BEIRUT: Beirut’s tap water is free of germs and safe to drink, the Beirut and Mount Lebanon Water Company said Tuesday. “After conducting chemical tests on several samples … during the months of May and June, results revealed that the water was free of germs,” the company said in a statement. (Link)

  A few steps from Brisk Cafe on Beirut’s Hamra Street, a teenage Syrian squats with her three children and cups her hand appealing for loose change. Along the road, a Syrian shoeshine boy urinates against a poster. “This is not the Hamra Street we used to know,” said Mustapha Broush, the cafe’s supervisor. “We […]

  Figures released by the Order of Engineers of Beirut and Tripoli show that the number of construction permits reached 10,091 in the first seven months of 2014, constituting a marginal decrease of 0.2 percent from 10,115 for the same period last year.   However, the surface area of construction permits issued in the first […]

    Britain is at risk of being “sanitised” of faith because an “aggressive form of secularism” in workplaces and public bodies is forcing Christians to hide their beliefs, a former attorney general has warned. Dominic Grieve said he found it “quite extraordinary” that people were being sacked or disciplined for expressing their beliefs at work. […]

  Islamic militant terrorists ISIS is giving non-muslims in Iraq three options: leave, convert or die. A WorldWatch Monitor report tells the personal account of Iraqi Christian Mikha Qasha.  In August, WWM reported that Qasha, an elderly paralytic, was moved from his home in Qaraqosh after ISIS members threatened him with weapons giving him one week […]

  Some 2,200 years ago, Carthaginian military commander Hannibal – who some maintain is of Phoenician descent – set out to defeat the Romans by attacking from the north, through the chilly and hostile Alps. During this journey, on which he was followed by 60,000 troops, horses and three-dozen war elephants, Hannibal, as legend has […]

    The summer of violence in Gaza and Israel on Tuesday entered its fifth week after rockets, fired from inside Gaza, broke the latest ceasefire. After the attack, Israel recalled its negotiators from peace talks in Cairo, and Israeli forces launched new airstrikes.   Since the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) launched Operation Protective Edge […]

  A copper awl is the oldest metal object unearthed to date in the Middle East. The discovery reveals that metals were exchanged across hundreds of miles in this region more than 6,000 years ago, centuries earlier than previously thought, researchers say.   The artifact was unearthed in Tel Tsaf, an archaeological site in Israel […]

    BEIRUT: Nusra Front released a video of captured soldiers and members of the Internal Security Forces asking Hezbollah to withdraw from Syria or else their kidnappers would kill them. "This apostate group is killing our Sunni families in Syria while it has no business in doing so. I call on my people in Taraya […]

  I like to listen to Jazz music while I do household chores. Like ironing my shirts. And that is precisely what I did on August 6, 2014, when I first listened to Lisan al Tarab, pianist Tarek Yamani’s new album. The conflicts in the Middle East had occupied my mind and my writing for quite […]