In the vast chaos ravaging through the Middle East, these past few days have been especially detrimental to the already extremely weak freedom of thought and speech. Yesterday, Jordanian officials banned Lebanese band Mashrou’ Leila from ever performing in Jordan simply because they were afraid of their progressive message.

A few hundred kilometers away from Amman, a 17 year old named Omar Mohammad was living his last hours before being killed by extremists in his country. His fault? They thought he was an atheist, and as such an apostate. He was, however, a firm believer in God and Islam, but not the Islam those terrorists wanted to propagate, and as such his words on Facebook and his way of life proved to be too much for them to handle.

Today, Omar Mohammad is no more, because he dared to speak up against the horrors that had become customary in the place he called home, Yemen. People like Omar should be memorialized for the courage they exhibit in challenging the status quo where they exist, in doing so with extreme modernity in a sea of backwardness.

Going through his Facebook profile, on which his words will now forever be imprinted, the only thing you can call Omar is a martyr for Arab free speech and thought. He may not have been safe in his last days, as he wrote “a country in which you don’t feel safe is not your home,” but he was brave enough to oppose, brave enough to stand up for himself, for what he believe to be true, for what he thought was wrong in his community and society.

When accused of atheism he replied: “They accuse me of atheism! Oh you people, I see God in the flowers,
And you see Him in the graveyards, that is the difference between me and you.”

On extremists groups he wrote: “How do we await peace from those whose emblem is death?”

On the use of religion to pass ulterior agendas, he said: “You can force your will onto other people. Just call what you want to do the will of God, for that is what men of the cloak do.”

On the current status of the Middle East, he wrote: “We need a moral revolution before everything else, one that brings us back to our humanity, one that wakes us up from our coma. Our situation has become disastrous.”

On the sexual repression culture of the Arab world, Omar said: “Our societies have become purely sexual, and that is because of the repression that our youth live. The simplest example to that is sermons that call for heaven affixed with beautiful women. I challenge a man of the cloak to mention heaven without associating it with women.”

With the murder of Omar, the Arab world has lost a youth that promised a better future, that promised hope that one day this region would amount to something again. May his family find solace in him being remembered by millions of those who didn’t know him, his words propagated forevermore.

As a rule of thumb in the Lebanese political scene, you should know you’re doing something right when all kinds of political groups from all across the political spectrum rally against you and fight you in the dirtiest of ways, slogans and rhetorics.

The “Byerte” list, translating to the Beirutis List, with its slogan “Keep Beirut For Its People” was Hariri and the political establishment’s choice for the upcoming municipal elections on May 8th. Of course, the slogan “Keep Beirut For Its People” is nothing more than a simple variation of the equally xenophobic, horrific political rhetoric rising around the world today, championed by people like Donald Trump. If they had the audacity, they might as well run with “Make Beirut Great Again” and be done with it.

The fact of the matter is no area in the country is exclusive to “its people,” and certainly not the capital which houses 50% of the Lebanese population.

Of course, those politicians had no problem with making sure all investment is placed in Beirut only while forgetting other regions entirely. Those politicians had no problem spending billions of dollars in post war restoration that belonged to the whole country to rebuild Beirut’s heart, making it heartless in the process.

They also had no problem in entertaining the idea of taking Beirut’s trash to places like Akkar. Clearly, keeping Beirut for Beirutis does not extend to their garbage.

Those politicians had no problem as well in championing policies over years to make Beirut not remotely affordable to its own people, unless we now have plans to nationalize GGC citizens.

Those politicians had no problem in making sure Beirut sunk in garbage and stunk of its smell, of its streets being the scene of fights and death that happened not even 8 years ago – ironically on the day the elections are supposed to happen.

I can go on and on, but the epitome of it all is in the fact that Hariri isn’t from Beirut to begin with. Say hi to Saida for me, why don’t you?

