![]() Next to the Brooklyn Heights Synagogue on Remsen Street stands Our Lady of Lebanon Maronite Cathedral, a Romanesque building dating from 1846 and originally the Congregational Church of the Pilgrims. The focal points for the established Lebanese communities are the churches, which often give haflis - parties with traditional dancing and feasting. Sahadi took his wife and three children to Lebanon for a visit in 1972 and says he would like to go back ''when and if things get better.'' ''But then about a decade ago, ethnic foods came in, and now it's gourmet foods so we're doing fine.''Īny Middle Easterner would feel at home in the store, with its apricots from Turkey, olives from Greece and tahini or crushed sesame seed paste and baba gannouj or eggplant dip from Lebanon. ''As a kid, I used to worry about what would happen when the old- timers disappeared who used to come in and buy 15 pounds of olives and 25 pounds of bulgur at a time,'' says American-born Charles Sahadi, 40 years old, who runs the main wholesaler-retailer of Middle Eastern food in the area. This Arab oasis, near Court and Clinton Streets, includes a score of Middle Eastern restaurants, two bakeries, a music shop and half a dozen Oriental groceries. The Sahadis and other Arabs were displaced in the 1940's by the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel and moved to Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn.Ītlantic Avenue is still the main Arab bazaar or shopping center in the New York area and is all most New Yorkers ever see of the Arab community. The Sahadi family, Orthodox Christians from Zahle in East Lebanon, started Sahadi Brothers' food store in 1885 on Washington Street in Lower Manhattan, known as Little Syria. The new generation, usually Lebanese-born, is secular, professional and lives largely in Manhattan. The old generation born in this country lives in established communities such as the Bay Ridge section of Brooklyn and is largely Americanized, although it clings to the Eastern-rite churches. The Lebanese of the New York area, generally estimated at 60,000, are divided essentially into two groups. So few are in New York that there is no Lebanese imam - prayer leader - or mosque. They went to Chi cago, Toledo and Detroit. The flow of Lebanese Moslems began in 1976 after the first serious fighting in Beirut. The first Lebanese Christians to come here in significant numbers, at the end of the last century, were generally tradesmen, farmers and skilled laborers who hoped to make their fortunes and return home. ![]() The great majority are Christians of the Maronite and Melkite Eastern Rite and Antiochian Orthodox Churches. Although he is happy here, he says he feels he could be more useful in Lebanon and would like to return, ''but only if there is decent long-term peace.''Īccording to estimates from churches, there are between 1.5 million and 2 million people of Lebanese origin in this country. Khalil, a Shiite Moslem, is now director of vascular surgery at Bellevue Hospital. Ismael el Khalil, who was director of vascular surgery at the American University Hospital in Beirut, brought his wife and three school-age children here three years ago. He was worried because he had tried to call his 80-year-old father in Beirut for four weeks but got no answer.ĭr. ''Our hearts and our minds are in Lebanon because we all have relatives there,'' says Maroun Asmar, who came to the United States in 1956 and is a supervisor in the Transit Authority. ![]() When someone from Lebanon meets a compatriot these days, he often asks, ''Did you get a phone call through?'' Above all, there is a shared concern over the fighting in Lebanon. ![]()
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