Swiss foundation New 7 Wonders of Nature organized a world-wide poll in which anyone in the world could vote via telephone, text messages or Internet social networks for their favorite sites

Lebanon’s Jeita Grotto is among the top 10 finalists according to poll results five days before voting ended.

Lebanon’s nine competitors according to poll results of five days ago are: The Grand Canyon (United States), the Great Barrier Reef (Australia), Halong Bay (Vietnam), The Dead Sea ( shared by Jordan and Isarel), Jeju Island (Korea), Komodo Island (Indonesia), Puerto Princess Underground River (the Philippines), Sundarbans (Bangladesh and India) and Mount Vesuvius (Italy).

Jeita Grotto, an almost 10-kilometre cave system, was discovered in 1836 when an American clergyman stumbled upon the lower chamber. The discovery led to further exploration and the opening of sections of the site to visitors by the late 1950s.

Founded in 2001 by Bernard Weber in Zurich, the foundation New7Wonders is based on the same principle on which the seven ancient wonders of the world were established by Philon de Byzance in ancient Greece.

It aims to create a global memory by garnering participation worldwide.

But even as the natural wonders poll came to a close, the New7Wonders foundation has set its eyes on a new survey — the top seven cities of the world. Participating cities will be announced on January 1, 2012.

Beirut get ready !

Update: Preliminary results indicate that Jeita Grotto is among the top 14 finalists according to the organizers

Their eyes widened like golf ball-sized falafels, their mouths slack-jawed.

I understood my friends’ panicked concern over my decision to explore Lebanon as Arab Spring somersaulted across the Middle East.

But I assured them that the tiny Mediterranean country was relatively stable based on the glowing reviews of recent visitors and kept the days-old news accounts of the Estonian tourists kidnapped in Bekaa Valley to myself.

“You’re going to get shot,” my mother said half-jokingly, suggesting that the snug University of Illinois T-shirt I threw on for the airplane ride wasn’t modest enough and would out me as an American.

Several hours later, as my younger sister Almas and I ambled through Beirut’s trendy Gemmayze Street in a jet-lagged haze, we smirked as throngs of women in tiny, form-fitting pencil skirts stood feet away from neon-lit stalls selling … hot dogs.

These fast-food joints accept U.S. dollars, as do most Lebanese businesses, we soon learned.

“Wait. That’s Guns N’ Roses!” I said, playing an impromptu game of “Name That Tune” as we pressed our faces against a tavern where drunken revelers karaoked and puffed away on ornate hookahs, or as the Lebanese call them, nargiles.

Lebanon, our bed-and-breakfast host Jamil Azar explained, is a conciliatory antidote for wary Westerners uninitiated to the paradoxical ways of the Middle East.

He was on to something.

As Muslims whose wanderlust parents took us back to their native India and other exotic locales, we weren’t shocked that it was foreigners who mostly rode the rare camel or by the burqa-clad women browsing through racks alongside kohl-eyed hipsters at the Reem Acra spring/summer collection show we crashed.

But we were pleasantly surprised at the ease with which Lebanon embraced modernity without compromising centuries-old traditions, and its attempt to corral together a religious and ethnically diverse population who not too long ago battled one another for a drawn out 15 years.

“They pray together,” I thought to myself, glimpsing Mohammad al-Amin Mosque’s grand turquoise domes from the neighboring St. George Cathedral, a Maronite church dating to the Crusades in Beirut.

My new friends — Ali, a Shiite, and Nicolas, a part-Greek Christian — also pointed out that when the sun goes down, the young and trendy also play together, hitting the capital’s famed nightclubs and bars.

I told Ali and the drivers working for his brother’s 4-wheel rent-a-car company that we could forgo the discos and brushed away offers to “make ski” in the snow-capped Faraya-Mzaar.

We don’t want to do things we could do in Chicago, we said, mapping out an itinerary that had them driving us to the famed Jeita limestone caves and Roman ruins that outrivaled their European counterparts.

Every morning, sometimes after an early tai chi lesson, Jamil would prepare a traditional meal, then walk us to the door, once shooing away a Jehovah’s Witness who didn’t stand a chance with the secular Christian artist or his Muslim guests.