Horrifying slogans aside, the Future Movement and the rest of political groups in that list are rallying people in the only way they know how: fear and sectarianism.

Behold a Hariri supporter’s latest magnum opus on Facebook:

It’s precisely rhetoric like this that shows how despicable and afraid those in governance can get, in order to instill this sense of fear and hatred in those who support them, by getting them to fabricate silly, redundant and baseless arguments in order to main a status quo that just doesn’t work.

Omar Chebaro is not alone. Many Beiruti Sunnis as well as other sects or party enthusiasts entertain the notion that opposing Hariri’s list would be unwise simply because it means falling out of rank at a time when doing so is not in the better interest of their sect. What I heard repeatedly goes along the lines: “you can’t be secular in a sectarian environment.”

This is not a justification to support Hariri’s list of “same old same old” at a time when people are dying, suffocating, and getting poisoned from that same old same old. It is in municipal elections that you can stand up to those who have taken you for granted and whose entire message is not one that’s based in the future but in a past rooted in bigotry and brainwashing.

Dear Beirutis, Sunni and otherwise, Beirut Madinati is not the list of Civil Marriage. A list running for Municipal Elections cannot enforce Civil Marriage, regardless of what its candidates believe regarding that issue.

Dear Beirutis, Sunni and otherwise, Beiruti Madinati will not set Beirut on the path to become a haven for sin. Walaw? Don’t be fooled by hateful messages whose only purpose is to get you to vote the way a party that has failed over and over and over again wants you to on May 8th.

Dear Beirutis, Sunni and otherwise, your vote on May 8th is really, very simple:

You can vote for trash. You can vote for the garbage filling your streets. You can vote for the smell that has made you vomit every day for the past 3 weeks. You can vote for the city in which you can’t afford to buy an apartment. You can vote for the city whose downtown you cannot even enter. You can vote for the roads congested with cars at any moment of any day. You can vote for poisoned water, poisoned food, poisoned air.

If you vote that way, you’d be voting for Beirut today, Beirut the city that is dying because of the policies of that who wants you to believe you have no other choice because you’re Sunni, or Orthodox, or from Beirut born and bred, keeping Beirut for its people, because its people are not all Lebanese.

Or you can vote to change things. You can vote to those who are not taking your vote for granted, but going to your neighborhood to ask you: what do you need? You can vote to those who have taken the time to write a 32 pages program for you, not someone asking you to vote for them just because you should.

On May 8th, the choice couldn’t really be simpler. I hope you choose those who are good, not those who make you afraid of wanting better.

Tucked in the lower floor of a building was Al-Quds hospital in Aleppo, Syria, a small 34 bed facility in the Sukkari neighborhood. Its windows and entrance were fortified with mostly sandbags for extra protection despite the many buildings around it that, in theory, protected it from being attacked.

The hospital was not a rebel-run hospital, despite it existing in a rebel-controlled neighborhood. It was a Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) and International Red Cross affiliated institution with an emergency room and an 8 bed pediatrics ward. It was as fully equipped as a hospital in times of war could be.

In the rules of warfare, horrifying as such a notion’s existence is, and as dictated by multiple conventions, notably the Geneva ones, attacks on medical institutions by any side of a conflict is considered a severe violation.

A few hours ago, a fighter jet, flying at low altitude, charged a missile through Al-Quds hospital, to the background of a Syrian citizen being killed every 25 minutes over the past 48 hours.

The jet in question was commissioned by the conjoined Assad-Putin forces trying to reclaim their hegemony over Syria, despite what some anti-resistance news outlets would want you to believe, with them taking videos of the government forces attacking and portraying them as resistance fighters doing so.

The above picture is that of Dr. Muhammad Waseem Maaz. He was a man who spent most of his adult life finishing medical school, and then specializing in pediatrics, before spending his days doing the most self-less thing that any man, especially a physician could do, leave his family behind in Turkey while he helped the ailing children in Aleppo. Al-Quds was the hospital where he worked. Aleppo was the city he called home, the city that is now being ravaged by regime forces. He was the last pediatrician in Aleppo.

