Susannah Butter The nightmare facing my loved ones in Beirut, where rage is at a tipping point
MY mother is from Ras Beirut, three kilometres from the warehouse where last Tuesday 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate exploded, causing devastation. This past week she has been glued to her phone, talking to friends who have lost family, whose loved ones are in intensive care, whose homes and businesses have been destroyed and who are despairing at the lack of accountability.
The explosion hit a friend’s flat and a huge shard of glass was embedded in her six-year-old son’s head. Running on adrenaline and also injured, our friend drove to the nearest hospital. It was full. After three panicked hours of driving around crammed hospitals, they found a doctor in the mountains above the city. He removed the glass and reassured the boy, telling him the scar on his forehead meant he was now like Harry Potter. More than 200 people died in the blast and they are being called martyrs. That jars. Being a martyr implies dying for a cause. These are people who lost their lives in an explosion that is the result of carelessness at best, at worst something more heartbreaking, yet more negligence from the government.
Yesterday, the government resigned, amidst mass protest. Unfortunately though, that is unlikely to resolve anything because the power structure is the same, determined by religious factions. During protests last year people chanted “everyone means everyone”; they need a clean break, one government resigning won’t change knotty, deeply embedded structural inequality.
International aid is welcome, as is President Macron’s demand for political reform. But people in Beirut have been here before. My mother, who lived through 15 years of civil war and unrest, is tired of hearing that it will be different this time; that aid won’t just go straight to corrupt officials. Beirut is full of people grieving for a country that has suffered repeatedly since the civil war broke out in 1975. Last year people took a stand after the banks collapsed due to corruption and mismanagement. Covid crippled the economy further and hospitals struggled to cope with the pandemic and the refugee crisis — there are more than a million refugees, mostly from Syria. Rage is at a tipping point.
All over the city, there is stark evidence of the problems this country faces; projects which have started but then lost funding because of government corruption. Many buildings don’t have electricity and rubbish often isn’t collected. But there is also ostentatious wealth, used to prove the country is doing all right. The Zaytouna Bay area symbolises the tension. Looming over the swimming pools of the five-star hotels is the towering shell of the Holiday Inn, which was attacked in 1976. A disagreement between its owners means it can’t be demolished so it’s stood empty and pockmarked for nearly 40 years.
Beirut isn’t just a country of chaos and crisis though. As the proud Lebanese people boast, you can drive to the mountains to ski in the morning and swim in the Med in the afternoon. It has food that has inspired many restaurants in London, history and scenery. And it never rains until winter. Last year I spent time in Gemmayzeh, at bars, cafes and art galleries. It felt hopeful and lively. The people are doing all they can to make a better future. Now, with their lives in tatters that has become even more of a struggle.
Another friend is thankful that she felt too tired to take her usual walk by the sea near the warehouse last Tuesday — she is now protesting, demanding an inquiry for those whose already fragile lives were turned upside down in an instant.
My mum lived through 15 years of civil war in Beirut. She is tired of hoping it will be different