EDITORIAL LETTERS

Freeing Lebanon From Syria's Grip

Regarding the news-in-brief item "Pro-Iranian Hizbullah guerrillas claimed responsibility for rocket attacks from Lebanon," April 10: Once more the Iranian-Syrian-Hizbullah circuit is activated in South Lebanon, with deadly consequences. The cycle of terrorism and Israeli counter-terrorism in that part of Lebanon spans a 30-year period.

It used to be that Israel would retaliate, or the Lebanese government would try to quell the terrorists. A monolithic United States policy, however, has yielded to Syrian President Hafez al-Assad the exclusive leverage of Palestinian, Islamic, and Kurdish terrorism, which he exerts in his meanderings around the peace table.

State Department officials from Henry Kissinger to James Baker to Warren Christopher have justified this policy with the "strategic" objective of luring Assad into the peace process. But it is Lebanon that is paying the price under this US-sponsored Syrian "stabilization." When will Lebanon be freed from Syria's grip and be given a chance at rebuilding itself and joining the peace process?

Youssef Hitti Somerville, Mass.

Council of Lebanese

American Organizations