As regime fighter jets attacked his hospital head on, Dr. Maaz did not run for his life. He ran to the incubators to try and save as many lives as he could. His life was not one of those that made it out of that building alive, along with 27 others.

His death is not a number. Dr. Maaz’s murder is a war crime, plane and simple. The more horrifying part is that this is not a lone event. His death is one of the most worrying trends of the Syrian Civil War, and conflicts of the 21st century. It’s becoming a trend.

In Syria alone, 654 medical personnel have been killed until September 2015, according to the UN, and, in the past year alone, 7 attacks have been reported by MSF against its facilities in the country.

Syria is not the only place where attacks against hospitals and doctors occur. All sides have been attacking healthcare workers and instutions: rebels, armed groups, and governments.

A few months ago, American military led a 30 minute barrage on an MSF-led hospital which they believed to be a Taliban HQ. They killed 42 people. They justified themselves as it being an “intelligence error.” Intelligence must have come a long way not to be able to differentiate between a hospital and a terrorist haven.

MSF reports their hospitals sustaining 106 attacks in 2015, with the loss of countless lives as well as extremely valuable equipment that is, for thousands and hundreds of thousands, the only difference between life and death.

The most dangerous aspect in such attacks is that they’ve begun to be considered as normal, not as a war anomaly, setting a war precedence into them becoming not only more “mainstream” in conflict, but also more deadly and more unchecked.

The more threatened doctors are, the less they will be willing to work in those areas that require them the most. It’s already started. Over 60% of Syrian areas, for instance, have no possibility to access any

We are doctors, not martyr projects. We work at hospitals, not battle ground sites. We save lives, regardless of who those lives belong to, irrespective of green lines and battle sides. Our lives are not worthier than others, that’s for sure, but us dying because of horrifying war crimes in which we are targets means the lives of those who are equally worthy of saving are lost forever.

We are doctors, not martyrs. We promise to go to the extreme of what we can to save anyone who can be saved. Dr. Maaz was one of those doctors who did just that. The hundreds of MSF doctors who have been killed over the past years have also been doing just that. When did medicine become open season? When did the act of warfare become one that plays out in surgical theaters and in pediatric incubators?

Everyone is at fault. The Assad regime was the culprit in this case, but this is something that everyone is doing. The targeting of healthcare personnel cannot be normalized. In a world where war is everyone’s favorite pastime, certain entities should always remain off limits. These are doctors, not martyrs. They save lives without asking for theirs to be saved. Don’t make them need to.

Aleppo is dying. Aleppo is bleeding. With labels such as “humanitarian disaster” becoming way too common, one cannot but wonder: what is causing this particular disaster? It’s not an earthquake. It’s not a natural disaster. It’s missiles, and terrorist regimes, and armed factions and other men who know no morality. The murder of people just because they exist, the targeting of hospitals just because they are, the killing of doctors just because they are doing their job is not a humanitarian disaster. It’s a war crime. Call it as such.

 This post has been translated from English by Bilal Al Ayoubi and Larissa Abou Harb.

من قواعد الُّلعبة على السَّاحة السِّياسيَّة الُّلبنانيَّة أن تجتمع جميع الأطراف السِّياسيَّة على محاربتك، مستخدمةً أقذر الوسائل والشِّعارات والخطابات، فكيف إذا انتقلت هذه الُّلعبة إلى معركة الانتخابات البلديَّة؟ “لائحة البيارتة”، بشعارها “لتبقى بيروت لأهلها”، هي الَّتي اختارها سعد الحريري وسائر القوى السِّياسيَّة لخوض الانتخابات البلديَّة في الثَّامن من أيَّار / مايو المقبل. وما هذا الشِّعار إلَّا  تعديل بسيط في الأسلوب المتَّبع لإرهاب الشُّعوب سياسيًّا بطريقة لا تختلف كثيرًا عن خطاب دونالد ترامب الترهيبيّ السَّاذج. فلو كانت لديهم الجرأة الكافية، لكانوا اقتبسوا شعار “لتعود بيروت عظيمة من جديد” على غرار “لتعود أميركا عظيمة من جديد”!

