BY LAURIE KELLMAN AND ZEINA KARAM ASSOCIATED BEIRUT — The militant group Hezbollah fired a barrage of rockets toward Israel on Friday, and Israel hit back with artillery in a significant escalation between the two sides. It was the third day of attacks along the volatile border with Lebanon, a perennial focus of Middle East conflict where tensions between Israel and Iran, which backs Hezbollah, occasionally play out. But comments by Israeli officials and Hezbollah’s actions suggested the two were seeking to avoid a major conflict at this time. Israel said it fired back after 19 rockets were launched from Lebanon, and Prime Minister Naftali Bennett swiftly convened a meeting with the country’s top defense officials. No casualties were reported. “We do not wish to escalate to a full war, yet of course we are very prepared for that,” said Lt. Col. Amnon Shefler, spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces.

The attack sparked tensions between local residents and Hezbollah. Videos circulated on social media after the rocket attack showed two vehicles, including a mobile rocket launcher, being stopped by villagers in the southeastern village of Shwaya in Hasbaya region, near the border with the Golan Heights. The windshield of one vehicle was smashed. Some of the villagers could be heard saying: “Hezbollah is firing rockets from between homes so that Israel hits us back.” The Lebanese army said it arrested four people who were involved in the rocket firing and confiscated the rocket launcher. It said Lebanese troops and U.N. peacekeepers are taking all measures to restore calm. Hezbollah issued a statement saying that the rockets were fired from remote areas, adding that the fighters were stopped in Shwaya on their way back. “We lived a similar period in the 1970s, when Palestinian fighters were carrying out guerrilla attacks against Israel. We are now to the same status, and this is causing tension,” said Ajaj Mousa, a resident of nearby Kfarchouba.

سجعان قزي

اليومَ ليس يومًا جديدًا. منذُ انفجارِ المرفأ كلُّ أيّامِ السَنةِ 4 آب. لا اسِمَ لها آخَر. لا أشهرًا ولا أسابيعَ ولا أيامًا. اكتفَت بهُنيهةِ الانفجار. كانت الهنيهةُ دهرًا. بعدَها لم تتوالَ الأيّامُ. خَجِلَت أنْ تُطِلَّ فتَنتَحرَ فوقَ جثامينِ الشهداء. سنةَ 4 آب ما عاد سكّانُ لبنانَ أربعةَ ملايينِ نسمةٍ، بل مِئتي شهيدٍ وسِتّةَ آلافِ جريحٍ. سنةَ 4 آب ما عادت مساحةُ لبنان عشْرةَ آلافٍ وأربَعَمائةٍ واثنينِ وخمسينَ كلم²، بل مدى العالم والفضاء. شَخَصت الشعوبُ نحوَنا. رأت انفجارًا وسَمِعَت دُخانًا يُرشِدُها إلى “المغارة”، حيث وُلِدَ الشهداءُ الجُدد.

أتَوا جميعًا يَسجُدون أمام المرفأِ وبيروتَ والشهداءِ باستثناءِ أركانِ الدولةِ اللبنانيّةِ (أو غيرِ اللبنانيّة). سنةَ “4 آب” كان إيمانويل ماكرون رئيسَ جمهوريّةِ لبنان. وكانت حكوماتُ الدولِ العربيّةِ والأجنبيّةِ حكومةَ لبنان. وكان البطريركُ بشارة الراعي رمزَ الموقِفِ الوطنيِّ. وكان البابا فرنسيس مُحرِّكَ الديبلوماسيّةِ الدوليّةِ. يومَها برز التضامنُ بين اللبنانيّين. عَزفوا على وَترٍ كئيبٍ واحِد. كلُّ بيتٍ شَعَر أنَّ الانفجارَ في الدار. كلُّ لبنانيٍّ أحسَّ أنّه مصابٌ. بدا تبادلُ التعازي بين الناس حَرفًا زائدًا وكلمةً جوفاءَ ورديفَ صلاة. أما المسؤولون، فاعتَبروا أن تعازيَهم عَبرَ شاشاتِ التلفزيون إنجازٌ عظيمٌ يُغني عن العدالةِ والحقيقةِ وتأليفِ حكومة، وعن… رحيلِهم الآتي. قالها البطريركُ الراعي للجموعِ أمس: “حافِظوا على الوطنِ وغَيِّروا الباقي…”

