingly strong. Perhaps too strong. Somedays, it's as if - now that I'm here - the same momentum that carried me here to ostensibly 'do some good' carries me a little over the line, carries me to thoughts of throwing rocks. I am inclined to fight for what I believe in - this is a double edged sword that I must learn to handle responsibly. I suppose this means I am a human being.

I realize too that, as I'm young and as these principles have been so...underchallenged (?) that without a substantial further investigation during a period of relief, of leisure that that last 1% might never be secured. I decided, then, today to take off early from volunteering and go to the one place in Beirut that still seems relaxed. The AUB campus: very much intact, grounds well manicured, students strolling, cats chasing birds and sprawled in the sun. I sat alone, watching the sea. If you squint your eyes just right, you can't even see the Israeli warships.

If/when this conflict comes to an even temporary close, I 'get' to leave. Although many have claimed that due to this fact - the fact that I have a 'way out' - I could never truly put myself in the shoes of the Lebanese and therefore could never actually call this "my fight", I can only respectfully disagree. At least, today.

I've come to know that my/our (outsider) responsibility does not end with leaving, with absence - in fact, it grows. In my opinion. If you doubt it, read the news: everyone is looking to the United States now.

We have the gift of relief, we have the gift of leisure and time; we have the opportunity to actually learn, to follow our ideas, to imagine - to envision - solutions. All this because we have a nurturing environment difficult to imagine for Beirut, for the people of this country for years if not generations to come.

It's sort of a difficult idea to face, but part of what has and continues to support the existence of that environment are two things so decried by the most lividly liberal: the strength of the US military and benefits of a capitalistic economy.

So it gets complicated - but here's where I come to answer the question that so many people have written to me in emails: What can/do 'we' do?

Although it is not a sexy responsibility, has not the "story value" of sitting in front of a tank or the notoriety that comes from jumping a French ship to a warzone, what can and should be done is noble, nonetheless. It is the supreme stand, the quiet act of standing against our immediate desires and impulses for the sake of practicing the eternal vigilance that Eisenhower so lucidly described.

The role of the American citizen. To learn, to live, to vote - to vote well. To practice whatever life out of simple, common decency - out of an interest in humanity of others; to demand accountability of ourselves; to understand that although s/he may not have to fight gun in hand to secure power, that s/he has inherited a far more important task: the preservation of the idea of responsible citizenship through simple practice. The maintenance of what has been achieved, of what so many others long for and (in the country's better moments, at least) look to.

I'm sorry this has gotten so "America-centric" again. But I suppose the thoughts of the past few days have had me reciprocally envious of the positions - the actual power and influence - of those seated at home - my home - and reading this.

He didn't need much pressing on it.
Selim: "I would go down there! I would engage in non-violent protest."
Me: "Yeah, I would too...I would, I would too. I would beat you there, probably."
Selim: "You would be there with me?"
Me: "Yeah, that's what I would do. I would stand there, no question about it. But, I don't know, there are times...last night I was thinking that sitting there with a sign or something just wouldn't be enough for me -"
Selim: "Oh no enough (laughing), so what would you want to do?"
Me: "I think, since - look, it's personal at this point, so I mean, I would do my own form of protest"
Selim: "What, what is that?"

I looked up to the ceiling pretending I was looking at a tank. Selim looked up and acknowledged the vision and looked back, waited for me. I stared at the fake tank and, starting to laugh, gave it the finger.

Selim (laughing): "It's a deal. I will see you there." We shook on it.

I suppose I still have a lot of growing up to do.