Jamil’s spacious ancestral apartment mirrors modern-day Beirut’s chic and stately facade marred with an occasional blemish intentionally left untreated, as if to serve as a sobering reminder of the country’s bloody past and its powder-keg geographical location, sandwiched by Israel and Syria.

One day, as I dipped flatbread in Lebanese yogurt and an herbed sesame spread — Jamil lifted the cream-colored linen, revealing where a bullet grazed across the dining table during the civil war between 1975 and 1990. Near his stereos and CDs sits a framed picture of his beloved nephew who was killed in a bombing a few years back.

Outside, a sniper-riddled Holiday Inn from the 1970s juts out from the million-dollar condos, palm trees and five-star hotels like a pockmarked teen amongst air-brushed Abercrombie & Fitch models.

At the breathtaking American University, where students in Uggs, hijabs and beanies mill about, stands a knotted banyan tree dedicated to the school’s late president Malcolm Kerr — the father of former Chicago Bull Steve Kerr — who was gunned down by terrorists on the campus in 1984.

And just outside the Al-Amin mosque, recorded Quranic passages waft through the air at the gravesite of Prime Minister Rafic Hariri, who was assassinated along with his trusted bodyguards in 2005.

Yet the Lebanese continue to march on, celebrating life while keeping an eye on who they once were.

This resilience is best personified by 80-year-old Moussa al Maamari, who built a towering castle in the Chouf region for the woman he loved but who never loved him back. While less historic than Sidon’s Sea Castle and more rudimentary than the nearby Beiteddine Palace, Moussa’s handiwork is impressive because the elderly man built the structure himself over a 60-year period, filling it with kitschy miniatures and an antique weapons collection.

Moussa married another woman, he told me in Arabic as a local tourist translated. But I had no doubt he still held a torch for his childhood crush.

“She slapped me twice. But I enjoyed it,” Moussa said, relishing the memory.

Rain dampened our trip to Byblos, the quaint fishing village housing the ancient town of influenced by Egyptians, Greeks, Romans and Phoenicians.

But the weather was more agreeable when we visited the ruins of the Umayyad city of Anjar and the must-see temples in Baalbek — the “nest” of Hezbollah. It was the only excursion we took with a tour group.

As hawkers tried peddling Hezbollah souvenirs outside, we marveled at the well-preserved, intricate temples dedicated to Venus, Jupiter and Bacchus inside. More than 100,000 slaves are believed to have helped build the structures, with the work starting in 60 B.C. and finishing 120 years later.

“This is much better than the Parthenon,” my sister said, otherwise speechless over the sheer massiveness of the Corinthian columns in what many historians believe to be the best-preserved Roman temple of its size.

Baalbek was no doubt the highlight of our trip.

On our last day in Lebanon, Bedros, a young L.A.-based Armenian-American hairdresser visiting relatives and sorting his family’s property, asked us if we knew where the open-air farmers market was.

We didn’t. But we took Bedros to the mosque, Christian Louboutin and Hermes boutiques before accidentally stumbling upon the outdoor produce and snack haven he had been searching for.

There, at the farmers market, a woman Almas recognized from the popular Anthony Bourdain travel series prepared kibbeh with raw meat and bulgar.

We asked just for a sample because we weren’t sure if the uncooked delicacy would be too gamey for our palates.

Then, when I wasn’t paying attention, the woman stuffed the uncooked concoction into my mouth.

It was unexpected, a jolt to my senses.

Just like Lebanon.

Sun Times

Air passenger traffic fell in the first week of August from a daily average of 15,000 to 7,000 which is in excess of 50 percent less than traffic recorded for the same period in the month of July.

On the other hand more people are departing. The daily average of passengers departing from Rafik Hariri International Airport in Beirut was at 10,600 in the first week of August compared 7,000 to 8,000 passengers in July.

Local travel agencies and several airline companies say the number of bookings indicate that a sizeable number of Lebanese want to return to the country at the end of August in order to spend the Eid el-Fitr at home.

The number of tourists from the Arab countries has dropped even more from 81,097 in June 2010 to 54,140 in June 2011 or about a drop of one third.

