I wrote those poems for myself as a way of being a soldier here in this country. I didn't know the poems would travel. I didn't go to Lebanon until two years ago but people told me that many Arabs had memorized these poems and translated them into Arabic.

What is being talked about now is the probability of the Sharon government launching an attack against Lebanon to eliminate the resistance of Hezbollah by using the American war against Iraq. But of course in this case we will certainly fight with all our strength.

That is why if Lebanon concludes a peace agreement with Israel and brings that accord to the Parliament our deputies will reject it Hezbollah refuses any conciliation with Israel in principle.

Because I know about the Holy Land I've taught lessons about the Holy Land all my life and - but you can't bring peace to Israel without giving the Palestinian also peace. And Lebanon and Jordan and Syria as well.

Arab leaders worry more about making money from the profits they get from oil and gas that they turn the other way when Lebanon is being destroyed right next to them. Their neighbours are being murdered but they only make calculations for their own benefit.

That U.N. Security Council resolution requires getting Syrian troops and intelligence officials out of Lebanon so that the Lebanese can have elections here this spring that are free and fair and free of outside influence.

We believe that Lebanon has been the first real experience for all the Arabs.

My family moved - first to Washington D.C. and then in the spring of 1975 to Lebanon where my father worked as a diplomat at the American embassy. My parents were enthusiastic about the move so my older brother and I felt like we were off to some place kind of cool.

I never felt totally 100% patriotically English... I'd seen a lot of the world by an early age - sort of spent a lot of time traveling around Lebanon and I'd seen Babylon and Damascus and all sorts of places in the Middle East by the time I was ten. Then we'd return to Ruslip in West London... Done a fair bit of traveling really.