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A Cease-Fire Drives Into a Mirage on a Border That Disappears as It Gets Closer

[New York Times] Craig S. Smith - There is no fence, no marking, no sense of a border at all in the broad track-crossed swaths of open land and rugged mountains that lie between Lebanon and Syria. Israel is concerned that Hizballah will continue to receive missiles and other sophisticated weapons from Iran across the 205-mile long, sparsely guarded frontier. Local residents say it would be a simple matter requiring only the barest collusion of either side for a tractor or truck to haul weapons from one side to the other. Lebanon has put more than 8,000 soldiers along the border to monitor traffic, but few people here believe the Lebanese Army is capable of stopping the arms flow. At the new army checkpoint in Al Qasr, half a dozen soldiers idle away the day beside a blue metal sign reading, "Stop. Lebanese Army." The cars and trucks slow down but rarely stop. The line separating Lebanon from Syria is arbitrary, drawn in the 1920s by France. The border left 15 Lebanese villages in Syria and 9 Syrian villages in Lebanon. The border region is dominated by Shiites, who have a strong allegiance to Syria.
2006-09-18 01:00:00
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