By Anchal Vohra — foreignpolicy.com — Lebanon’s ruling elite designated billionaire Najib Mikati to be prime minister at a time when Lebanon’s masses have fallen under poverty. He comes from Tripoli, the poorest city in Lebanon, but owns a yacht, a stake in Pepe Jeans, a South African telecom firm, and prime real estate in New York and London. According to Forbes, Mikati is one of the richest men in Lebanon with an estimated worth of $2.7 billion. But such wealth highlights the widening inequality, and political dysfunction, in a country where most people find it hard to imagine how they will ever again make ends meet. Nobody believes Mikati’s leadership is sustainable even in the medium term. It is Lebanon’s misfortune that its political class, and many of its international backers, believe he is worth supporting nevertheless. Mikati is seen by most Lebanese, by contrast, as a symbol of an old and corrupt order. In October 2019, the month Lebanon erupted in protests, he was charged with corruption for illegally profiting from housing loans meant for lower-income groups, but the case was buried. Most insulting to the suffering of the Lebanese is the fact that Mikati has previously served as prime minister—and last did so when a ship laden with thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate first docked at Beirut’s port. He now returns to power a year after the unsafely stored explosive caught fire, exploded, and fatally damaged some of the most glorious parts of the city.

Is Mikati the man to extract Lebanon from its myriad crises? Activists say he is a pawn of the political class, a stopgap prime minister tasked with preserving the status quo. But optimists believe that as an experienced businessperson, Mikati might strike the right compromises and find a way to keep the country afloat until elections next year. Lebanon’s backers in the West are clearly hoping that, through Mikati, a disruptive collapse of Lebanon’s political order can be avoided for now. Lebanese politics has been in dysfunctional stasis ever since Beirut was shaken by an explosion so strong it has been compared to the Chernobyl disaster. Around 200 innocent people were killed, thousands of people were injured, and hundreds of thousands of people were rendered homeless in an incident that could have been avoided. One week later, Hassan Diab was forced to resign as prime minister. But Diab has continued as caretaker prime minister as former Lebanese chief of staff Mustapha Adib and Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri failed to form a government.

CAIRO, (Reuters) – Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister said on Wednesday the insistence of the Iran-backed Hezbollah group on imposing its will in Lebanon was a major reason for the country’s crisis, according to Saudi state TV and a foreign ministry statement. Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud also said Riyadh was concerned that no tangible […]

هل سيجتمع المجلس الاعلى للدفاع لمعالجة موضوع الاعتداءات الاسرائيلية على لبنان كون القضية ليست من اختصاص مجلس الأمن المركزي الذي اجتمع في الاونة الاخيرة

 A justice symbol monument is seen near the grain silo damaged during last year’s Beirut port blast as Lebanon marks the one-year anniversary of Beirut port explosion, in Beirut, Lebanon August 4, 2021. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir

By By Tamara Qiblawi — cnn — It’s been a year since one of the world’s largest ever non-nuclear explosions ripped through Lebanon’s capital, killing more than 200 people. On any given day in Beirut’s worst-affected neighborhoods, theories about the explosion still circulate. No two stories of human tragedy are alike, and most interactions between people here end not with a goodbye, but with an invocation that Lebanon’s ruling elite be toppled. The political class is, overwhelmingly, blamed for the disaster. At just after 6 p.m. on August 4, 2020, hundreds of metric tons of ammonium nitrate ignited, sparking the massive blast in the city’s port. The industrial chemicals had been improperly stored there for years due to the failure to act by successive governments and lawmakers across the political divide. That much is clear. But for people across Lebanon, there are still many unanswered questions about what led to the tragedy, and there has been no sense of closure in the 12 months since the explosion.

