A Lebanese flag flies along a bridge near the port of Beirut, while in the background the damaged grain silos are visible in front of the site of the explosion. (Credit: AFP archive photo)
In the beginning, there was hope. A cease-fire. A regime change in Syria. A new president. A new prime minister. Lebanon seemed poised to turn the page on war and reinvent itself. It was too good to be true — but for a brief, enchanted moment, we needed to believe it.Three months later, reality has returned. The fighting hasn’t fully stopped. The new regime in Damascus may be different from the old one, but not necessarily more reassuring. The neighbor to the South is even more worrisome. And before geopolitics inevitably catch up with us, Lebanon still hasn’t resolved its own internal issues. We may yet turn on each other before, or while, one of our neighbors, especially the more dangerous one, devours us.Beneath the surface, the “new” Lebanon looks strikingly similar to the old. Decades of decay cannot be swept away with a single...
In the beginning, there was hope. A cease-fire. A regime change in Syria. A new president. A new prime minister. Lebanon seemed poised to turn the page on war and reinvent itself. It was too good to be true — but for a brief, enchanted moment, we needed to believe it.Three months later, reality has returned. The fighting hasn’t fully stopped. The new regime in Damascus may be different from the old one, but not necessarily more reassuring. The neighbor to the South is even more worrisome. And before geopolitics inevitably catch up with us, Lebanon still hasn’t resolved its own internal issues. We may yet turn on each other before, or while, one of our neighbors, especially the more dangerous one, devours us.Beneath the surface, the “new” Lebanon looks strikingly similar to the old. Decades of decay cannot be swept away with a...