 تخوننا للأسف كلماتنا عندما نريد أن نطرح واقع الأمور في لبنان. إذ لا توجد منطقة لبنانيَّة واحدة لأهلها فقط، ناهيك عن العاصمة الَّتي تحتضن ما يُقارب نصف سكَّان لبنان! وبالتَّالي، لم يكن لدى هؤلاء السِّياسيين أيَّ مشكلة مثلاً، عندما حصروا الاستثمارات في لبنان ببيروت، حارمين بذلك المناطق الأخرى كلِّها. لم يكن لديهم أيَّ مشكلة أيضًا في تحويل ميزانيَّة “إعادة إعمار لبنان” بعد الحرب، إلى وسط مدينة بيروت الَّذي أُفْرِغَ من روحه. هذا وكيف نغضُّ الطَّرف عن كونهم العرَّابين لفكرة إرسال نفايات العاصمة إلى عكار وغيرها من المناطق؟ لعلَّ بقاء “بيروت لأهلها” لا يشمل نفايات البيارتة… لَمْ تكن لدى هؤلاء السياسيين أيَّ مشكلة مع سنِّ التَّشريعات الَّتي جعلت المعيشة في بيروت تفوق قدرة المواطنين، فلم يعد باستطاعة الكثيرين دفع الإيجار، أو شراء شقَّة… إلَّا إذا اعتبرنا أنَّ توطين الخليجيين هو من بين الخطط المقترحة!

إنَّهم هم الَّذين أغرقوا المدينة بالنُّفايات وجعلوها نتنة. إنَّهم هم أنفسهم الَّذين أنتجوا الفساد وقادوا أبناء عاصمتنا إلى الاقتتال، ليس من زمن بعيد بل منذ ثماني سنوات. ولسخرية القدر، ها هي الانتخابات اليوم تجري في التَّاريخ عينه… فهل سينسى التَّاريخ أفعالكم في 7 أيَّار؟ لا تنقصني الأمثلة لكنَّني لن أغوص فيها لأنَّ الخلاصة تكمن في أنَّ الحريري نفسه ليس بيروتيًّا! فهلَّا  أرسلت تحيَّاتي إلى صيدا لو سمحت؟

فلنضع تلك الحقائق جانبًا، ولنرى كيف أنَّ تيَّار المستقبل وسائر القوى السِّياسيَّة يقومون بحشد جمهورهم عبر الوسيلتين الوحيدتين الَّلتين يتقنونهما: الخوف والطَّائفية. إليكم في ما يلي مثالًا فاخرًا عن إحدى الرَّوائع الَّتي يستخدمها مناصرو الحريري عبر الفايسبوك:

إنَّ خطابًا كهذا يُظهر مقدار الخوف الَّذي يمكن أن يعتري من هم في السُّلطة، دافعًا إيَّاهم إلى تحريض أتباعهم لاختلاق حجج واهية ولتكرار الاتِّهامات السَّخيفة الَّتي تشحن النُّفوس كراهيةً من أجل الإبقاء على الوضع السِّياسي غير المنتج. عمر شبارو ليس وحيدًا… كثيرون هم سنَّة بيروت أو المنتمين إلى أحزاب وطوائف أخرى الَّذين يعتقدون أنَّ اختيار من هم من غير لائحة الحريري خيارٌ غير صائب. فبالنسبة لهم، الوقت ليس مناسبًا للتغريد خارج السِّرب، خصوصًا من منظور حقوق الطوائف. ولطالما ردَّد بعضهم على مسمعي بأنَّ “لا يمكنك أن تكون علمانيّ في مجتمع طائفيّ! لم تعد هذه الحجج كافية لانتخاب الوجوه والأسماء نفسها، في وقت تختنق فيه النَّاس وتموت وتتسمَّم جرَّاء هذه الخيارات. الانتخابات البلديَّة هي الفرصة شبه الوحيدة للوقوف بوجه من عمَّم خطاب التَّفرقة ونبش الأحقاد ولم يكترث بآراء النَّاس ولا بمستقبلها.