Here’s what we still don’t know.

What triggered the blast?

Because of the many inquiries by journalists and rights groups over the past year, we know that the ammonium nitrate — stored alongside fireworks in a poorly maintained warehouse — was a disaster waiting to happen. Six urgent letters sent by customs officials since 2014 — the year the material was unloaded at the port under mysterious circumstances — had alerted the authorities to the danger posed by the chemicals. One was written by a port official in May 2020, just months before the blast. “This substance, if ignited, will lead to a large explosion, and its outcome will almost obliterate the port of Beirut. If the substance were exposed to any kind of theft, the thief would be able to use this substance to build explosives,” warned the document, which was obtained by CNN after the incident. Beirut’s port is just 100 meters from some of the city’s most densely-populated neighborhoods. The blast destroyed not only a large part of the port, but also left swathes of the city in tatters. The damage was estimated at between $3.8 and $4.6 billion. It is clear that successive leaders — four governments and three prime ministers — either would have or should have known about the threat posed by the material, and that little was done to address the danger.

But what is far from clear, 12 months on, is what ignited the ammonium nitrate. According to a report by Human Rights Watch, Tarek Bitar, the judge charged with investigating the explosion, is looking into several theories. One is that sparks from welding works that day caused a fire in hangar 12, the warehouse where the chemical was being stored. Another is that an Israeli strike was the catalyst, though Lebanese aviation officials reported that local radar systems did not detect military aircraft over Lebanese airspace in the hour or so before the blast, Israeli officials have denied any involvement, and Bitar himself has said the Israel theory was highly unlikely, according to HRW’s report. Bitar is also exploring the theory that the explosion was an intentional act, according to HRW. A huge fire broke out Thursday at the Port of Beirut, triggering panic among residents traumatized by last month’s massive explosion that killed and injured thousands of people.Huge fire breaks out at Beirut port a month after explosion “Speculation that Hezbollah may have wanted to destroy the ammonium nitrate at the port supposedly to hide that some of the ammonium nitrate in the stockpile had been used by Hezbollah’s ally Bashar al-Assad in Syria to produce barrel bombs increased as reporting emerged regarding the connection between the cargo owners and individuals sanctioned by the U.S. for alleged links to Assad,” the report said, referring to an investigative report by local journalist Firas Hatoum.

People carry photographs of victims of last year’s devastating explosion, in a march in Beirut demanding accountability and justice, Aug. 4, 2021

Wounded people are evacuated after a massive explosion in the port of Beirut, Aug. 4, 2020. A year later, families of the victims are consumed with winning justice for their loved ones and punishing Lebanon’s political elite, blamed for causing the disaster through corruption and neglect.

By csmonitor.com — By Scott Peterson — No Lebanese citizen who felt the shock wave of one of the largest non-nuclear blasts in history will ever forget its destructive power – or that it signaled a new low of negligence and corruption for Lebanon’s political elite. The explosion a year ago of ammonium nitrate, poorly stored in Beirut’s port, destroyed swaths of the capital and enveloped the city in a shroud of trauma that left more than 200 dead and 300,000 homeless. Lebanon marked the grim anniversary Wednesday with a day of mourning, and protests in Beirut demanding justice. The Beirut port blast exemplified the government ineptitude that had fueled Lebanon’s protest movement. In response, a resilient and energized civil society has taken charge of the rebuilding effort. Yet even as Lebanon began last year to grope through one of its darkest moments, volunteers came from every corner of the country to help.

