Educational Travel in Hezbollah Land

Visiting the new Hezbollah Theme park must be a very constructive experience for a child. Walking between mangled metal tanks he is inspired by the triumph of spirit over matter. Hopping between mines he strengthens his athletic abilities and lest we forget the unforgettable encounter with adult role models in the shape of camouflaged gorilla fighters.

Kind of makes Disney World look like Geneva, doesn't it?

I think it would be a difficult stretch to contend that Hezbollah won the war against Israel. Or that this war achieved anything but destruction within Lebanon's border. So it may be difficult for us to understand the idea of opening a theme park devoted to Hezbollah's Epic struggle against the Zionist forces.

However, perhaps Hezbollah's new pet project isn't as outlandish as it might seem.

Winston Churchill once said “History is written by the victors.” And perhaps in past generations the outcome of a war dictated the accepted perception of history. In this age we are learning more about the war of perception, a war of narratives, where in by writing history you crown yourself a victor.

Asked whether the park was promoting terrorist propaganda, one of the park's guides and a school teacher answered; "I believe it's our right to have our own propaganda. The important thing is that this is the sincere and true propaganda." This brings to mind yet another Churchill quote; “History will be kind to me for I intend to write it” (ABC, 2010)

Here, between the upturned tanks and confiscated weaponry, inside the malleable minds of young school children, Hezbollah is writing its own history, and kindly winning. To use yet another worn out cliché Across the Lebanon border and in other places around the world Israel is winning the battle and losing the war.