The first contacts with the Allies of this region date back to the Alliance meetings of 1993, but they were not followed up. Since 1998, a network of Allies has been constituted, mainly from Lebanon, thanks to the activities of the Cultural Council for South Lebanon. This network organized several meetings dedicated to questions of regional governance, the Arab World’s place in globalization, the conditions for building social and political peace, the sustainable management of water and soils, etc.
The network facilitated by the Cultural Council for South Lebanon is constituted mainly of intellectuals, journalists, academics, organization leaders, and religious leaders from Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, Tunisia, and Palestine. Their proposals have been extensively circulated through the press, and a magazine called Majalat published over a period of three years many articles evaluating the work of the Alliance Meetings and Workshops. The Cultural Council for South Lebanon took the initiative of editing and publishing the Proposal Papers of the Alliance.
We have also tried to establish links between the Allies in Lebanon, Egypt, and Syria and those in Palestine and Israel. The Allies of this region are convinced that building sustainable peace will depend on multiple factors, including a political evolution allowing the active participation of the population as an essential condition. They are also deeply convinced that recovering the rights of the Palestinian people and arresting the colonial influence of Israel are essential conditions. The aftermath of the war on Iraq and the worsening of the situation in the entire region has put the search for peace on the agenda once again. The Allies’ proposals are being put to the test of history.
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