As if by reflex, Lebanon’s civil society swung into action, its skills well practiced after a 15-year civil war, multiple armed conflicts, a collapsed economy, the absorption of 1.5 million Syrian refugees, and the pandemic – all crises created or made worse by chronic political dysfunction. The outpouring of public support was as unprecedented as the scale of ruin. The website of the charity Offre Joie (Joy of Giving), for example, which for years had helped Lebanese rebuild from war and violence when government was absent, crashed as more than 6,000 volunteers rushed to sign up. The result, one year later, is the emergence of a vigorous and competent civil society movement that has seized the reins of rebuilding and convinced donors to bypass corrupt government institutions. And a unique mechanism called the Reform, Recovery and Reconstruction Framework (3RF) – run jointly under the United Nations, European Union, and World Bank – has made its demands for accountability and reform heard at the highest level and has placed activists carrying out the recovery across the table from government officials.

by artnet.com — Sarah Cascone — A year after the deadly explosion in Beirut that shattered the city, a new sculpture commemorating the victims of the tragedy has gone up. It’s a work meant to heal—but in the charged atmosphere of crisis-wracked Lebanon, the memorial is also being met by a wave of fierce criticism. The towering sculpture, by Lebanese artist Nadim Karam, was unveiled on August 2 at the site of the explosion. Standing 82 feet tall and weighing in at 35 tons, The Gesture (2021) is made of steel salvaged from Beirut’s port after the blast. The piece takes the form of a giant holding out a flower. Karam, an accomplished figure in local public art, intended the gesture to symbolize “an act of memory and a gesture towards the immensity of sadness that marks the people of Beirut,” according to a statement. “It is a giant made of ashes, traces from the explosions, scars of the city, that still exist everywhere in Beirut,” Karam told Arab News. “The work represents the scars of the people that still have not healed. This figure is every single one of us and a reminder that we are the living energy of Beirut.”

The Gesture will ultimately also incorporate a water feature and a light installation in time for Lebanon’s national day of mourning on August 4. But the response to the work has been divided. Some argue that the wounds of the attack—which killed more than 200, injured at least 7,000, and destroyed large portions of the city, leaving more than 300,000 without homes—are still too raw for a public memorial, especially on the site itself. “That’s a shameful gesture,” Mazen Chehab, a local creative director, wrote on Instagram, according to the National. “Nothing should be done with the port until those responsible for the explosion are heavily sanctioned.” “The killers have complete impunity and we are already pretending something is in the past and we are trying to transcend it through art,” filmmaker Rawan Nassif told Reuters. “I feel this is a crime scene that can’t be touched yet, and it has to be investigated.” Top officials have thus far not been investigated for the devastating blast, though Lebanese parliament indicated on July 29 that they will no longer have immunity.

by reuters By Maha El Dahan, Editing by Timothy Heritage — — A report released by Human Rights Watch on Tuesday concluded there was strong evidence to suggest some Lebanese officials knew about and tacitly accepted the lethal risks posed by ammonium nitrate stored at Beirut port before the fatal blast there on Aug. 4 last year. HRW called for a U.N. investigation into the explosion, which was caused by the chemicals stored unsafely at the port for years and killed more than 200 people, injured thousands and destroyed swathes of Lebanon’s capital. The report by the international rights watchdog contained over 700 pages of findings and documents. Its investigation also concluded there was evidence that multiple Lebanese authorities were criminally negligent under Lebanese law.

HRW said President Michel Aoun, caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab, director general of state security Tony Saliba and other former ministers wanted for questioning by judge Bitar, had failed to take action to protect the general public despite having been informed of the risks. The presidential palace offered no comment. Saliba said his agency did all it could within its legal remit, filing legal reports to warn officials, and had an office open at the port only months before the blast. There was no immediate response from Diab. Aoun said on Friday he was ready to testify and that no one was above the law. HRW based its report on official documents it reviewed and on multiple interviews with top officials including the president, the caretaker prime minister and the head of the country’s state security.

by english.alaraby.co.uk — France said on Monday a forthcoming conference on Lebanon needs to gather $357 million in aid to meet the most urgent needs of the battered country’s population. The conference on Wednesday, co-hosted by President Emmanuel Macron and United Nations chief Antonio Guterres, coincides with the first anniversary of the blast that disfigured […]