Photos by Reuters
Lebanon (MNN) ― A car bombing in Lebanon Tuesday may have been aimed at undermining efforts to end Lebanon's presidential crisis.
It came during a visit by U.S. President George W. Bush. According to investigators, the car bomb was packed with 44 pounds of dynamite. The explosion damaged a U.S. Embassy vehicle, killing three passersby and wounding nearly two dozen.
SAT-7's David Harder says their team was close enough to hear the explosion. It sent shockwaves of panic through their team. "This bombing happened right next to a church, the Evangelical Alliance Church, and three of the 21 people who were injured were inside the church, including a pastor who had just been on a SAT-7 program about two weeks before."
SAT-7 is a Christian satellite ministry to the Middle East and North Africa. Harder says, by all accounts, it appears that the target was political. That does little to ease the concern over the instability of the region.
The tensions have been building since late fall last year. In spite of that, Harder says their SAT-7 team managed to launch SAT-7 Kids, a channel dedicated to Christian programming for children and young people.
SAT-7 KIDS channel is broadcasting from the Hotbird satellite platform and can be watched in every nation in the Middle East, North Africa and also across all of Europe. SAT-7's team of children's producers, writers, editors, actors and technicians worked for more than a year and a half making new programs for the channel.
The channel is broadcasting 24-hours a day and airs a wide variety of shows including cartoons, music programs, films, kid's game shows, drama and much more. Over 100 million children under the age of 15 live in the Arab world, and over half have access to satellite television channels.
That was a lot to accomplish with the threat of civil war hanging over their heads. Harder explains the team has a determination born of the hope in Christ. "SAT-7 is really part of the fabric of the Middle East. Our staff, and the people who appear on our programs live in the Middle East. So they're able to say, 'Yes, situations here are difficult, but we have hope in Jesus Christ. He is really the only hope,' so they're able to bring that into the programs."
