by Sam Brennan -- by al-monitor.com --TAANAYEL, Lebanon — Bobbing up and down in the circles of the folk dance dabkeh and eating a rich assortment of dips, meats and vegetables known as mezze, hundreds of people celebrated a drink that makes both dabkeh and mezze more enjoyable, the anise-based spirit Arak. The small town of Taanayel's Festival de L'Arak, now in its fourth year, was held June 15-16 in the Bekaa Valley. Run by Arcenciel, a Lebanese nongovernmental organization that promotes diversity and development, at the organization’s EcoLodge hotel, the event celebrated the long history and unique cultural role of Lebanon’s national drink. Served with two-thirds water and ice, the liquor is similar to but — as arak producers quickly and forcibly point out — still distinct from other anise-based drinks like the Greek ouzo or Turkish raki. It is made by crushing grapes and distilling them into alcohol using a copper contraption called an alembic. In the second or third distillation the all-important anise is added, giving the drink its distinct taste. Once the distilling is done, the liquid is placed into large clay jars to make the taste smoother. Small changes to the process lead to a wide variety of outcomes, and the alcohol content varies between 50% to as high as 80% when homemade.

Richard Kazan, the director of Arak Bechara Balaban and one of the many producers at the festival, is well acquainted with this process as a fourth-generation arak maker. Bechara Balaban itself has been producing arak since 1883 and was the first company to be registered in the Bekaa governorate of Lebanon. Its business number is 1/1948. The capital of this governate, Zahle, is the epicenter of arak production. Originally, people “would make arak from the fermentation of grapes only," Kazan told Al-Monitor. "Then the Zahle people added anise.”

Arak continued to be linked to Zahle and the surrounding areas, including Taanayel, often playing an integral role in holidays and celebrations. Kazan said, “My grandparents and parents during Easter would have nuts, not chocolate, and arak without water. This is a tradition. You would get one almond and a full glass of arak." This culture is common to nearly all who grew up in Zahle. Elias Boutros Maalouf, managing partner of Chateau Rayak, told Al-Monitor that he began making arak and wine for his grandfather. Though he passed away before Maalouf could serve him arak, a photograph of his grandfather holding a vine of local grapes is engraved on Cheteau Rayak’s giant alembic.

by naharnet.com —The Syrian army detained two members of the General Directorate of State Security after reaching the border between Lebanon and …

by theguardian.com —The wife of former Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn has appealed to Donald Trump for help and rejected suggestions that she …

by latimes.com --Former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, imprisoned since the military removed him from office in 2013, died Monday after collapsing in court, officials said, putting the nation’s authoritarian-minded government on the defensive over his treatment in custody. The country’s first democratically elected president and a leader of the now-outlawed Muslim Brotherhood movement, the 67-year-old California-educated Morsi lasted only a year in office before his defense minister, Abdel Fattah Sisi, moved to wrest power from him. Sisi has been president ever since.

Egyptian authorities did not immediately disclose the cause of death. The public prosecutor said in a statement that Morsi was taken to a hospital after his collapse, and pronounced dead there. It said there would be a forensic report, but did not say when that was expected. Security jitters were immediately apparent after the death announcement. Egyptian media said the Interior Ministry had ordered a state of the highest alert. But in Tahrir Square -- the epicenter of the Arab Spring protests that set in motion events that led to Morsi’s presidency – the mood was calm, with little obvious sign of extra police vigilance, although some street cafes were closed. On a nearby bridge over the Nile, Egyptian families were enjoying a night out, with vendors selling balloons and snacks. Morsi’s death, which followed years of reports of his health deteriorating in prison, was a dramatic new inflection point in Egypt’s tumultuous journey from the massive Arab Spring protests of 2011 that toppled Hosni Mubarak, a dictator of decades’ standing, and the country’s subsequent slide into a new era of repression under Sisi.

State television said Morsi collapsed during a court session that was part of his trial on espionage charges, one of dozens of legal proceedings that punctuated his years of imprisonment on an array of charges. At one point he was sentenced to death. In early courtroom appearances, he defiantly maintained that he was the country’s legitimate president. After he yelled angrily at judges, the authorities soundproofed the cage-like dock in which the accused are customarily held.