In this Father's Day 2009 my thoughts goes to my dear father Haleem, who raised me in love and education...

I owe you father, along with my mother, all what I am today and all I will be to my children and people around me for as long as I shall live.

How can I forget these precious moments, I always thought endless, where you patiently explained the world to me. These beautiful hours and days of my childhood, where you shepherded my first steps and made sure I get a peaceful and enlightened life until my own wings could fly me through adult life.

The long evenings spent at home, in the mountains, on the balcony and the shiny days strolling the streets of Beirut, all these years are in my memory for ever.

To you, who taught me to bring awareness around me and call for justice and liberty, I dedicate this day and think of all those who have been deprived of a dad since their young age. I had you and enjoyed you but when you left us on that morning of October 1990, it was as if I never had enough of you in my life. I wasn't able to accompany you to the end of your journey as we were separated by the wall of oppression..

I pray for those who lost their dads in the defense of freedom, from our military in Iraq and Afghanistan, to those who lost them in the bushes of Darfur and Southern Sudan, in jails under torture, killed by terror in Lebanon and all countries where freedom is struggling. And I think of those dads who braved the dictatorsip and will not return to their families in Tehran. You are all in one place, where my father is..until we meet again

Happy Father Day to all

Walid Phares
Washington, DC
June 21, 2009

Last Picture in our garden in Beirut

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