Hotel Owners Syndicate Association president Pierre Ashqar said even though the occupancy rate at the hotels in the capital is now around 80 % the hotels are still losing money, because the the hotels were hurting badly before the cabinet was formed and the peak season will end by August 1 when the holy month of Ramadan starts . He added That had there been stability in Lebanon the occupancy rate at the hotels in the capital should have been 100%.

He said there is no way to recoup the losses this year if the tourism situation does not get any better
He urged the government to get the vote of confidence of the Arabian Gulf counties , saying getting it from the Lebanese parliament is not enough

Cafés and restaurants often operating at near capacity at this time of year remain far from it now. Luxury goods that would normally be flying off the shelves are not. Place de l’Etoile, the heart of downtown, is busy but not booming.

In this part of Beirut, as with many sectors affected by tourism, business owners are feeling the big-handed pinch of the drop in visitors to Lebanon so far this year.

To use just a handful of examples gathered from interviews with staff or business owners in downtown, business is down 20 to 30 percent in the souvenir store Atelier Chalaan, 30 to 40 percent in M and K handbags, 50 percent at Sarya Jewellery and 60 to 70 percent at Petit Café compared with the summer season last year.

Another business largely reliant on tourists, the Teleferic cable car in Jounieh, is down 30 percent from last year but has seen a similar number of customers as prior to 2010’s boom, according to General Manager Eli Boulos.

Stores that serve a Lebanese clientele aren’t hurting as much. Staff members at Coccinelle in downtown said that sales are down 40 percent, though their other outlets in Verdun and Achrafieh, which have a more Lebanese customer base, are doing much better.

According to figures released by Byblos Bank, the number of tourists who came to Lebanon during the first five months of this year is 596,298—down 18.6 percent from the same period last year.

This is bad, but not quite as bad as it seems. 2010 was an exceptional year in terms of tourist numbers, and the number of visitors coming to Lebanon in the first quarter of 2011 was greater than in the same period in 2009, another bumper year.

But what is concerning from these figures is the fact that percentage-wise, there has been an almost consistent decline in tourists coming to Lebanon in 2011 compared with 2010—from a 7.6 percent drop in January to a 29.1 percent drop in May.

Explanations for the downturn range from “domestic political instability and regional turmoil, [to] the kidnapping of seven tourists from Estonia [in the Bekaa earlier this year],” according to Nassib Ghobril, head economist at Byblos Bank. “I think Western tourists have written off the Arab world since early this year,” he said, adding, “As for Gulf nationals, with the turmoil in Syria, they might be concerned that it might spill over here. So I don’t expect the same number of Gulf nationals to be here during the summer.”

Syrian instability is also likely to dissuade tourists who would normally drive to Lebanon, added Rabih Zreik, general manager of Petit Café in downtown. This particularly affects tourists from Iran and Jordan, the latter of which were the top nationality to visit Lebanon in 2010, according to a report by local and regional monthly business magazine Executive.

For many sectors reliant on tourism, the next five weeks are crucial. Now that school terms are generally finished, the country usually witnesses a large influx of tourists over the coming months. However, this year, with Ramadan falling in August, the number of visitors from the Gulf and other Arab countries is expected to be much lower at the end of the summer.

According to Ghobril, Lebanon is going to have a summer that is “dependent on Lebanese expatriates, historically the biggest spenders.” But while he estimates that they will help offset some of the losses this year, they will not do so completely.

“I don’t think we’ll make up for the first half of the year in terms of tourists,” he told NOW Lebanon. “I don’t think we’ll see the same results overall as we had last year or the year before.”

To counter this, some businesses are adapting and implementing innovative ways to attract customers.

Houka The Marbouta restaurant in downtown, for example, has begun hosting Karaoke nights and live bands in response to slow sales at the beginning of the year. “We want to attract more Lebanese tourists and dispel the myth that downtown is just for Arab and Western tourists,” said Public Relations Manager Ali Al Atrash.

Meanwhile, Gordon Campbell Gray, owner of Le Gray, told NOW Lebanon that the hotel has been working hard to promote its image that Lebanon is a safe destination. These efforts, as well as the relative small size of the hotel, are some of the reasons it has performed as well as in 2010, according to Campbell Gray. In addition, to offset an expected drop in business due to Ramadan, the hotel will be offering deals in August that it normally would not.

