Dear assassins,
I take this opportunity offered to me by "L’Orient Littéraire" to reply to your bullets by words. I know that this initiative will not discourage you, knowing well that you are determined to put an end to my life. The moral violence used by your objective accomplices to minimize the gravity of the assassination attempt is evidence which confirms that nothing will stop you. Despite this, I am also determined to live my beliefs and reject any fatality (Death triumphs once we believe in it).
I decided to talk to you directly, despite the risk of annoying you. Isn’t the intimacy mandatory between the murderers and their victim, after all this precious time you have wasted to inspect my minor displacements, with one idea in mind: killing me? I thought that an open letter would make you, maybe, think about your actions. What do you expect, I am hopelessly optimistic! It was probably in part because of this – the rest being certainly due to divine Providence – your bullets could not reach me. Each of us is born under a star, good or bad, it depends, with a distinctive sign, a kind of archetype. I know I am a survivor. Eleven years at the bottom of a hole were not able to overcome me, neither physically nor psychologically. It is therefore not your bullets – and even less your friends’ sarcasm and servility – that will intimidate me.
But make no mistake on my initiative. My aim is not to inspire in you any pity, but just to get to know us better. In trying to kill me, you have initiated between us a conflict. You wanted to take me back to underground, for good this time, but you forgot a capital detail: good always triumphs evil.
Dear assassins,
I do not think that we really need to dwell on the reasons of your act. My disappearance would have offset the internal rotting of the Syrian regime by an unexpected distraction; a momentary compensation which would have given it the illusion that it is still the master on board. It is true that actually, for the Kingdom of the Baath and its regional and local allies, the time is more than ever to nostalgia. You think that a few bullets would have been enough to bring down March 14, and especially the main Christian tendency to support the Arab people, and especially the Syrian people's aspiration to democracy and pluralism. You think that by silencing me, the politicians and civil society would derive the necessary conclusions and will also, through intimidation, plunge in a total silence. You may also bet on a sectarian chaos and overflow in the street which would come in time to legitimize the use of illegal weapons. You are mistaken: you have learned nothing from your experiences, learned nothing from March 14 and April 26, 2005, learned nothing from May 7, 2008. Nothing.
For Clausewitz – Because we must use a language that you would understand-, it is always the assaulted party that decides the war, depending on the nature of its response. The future of this conflict that you have caused, and on my own field, moreover, is in my hands. I know it. What you have not understood, and what you will never understand without doubt before it is too late, is that I definitively turned the page of the war the day I basked in the clean air of the Cedars Spring. Do we need to recall that the logic of war does not apply to periods of peace?
This choice is strategic: it comes from a deep conviction that freedom is nothing but slavery as we are prisoners of arrogance and resentment; that man only rises when he is at peace with himself, with nature and with others. You would find my apologies for the crimes committed during the war pathetic, I'm sure of that. It is true that I have never shone in demagoguery and populism; others have developed the art of charming the crowds better than me, and I am proud of myself. In fact, I even take some pride for not belonging to the growing club of the agitated street language index… However, I discovered that asking forgiveness is an act that ennobles and does not demean, contrary to popular beliefs. This does not also change anything of my convictions that the cause I defend, and with me the Lebanese Forces and March 14, will ultimately triumph the culture of death that you practice openly and without complexes. The logic of force has its advantages, but at the end, just causes eventually triumph; being combated by force does not change anything. Lebanon has gone through this experience in 2005, and today, the Syrian people whom I have every respect for, are also reminding us of this experience.
Dear assassins,
As long as there are free men having an universal conscience, justice eventually triumphs and violence caves in. You must know and understand this. History is teleological; future is irrevocably made of justice and peace. I know that you may find my reasoning absurd… After all, you are murderers, I certainly do not forget: I would not expect, except by miracle, that you come out of your world where you live without shades. But unlike murder, hope is vital. That is why I have chosen to line up under this star. Anyway, I hope I did not take, with my meditative reflections, from the time you put to prepare (for me) your next attempt, which will have the same end as the first. I leave you, to return to my pansies (the flowers), that grow around my house. They also, I must say, had their share from your bullets.
Until we meet again!
Translated by Sophie Chammas