The Scots charity helping rebuild Beirut

● Group retraining Syrian refugees has found new outlet for their skills

A month has passed since Beirut’s beating heart was stopped by the devastating blast that killed at least 190 people and injured more than 6,000 others, but the aftershocks are still being felt.

People are clinging on in the wastelands of a once- thriving cit y, where the damage wrought by one of the largest non- nuclear explosions in history is being compounded by economic turmoil.

But there are big hearts in Beirut, and few bigger than Nabil Khallouf’s.

He sets off f or t he worst affected areas shortly after 6am and it is close to 8pm by the time he gets home. The days mostly pass by in a blur, spent amongst jumbles of broken masonry, shattered wood and shards of glass. These are the footprints of the homes where people used to live, the footprints where some still do.

Only yesterday morning, the 34- year- old and his colleagues came across a woman sheltering in an exposed, rubblestrewn flat after her door and windows were blown out in the explosion. With no family, and no means of repairing the damage, she had to wait until help arrived.

And it is not just the poor who are in search of respite. Nabil, a tall, friendly figure in a vest top and flip- flops, speaks of being approached by a panicked wealthy woman in need of assistance after the blast devastated her home.

The economic crisis that has engulfed Lebanon has also crippled its banking system. Nabil wants to help as much as can. “There is a lot of work to be done here and we are happy to help people in Lebanon because they have big needs with the rain and the winter coming,” he said. “We came here when the war started and we want to help them so they can help us.”

Nabil is the project manager in a seven- strong team of Syrian refugees attempting to rebuild areas of Beirut one door and one window frame at a time, thanks to the help of charity Edinburgh Direct Aid.

Withi n f o ur d ays o f t he 4 August explosion, Nabil and his compatriots had left their loved ones behind in the north- east town of Arsal, travelling three hours west to the Lebanese capital. The scale of the challenge, coupled with strict restrictions imposed to contain the spread of Covid- 19,

means they have yet to be reunited with their own families.

There is an irony in these young men, f orced t o f l ee their own homes back in Syria, helping the reconstruction effort in a country that has not always been sympathetic to their plight. The Lebanese authorities have demolished some of the makeshift refugee camps surrounding Arsal, but Nabal wants to build a better life for others, as well as for his young son and daughter.

Maggie Tookey, field operations director for Edinburgh Direct Aid, has been overseeing the reconstruction effort in Beirut. Even four weeks after she set foot in the city, the veteran aid worker finds it difficult to comprehend the scale of the destruction.

“I don’t like to say that what we’re doing is a drop in the ocean because we’ve put in hundreds and hundreds of new panes of glass and front

d o o r s , a n d made h o u s e s watertight,” she said. “But the devastation is beyond anything I have ever seen. I can’t do it justice with a description. Every day I am more and more gobsmacked by what I see.”

E d i n b u r g h Di r e c t Ai d ’s relief effort is centred around a modest workshop i n t he impoverished Karantina area, near the remains of the blast’s epicentre. Having set up vocational training programmes in Arsal five years ago, the charity has helped refugees learn new trades. Now an initiative designed to help displaced Syrians fend for themselves has helped hundreds of families to date in Lebanon’s capital.

Those in the city alongside Nabil include trained carpenters, construction workers, and engineers. Neither they nor Ms Tookey ever thought their skills would be put to such vital use.

Edinburgh Direct Aid is not sure when the work will end. No- one in Beirut is.

The small charity, based in the Newhaven area of Edinburgh, set aside £ 7,500 for its efforts in Beirut. That money has already gone, eaten up by the need to source wood, glass, and aluminium. Ms Tookey said even though the world’s gaze had moved on from Beirut, the city’s plight remains desperate.

“This is a catastrophe which is ongoing,” she said.

To find out more about the charity’s work in Beirut, visit www. edinburghdirectaid. org

“The devastation is beyond anything I have ever seen. Every day I am more and more gobsmacked by what I see”

MAGGIE TOOKEY