Journalist Mariam Majdoline Laham. (Credit: Facebook)
The series of assassinations of top Hezbollah officials over the past few weeks has given Israel the opportunity to show off its intelligence superiority and instilled a climate of suspicion within the party and its immediate environment. Journalist Mariam Majdoline Laham is now the subject of treason charges that have mobilized the Lebanese judiciary.
On Oct. 5, Zaher Hamadeh, Public Prosecutor at the Beirut Court of Appeal, issued a search warrant for this MTV channel contributor, known for her hostility towards the party. The journalist failed to appear at her hearing, scheduled for the same day, to explain a comment posted a few days earlier on social networks.
"Every first-aider in Hezbollah's Islamic Health Committee association does not have a different political orientation to that party. On the contrary, he or she adheres to it wholesale and in detail ... Anyone who is affiliated to this committee is a first-aider for the fighters, not a neutral civilian," she had written, following an Israeli strike targeting the committee in the Beirut neighborhood of Bashoura, on the evening of Oct. 2.
'Paying with blood'
Although Laham quickly withdrew her post, Internet users and Hezbollah sympathizers had previously circulated it widely, accusing her of treason and inciting the assassination of rescue workers. "It is necessary that she pays with her blood," read one of these posts, under a photo of the journalist. Another asked, "Does incitement to the murder of civilians exemplify the profession of journalism?" A question echoed in other terms by the head of the news and political programs department of the Al Jadeed channel, Mariam Bassam: "How does baseness become journalism?"
For several days, Laham responded to these accusations, denying that she had incited anyone to kill. In a video published on Oct. 5, an hour before her scheduled interrogation by the judicial police, she reaffirmed that she had posted the comment only after the strike. She added that she had posted it in a "sentimental" context, as her father is buried in the cemetery opposite the center, which she is prevented from visiting due to "threats from Hezbollah."
'A heroine'
Going against the grain of this campaign, many Internet users lent their support to Laham, hailing her "courage," her "sense of freedom" and even describing her as "a heroine."
Several political parties also reacted in favor of the journalist. The Lebanese Forces (LF) refuted "the accusations of collaboration" leveled against her. "They must be sent back to the milieu teeming with traitors," said a press release issued by Samir Geagea's party, referring to Hezbollah's circles. The text also criticized "the repression of freedoms aimed at satisfying the forces of fait accompli," before calling for the removal of the search warrant against Laham, whose "only fault is speaking in the name of the law, far from intimidation and threats."
Contacted by L'Orient-Le Jour, Charles Jabbour, LF's head of communications, was critical of the notion that the Israeli enemy was waiting for "this or that" journalist to help it commit its murderous acts, such as those against "pager and walkie-talkie carriers, or the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah." Ashraf Rifi, independent MP for Tripoli (Renewal bloc), denounced in a press release, "the constant campaigns of accusations of treason and calls for the liquidation of journalists and activists, which come from people whose identity is known," calling on the justice system to "summon the authors of these death threats."
This article was originally published in L'Orient-Le Jour.