The Phoenicia Hotel, for its part, has invested heavily in a major refurbishment project, as well as opening the Whisky Mist nightclub ahead of its 50th anniversary. While business was slow at the start of the year, Daniel Weihrauch, the hotel’s director of sales and marketing, expects the second half of the year to be very encouraging.

But the forecasted pickup over the coming months faces at least one major obstacle, namely the impending indictments from the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, which is charged with investigating the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in 2005. The tribunal is widely expected to indict several Hezbollah members. When its findings are released, which is rumored to occur in the coming days, some fear civil strife. Now Lebanon

A vendor waits for tourists in the old souk of the capital Damascus on April 30, 2011.

The wave of protests and the brutal government response, which human rights activists say has killed more than 850 people, are all but invisible in the center of Damascus. More striking here is the emptiness of streets lined with stores selling pottery, jewelry and carpets. Salesmen sit idly playing backgammon and have time to drink tea and complain that their businesses have been ruined by the “problems.”

The death of tourism is the most visible sign of major economic damage from the protests and crackdowns, damage that could eventually undermine the government of President Bashar al-Assad.

The economic instability is forcing the government to increase its deficit to fund promised concessions, though such fiscal problems are unlikely on their own to bring down a regime that has survived hard times and diplomatic isolation before. However, economic damage could prove decisive in spurring new sectors of society to join opposition movements.

One Western diplomat said a collapse in financial markets could push the merchant classes in Damascus and Aleppo to join the protesters. Thus far, they have remained largely on the side of the government, perhaps because instability is bad for business. “But if the economy collapses and they don’t have a market to sell to, that could change things quite dramatically and quickly,” the diplomat said.

In recent years, Syria has capitalized on its long history and scenic cities to build a thriving tourist industry. About 12 percent of the Syrian economy last year was generated by foreign visitors, a vital source of revenue as oil reserves, never abundant, dried up.

But after protests spread from the southern town of Deraa to areas around Damascus, the coast and Homs, most embassies warned their citizens to leave. Hotel owners now say they have fired waiters and cleaners, while many shopkeepers are thinking of closing.

Other businesses have also been badly affected by the instability, said a banker in Lebanon who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Internationally funded projects, including two power projects by a Qatari company, have been put on hold, and manufacturing and trade have declined sharply.

Syria had aimed to attract more than $50 billion in foreign investment during the next five years, and had hoped that foreign projects would employ its growing population, as the government’s oil revenue dwindled and it was forced to cut state jobs.

But U.S. and European Union sanctions against the president and the elite, many related to Assad, will discourage foreign investment, and the Institute of International Finance now predicts that the Syrian economy will shrink by 3 percent this year.

Syria has long been economically insular; it does not have a credit rating and cannot borrow on the international debt markets. But despite plummeting income, the government has introduced a program of economic concessions after pressure from an angry population.

During the past five years, life has improved for some, but the divide between rich and poor has widened. Business restrictions have been lifted and trade agreements signed; private banks have opened, offering mortgages and loans; and there has been an influx of consumer goods, such as cars, from China — opportunities eagerly seized on by the urban middle classes.

But the removal of subsidies and a flood of goods from outside the country has made life harder for the poor, as prices have risen and factories have shut down. Drought devastated farming, and hundreds of thousands have fled the countryside and now live in slums on the edges of cities.

Syria also ranks even lower than notoriously graft-ridden Egypt on Transparency International’s scale of corruption. Whole sectors — including telecommunications, transport and insurance — are dominated by Rami Makhlouf, Assad’s cousin, whose corrupt network of patronage is reviled by protesters and ordinary Syrians alike.

It is these poor and disgruntled people who made up much of the protest movement, said one Western diplomat in Damascus, and the government has now cut the price of fuel, increased the salaries of government employees and promised more jobs to discourage further demonstrations.

But in the long run, the regime cannot afford the concessions, experts say.

Joshua Landis, an associate professor of Middle Eastern studies at the University of Oklahoma, said it is “hard to imagine that serious economic difficulties will not appear — cracks in the foundations of this very poor state.”

WP

Trouble erupted after a Beirut-bound Middle East Airlines plane, with 230 passengers aboard, had to abort a 5pm take-off on Thursday, having already missed its original 1pm departure slot.

