The episode of “The Interview” program hosted the Lebanese writer and historian Fawaz Traboulsi, who is considered one of the most important historians of leftist thought in the Arab world, where he talked about his struggle and experience and the civil war in Lebanon.
Traboulsi lived throughout his life as a socialist fighter for national and social liberation, and a radical revolution took place in his thought and life, from his national commitment to Nasserism and the Arab Socialist Baath Party to the leadership and establishment of two Marxist organizations, the "Socialist Lebanon" and the "Communist Action Organization".
In the context of his talk about his struggle, he touched on the events that affected and contributed to shaping his national awareness and struggle, including the tripartite aggression against Egypt and the Algerian revolution.
He also confirmed that his joining the Baath Party was in Britain, to which he went in 1958 in order to study, but his membership froze upon his return to Lebanon, and then he moved, with others, to establish "Socialist Lebanon" and then the "Communist Action Organization", stressing that Lebanon has known since the year 1964 to 1974 was a period of massive popular struggles in which students, trade unions, and various segments of Lebanese society participated.
The Lebanese writer and historian spoke - in his interview with the episode (22/1/2023) of the "The Interview" program - about the civil war in Lebanon, and said that the left played its role in the first two years of the war (1975-1977), and when the Syrian forces entered, its role practically ended. And that he personally - that is, Trabelsi - did not participate in the war because he had a military responsibility, but he sent large numbers of the media apparatus of the "Communist Action Organization" to fight.
In the same context, he revealed that the Syrian intervention in Lebanon was organized by the former US Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, with a representative in Lebanon, and that the Americans imposed restrictions on the entry of the Syrian army, and ensured that Israel would not interfere, stressing that the main purpose was to control the Palestinian resistance.
It is noteworthy that Trabelsi - who was born in 1941 to a family coming from Damascus - traveled to Paris to complete his studies after a hiatus that lasted for years to devote himself to partisan work, after which he obtained a doctorate, and then returned to Lebanon to start teaching at the Lebanese American University and then at the American University in Beirut.
He wrote on economics, history, and popular culture.
Among his books are "The History of Modern Lebanon from the Principality to the Taif Accord," in which he traces the most important historical stages in the history and march of Lebanon, and the book "Silk and Iron... from Mount Lebanon to the Suez Canal," and "The Portrait of the Boy in Red", which are his memoirs in which he tells of his upbringing. And his youth and his struggle in the sixties and seventies.
He said that he started writing books late in 1984, but wrote newspaper articles and published "Diaries of the Siege of Beirut under the Israeli Occupation," noting that the experiences of the Arab revolutions constituted the material for his production as a writer.