MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Lebanon may face a government crisis amid a wave of large-scale protests, and the events unfolding in the country may largely depend on the main players in the Middle East, which would prefer the status quo to avoid insecurity in the region, experts said on Thursday. The rallies in Lebanon have been underway for nearly two weeks. They were sparked by the authorities' plan to introduce a tax on online calls made via WhatsApp messenger. The measure was subsequently scrapped. Still, the protests continued amid an acute economic crisis and low living standards, which President Michel Aoun said were a result of an economic blockade against Lebanon. Prime Minister Saad Hariri announced his resignation late on Tuesday, which prompted a stop in the mass protests that rocked Lebanon. The demonstrators unblocked roads and cleared off barricades in Beirut. The majority of schools announced the resumption of classes beginning on Thursday. Banks, in their turn, are ready to resume operations on Friday. On Wednesday, Aoun asked Hariri to stay on as interim prime minister to allow a new government to form after his cabinet stepped down. Later on Wednesday, the protesters reportedly returned to the streets, calling on the authorities to meet all their demands. The government tightened security measures in the areas where the protesters were gathering.

Economy Deteriorating

"The population of the country has reached a degree of discontent with which they can't see worse than what they have been going through", Gilbert Achcar, a professor at SOAS University of London, said. The Lebanese economy had begun to shrink long before the protests started, and the people have been seeing the whole situation deteriorating further and further, with rumors about the possible collapse of the economy and of the Lebanese currency emerging, he said. "[The Lebanese economy] has been deteriorating, and I cannot see it reverted now, unless you have a foreign financial intervention. But there have been so many millions of dollars injected in the economy, and actually with the corruption a lot of this money goes into pockets of a few instead of really benefiting the country," Achcar added. The overall situation is pretty bad in Lebanon economically and politically, which is a problem for both the country's leadership and the people, Daniel Meier, associate researcher at University Grenoble Alpes, said. "There are not so many options on the table now", he said.

Geopolitics Matter

by arabnews.com TAREK ALI AHMAD -- BEIRUT: Shallow. Superficial. Politically motivated. These are some of the epithets being used by Lebanese men and women to describe the portrayal by the foreign media of the ongoing protests against the country's political elite. From Sidon in the south to Hermel in the north, Lebanon is witnessing an unprecedented cross-community uprising as public frustration with the country's tottering economy, administrative paralysis, crumbling infrastructure and chronic corruption boils over. From the very start, many Lebanese say, the protests have been mischaracterized by Twittering "armchair pundits" and sections of the foreign media as a "Whatsapp Revolution" because of the telcommunications minister's abortive attempt to introduce a daily $0.20 fee for users of Whatsapp and other internet-calling apps. Some Twitter users suggested the Lebanese "are going bonkers in the streets" because of the "Whatsapp tax." It was not just comments on social media that many Lebanese found deeply objectionable. Time magazine had posted a photo on Instagram of burning tires with a caption that said: “Tension had simmered for months but on Thursday, protesters learned about the government's plan to tax Whatsapp calls. As the streets swelled, the Associated Press adds, that plan was withdrawn.”

The Instagram post spurred many Lebanese abroad into reporting it for playing into media stereotype of the historic protests. But the attitude of some media outlets closer to home was seen as no less frivolous. The New York Times carried an opinion piece with the sub-headline "The Middle East could use a decent country. One million Lebanese protestors are demanding one. Hezbollah has other ideas". The reference to “decent country” got heavy flak from Lebanese and Arabs on social media, prompting the newspaper to modify the sub-headline. A Saudi daily carried a report on the protests decorated with images of what it described as Lebanon's “attractive and revolutionary” women, with the headline: “Lebanese babes: All the beautiful women are revolutionary.”

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