7/13/2000

The Editor,
The New York Times,

Dear Sir:

The New York Times is introducing bias into its reporting when it labels what was once the Southern Lebanon Army, Israel's proxy militia. In June, Col. Charbel Barakat formerly of the South Lebanon Army spoke about this and other misrepresentation by the media to the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on the Near East.

"We were not the mercenaries of Israel; we were allied to Israel," he said. "We were not traitors; we were the defenders of a free Lebanon. We are the natives; the Syrian Army is a foreign occupation. We were the freedom fighters, and Hizbollah are the terrorists. Yet we, the Lebanese people, were crucified, and Hizbollah became the hero, and Syria is the stabilizing power. Our land is occupied by pro-Iranian and pro-Syrian forces, and they call it liberation. Liberation from whom? Liberation from Lebanese communities who were 23 years defending their identity and right?

According to Col. Barakat, the SLA, which was organized in 1976, was never a mercenary force or a proxy militia created by Israel to assist in the Jewish State's occupation of South Lebanon. It was, he said, organized by local Lebanese officers, like himself, soldiers of the Lebanese Army, and a handful of armed civilians in order to defend their villages against the PLO and other radical groups that attempted to dominate the area during the Lebanese civil war.

Sincerely,

Gamaliel Isaac