Pity Beirut, but this darkness was of its own making
God knows the Lebanese have suffered. They stumbled out of one of the most brutal civil wars in modern times into a conflict with Israel. Just as the country was recovering from that, neighbouring Syria exploded in protest – sending a wave of refugees its way.
Lebanon miraculously weathered the storm, only to be hit by an economic crisis so deep it has plunged most of the country into poverty. Trauma – its citizens often grimly joke – has become part of the national psyche.
Yet Tuesday’s explosion was something else. I fear it is more than anyone, even the famously resilient Lebanese, can bear.
I spent more than four years in the capital, Beirut, as a Middle East correspondent for this paper. It’s a complicated and tumultuous place where tempers and passions run high. If you don’t fall in love with it, you’ve misunderstood it. If you don’t hate it, you’ve probably done something wrong. Anyone who has ever left it – which I did in February – knows you leave a piece of your heart behind.
Checking yesterday on friends and old neighbours who had become more like family to me, there was no good news. Most live in and around the
‘A picture sent to me of my old home showed similar ruin. I’m yet to hear of the new occupants’ fate – I know they were about to welcome a new baby’
‘It looked to be thriving in recent years ... but Lebanon had borrowed up to its eyeballs and it was only a matter of time before the bubble burst’
historic entertainment district of Gemmayzeh, which is so close to the port it was effectively a ground zero. One had shards of glass in her head and needed stitches. One was found badly concussed by the site after he had raced down on his motorbike to report on the initial fire.
My “Lebanese mother”, Christina, broke her arm as she was thrown by the blast’s terrible force.
Beirut’s health minister urged people to leave the city in case of any residual noxious gas but the 52-yearold mother of three – like most others – had nowhere else to go. She swept up the window fragments and put the broken frame back on her broken bed. Her grown children came home to join her, not wanting her to be alone.
There’s little left of the places we used to frequent: gone is Anise bar where we used to drown our sorrows after a tough day reporting, as is the little fruit and veg shop on the corner, and the New York Times reporter’s French-colonial-era apartment, where I had my farewell party. A picture sent to me of my old home showed similar ruin. I’m yet to hear of the new occupants’ fate – I know they were about to welcome a new baby.
It is hard to overestimate the damage done to a country half the size of Wales. More than 300,000 people – a quarter of Beirut’s population – have been made homeless overnight. The anaemic state, without serious international help, is incapable of rebuilding.
Many in Lebanon had predicted an explosion, though few could have imagined it would come in the form of the 2,750-ton nitrate blast that would devastate half the city.
It’s hard to pinpoint exactly where it all went wrong for Lebanon. The country had looked to be thriving in recent years.
Tourist numbers were up, the beaches along its beautiful Mediterranean coastline were packed. The middle classes appeared more comfortable than they had ever been.
However, that all belied a much more complicated reality. Lebanon had borrowed up to its eyeballs and it was only a matter of time before the bubble burst.
Corruption and greed among its ruling class – warlords who had gripped on to power since the end of the civil war in 1990 – had helped to bleed the country dry. The politicians didn’t even bother trying to hide it, simply blaming one another.
On Tuesday, Beirutis cursed their politicians before an official investigation was even under way. Experience had taught them that either incompetence or negligence would be behind the disaster which has claimed the lives of at least 135 people and injured thousands more.
Initial reports suggested that the authorities had seized several thousand tons of highly combustible ammonium nitrate and had been storing it at the port. The blast was suspected to have been triggered by a fire started by a welder.
Questions will soon be asked as to who signed off on keeping such a large quantity of a volatile and explosive substance stored in a densely populated civilian area.
“What exploded today in Beirut is not just ammonium nitrate. It is, above all, corruption, mismanagement, incompetency and cynical disregard for the security and lives of people,” wrote one local, Dyab Abou Jahjah, who expressed the thoughts of many of his countrymen.
Lebanon had for months been teetering towards ruin.
By the time I left Beirut in February there were daily street protests against government corruption.
Then the coronavirus hit. Lebanon had the sense to shut down, fearing that its already beleaguered hospitals would not be able to cope with a major outbreak.
But the lockdown sent its poorest – once rendered jobless – spiralling into even deeper poverty.
At the same time, the country was beginning to feel the full effect of its free-falling economy.
The country’s currency lost 60 per cent of its value in a matter of weeks. Its once proud and thriving middle classes have been forced to sell their possessions.
There was no point in looking to the government for help, it had been unable to provide the basics to its people – including water and electricity – even during the “good times”.
On Monday, the country’s foreign minister resigned, warning that a lack of vision and the will to implement reforms risked turning Lebanon into a “failed state”. There is little to suggest it can do much now to avoid its wretched fate.
Thousands in the Lebanese capital would have had a restless sleep in their dark, hot and windowless homes on Tuesday night. The windows may have been knocked out by the blast, but the darkness was of the country’s own making.