With the Airbus A330 not given another slot until around 7.30pm, disgruntled passengers argued with crew, raided the galleys and started ‘pushing and shoving’, name-calling and engaging in ‘fisticuffs’, said witnesses.

A Lebanese woman passenger was said to have suffered ‘heart palpitations’, and a male passenger needed to be given oxygen.

Up to eight police officers boarded the plane at 5.50pm but there were no arrests after the fracas and flight ME 202 eventually took off for Lebanon, apparently with all passengers still onboard.
Speaking from Beirut, one London-based businessman explained how trouble broke out, saying: ‘The atmosphere was very tense and a middle-aged man told the crew member he was an idiot.

‘And that was when the pushing and shoving began. The captain came out once and I told him he had failed in his duty, to which he replied I should fly the plane.’

Another passenger, legal translator Jordan Lancaster, 45, compared the chaos to Lord Of The Flies, the novel about a group of schoolboys who descend into savagery when a plane crash leaves them marooned on an island.

Giving the Daily Mail an account of the unrest as it unfolded, she said: ‘People are hysterical. The crew have given up trying to explain the situation to people, and it has ended up in fisticuffs. Several men are also arguing with the captain. This guy in his 50s is so worked up he is being given oxygen.’

As Miss Lancaster gave her account from the cabin over the phone, a male cabin crew member was heard over the intercom system telling passengers: ‘If any of our crew have been rude to you, we apologize for that. We need passengers to hold their horses and calm down.’

Another passenger described the situation as ‘a mutiny’.

The airline said it did not disembark the passengers because it was hopeful of getting a take-off slot and did not want to miss it.

The plane had been taxiing along the runway at 5pm with a view to taking off when the control tower told the plane that it could not because of bad weather en route.

Middle East Airlines’ UK and Ireland manager Naima Kassir said the flight took off at around 8pm and arrived in Beirut five hours later without further incident, adding: ‘Some passengers were in transit from Canada and must have been tired. They got abusive and intimidated the crew.’

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: ‘We were called at 5.50pm to a Middle East Airlines flight at Heathrow Terminal 3 following reports of a disturbance. There were no arrests.’

Heathrow airport operator BAA said that altogether about 50 departures and 29 arrivals were called off because of high winds and thunderstorms. A spokesman said the schedule was expected to be ‘running fine’ today.

The Daily Mail

People chant slogans during a rally against terrorism in Morocco, after an explosion rocked Argana cafe in Marrakesh's Jamaa el-Fnaa square, April 29, 2011. Morocco was counting the cost to its vital tourism industry on Friday from the explosion at the busy Marrakesh cafe that killed 15 people in an attack described by the government as a terrorist act. Moroccan officials have not said who was responsible for the Thursday blast. The sign reads: "No, no, no to killing the innocent".

Moroccan officials have not said who was responsible for the Thursday blast. Western security analysts said it was likely to have been carried out by Islamist militants trying to damage the tourism industry on which the country depends.

The Interior Ministry said seven of the 15 dead had been identified and included two French citizens, two Canadians, a Dutch national and two Moroccans.

Israel’s foreign ministry said two of the victims, a man and a woman, were Jews living in Shanghai and that the woman apparently had Israeli citizenship.

Standing outside the wrecked cafe in Jamaa el-Fnaa square, Morocco’s best-known tourist spot, German tourist Julia Zashou and her mother sobbed as they looked at the site. They said they used to visit the venue frequently.

“We don’t understand. Marrakesh is such a nice place,” said Zashou. “What happened is a catastrophe for tourists.”

The attack, in which 23 people were also wounded, is the deadliest Morocco has seen since suicide bombers killed 33 people in coordinated strikes on Casablanca eight years ago. There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

“Preliminary investigation … suggests that this was a terrorist act caused by an explosive device,” the official MAP news agency quoted Interior Minister Taieb Cherkaoui as saying.

He was later reported to have said the bomb was detonated remotely.

“Those who usually resort to this method… are known which leads us to believe that the risk remains present and that we have to stay on watch and be on guard,” he said.

