BEIRUT – The last public beach on
Beirut’s heavily developed seaside could soon be squeezed out by yet
another luxury resort, raising fears that residents could find
themselves living in a coastal city without much of a coast.
The fight for Ramlet al-Baida beach has emerged as a
new flashpoint between civil society activists and the entrenched
political establishment over land management and public services in
Lebanon’s capital. It follows last year’s trash crisis, in which
mountains of garbage piled up for months, and a conflict over a local
park that until recently was only open one day a week.
Activists say the Eden Rock Resort development,
greenlighted by the city’s governor in September, is the first step to
transforming the city’s last public beach into yet another exclusive
resort.
“If this is how Beirut is going to be, then tomorrow,
we’re going to be sitting in a cage,” said Nazih al-Raess, the
custodian of the beach’s public swimming zone. “The people who have
money will be able to go out to smell the breeze and the people who
don’t … will be buried at home.”
The project has rekindled debate in this intensely
stratified city over who has the right to its shrinking green spaces and
shores. Many of Beirut’s well-to-do have turned up their noses at
Ramlet al-Baida — or pinched them, as the case may be — as municipal
authorities have allowed sewage to pollute its once azure waters and
white sands.