Quoting an unnamed security official familiar with the investigation, the Lakome.com news portal said the device was detonated by a suicide bomber who was freed from prison two months ago where he was serving a sentence for rape.

HAVEN OF STABILITY

The attack adds to the challenges facing Morocco’s ruler, King Mohammed, at a time when he is trying to prevent uprisings elsewhere in the Arab world from reaching the kingdom, which is usually seen as a haven of stability in a volatile region.

The monarch has promised to reform the constitution to placate protesters. But more protests are planned for Sunday to demand a change of government and more democratic freedoms.

Tourism is Morocco’s biggest source of foreign currency and the second biggest employer after agriculture.

Tourism Minister Yassir Znagui on Friday visited Marrakesh’s Ibn Tofail hospital, where many of the victims — including several seriously wounded foreigners — were being treated.

“It’s difficult to talk about the consequences … For the moment, the priority is to be near the victims and their relatives,” he said.

At Marrakesh’s airport, where an official said security had been stepped up, there was no evidence that holidaymakers were cutting short their vacations. But many said they would reconsider visiting the country in the future.

“We used to come to Marrakesh on an annual basis but next year we will go somewhere else,” said French tourist Jean-Pierre Arnault. “Attacks happen all over the world, but this one targeted tourists. It’s serious.”

A German pensioner who gave only her family name, Hilgers, said at the airport: “I have not brought forward my departure but some tourists in the hotel where I stayed did.”

“We have always thought that Morocco is a peaceful country, the people are very nice. I think what happened deals a very serious blow to tourism. It disturbs people.”

NAIL BOMB

Hicham Nejmi, a doctor at the Ibn Tofail hospital, said medics had found nails in most bodies, evidence the bomb-makers had packed the device with shrapnel to cause maximum harm.

Moments after Thursday’s explosion, a Reuters photographer said he saw rescue workers pulling dismembered bodies from the wreckage of the cafe.

Western security analysts said the bombing carried the hallmarks of Islamist militants, possibly liked to al Qaeda’s north African wing, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).

Last week, men claiming to be Moroccan members of AQIM appeared in a video posted on YouTube threatening to attack Moroccan interests.

The ESISC think tank said: “We assess it must be the work of a well organized terrorist organization.”

An opposition group urged the authorities against using the attack as an excuse to crack down on rallies planned for Sunday. The banned Justice and Charity Islamist group called the bombing a “cowardly and criminal act.”

“The objective of the attack is to spread fear and to disrupt the popular protest in Morocco,” the group said. Reuters

Agha al-Qalaa said the meeting is aimed at serving the interests of Syria and Lebanon, given that tourism has become a real industry that highly contributes to the Gross Domestic Product, by 22 % of the GDP in Syria and 13 % in Lebanon.

”Our role is to provide all requirements of developing tourism in our countries respectively and to work together for our efforts to bear fruit,” he added, stressing the importance of catalyzing tourism between the two countries.

The Minister added that Syria and Lebanon are able to attract scores of millions of tourists from all over the world in light of their rich tourist factors.

Minister Agha al-Qalaa underlined necessity of coordinating Syrian-Lebanese efforts to attract expatriates to visit the two countries in joint tourist tracks, clarifying that frequent meetings were held lately and a tourist agreement was signed.

He hoped the two countries’ work will yield positive results as to guarantee durability of tourism in Syria and Lebanon.

Secretary-General of the Syrian-Lebanese Higher Council Nasri Khouri said the meeting of the joint tourist committee proves that the tourist integrity started to yield important steps.

Abboud said the bilateral meeting precedes the ministerial meeting to be held on Tuesday, bringing together Tourism Ministers of Turkey, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon for tourist integrity among the four countries.

He noted that tourist integrity between Syria and Lebanon serves the two countries’ interests, hoping the economic integrity and the freedom of movement will be a serious topic.
SANA

tourists sunbathe as others swim at the St. George Yacht club in Beirut, Lebanon. Lebanon expects nearly 2.2 million tourists in 2010

Foreign visitors to Lebanon will exceed 2 million this year, up from 1.85 million in 2009, Tourism Minister Fady Abboud said in a May 21 interview. Tourism revenue will rise to $8.5 billion from $7.2 billion over the same period, he said. Bloomberg