أعزَّائي البيروتيين،

أكنتم تنتمون إلى الطَّائفة السنيَّة أو إلى أيٍّ من الطَّوائف الأخرى، إنَّ لائحة “بيروت مدينتي” ليست لائحة الزَّواج المدنيّ! فهي لائحة مرشَّحة للانتخابات البلديَّة ولا تستطيع فرضَ أيَّ تغيير في قانون الأحوال الشَّخصيَّة، بغضِّ النَّظر عن وجهات نظر المرشَّحين حيال هذه القضيَّة. الاتنتخابات هي انتخابات بلديَّة وليست انتخابات تشريعيَّة!

 أعزَّائي البيروتيين، 

إنَّ لائحة “بيروت مدينتي” لن تحوِّل بيروت إلى مرتعٍ للرذيلة. “ولو؟” إنَّ مثل هذه التَّلفيقات والأكاذيب يطلقها من يريد أن يخدعكم بغية نيل ثقتكم، بالأحرى أصواتكم، في الثَّامن من أيَّار، وهو نفسه من خذلكم مرارًا وتكرارًا على مدى عقود. وها هو حاضركم الشَّاهد الأفضل على أعماله!

أعزَّائي البيروتيين، 

أكنتم تنتمون إلى الطَّائفة السنيَّة أو إلى أيٍّ من الطَّوائف الأخرى، إنَّ خياركم الانتخابيّ يوم الثَّامن من أيَّار سهل للغاية! نعم… سهل لأقصى الحدود: يمكنكم التَّصويت للنفايات؛ يمكنكم التَّصويت لإغراق الشَّوارع بالأوساخ؛ يمكنكم التَّصويت للرائحة الكريهة الَّتي دفعتكم للتقيُّؤ يوميًّا خلال الأسابيع الثَّلاث الماضية؛ يمكنكم التَّصويت للمدينة الَّتي لا تستطيعون شراء شقَّة فيها، ولوسطها الَّذي يحرَّم عليكم دخوله؛ يمكنكم التَّصويت أيضًا لزحمة السَّير الخانقة، وللمياه والطَّعام والهواء المسمومين! إذا كان هذا خياركم، فأنتم تصوِّتون لبيروت اليوم، لمدينة تحتضر بسبب السِّياسات الَّتي تريد إقناعكم بأنَّ لا بديل لكم، كونكم من السنَّة أو من الأورثوذكس، أو لمجرِّد كونكم ولدتم وترعرعتم فيها، لتبقى “بيروت لأهلها”. يمكنكم التصويت لمن يعتبر طائفتكم اهم مكوِّناتكم وأفضل تعريف بكم. 

بيدكم مفتاح التَّغيير. يمكنكم التَّصويت لمن يأخذ صوتكم على محمل الجدّ، لمن يذهب إلى أحيائكم ليسألكم عن تطلُّعاتكم. يمكنكم التَّصويت لمن وضع برنامجًا من اثنتي وثلاثين صفحة لأجلكم.

 في الثَّامن من أيَّار، لن يكون الخيار صعبًا! أتمنَّى أن تصوِّتوا للمرشَّحين الصَّالحين، بدلًا  من الانصياع إلى أولئك الَّذين يرهبونكم ويخنقون آمالكم لكي تشعروا أنَّكم دمى غير قادرة على طلب الأفضل. اقطعوا خيوط الدُّمى واقلبوا الطَّاولة على خائنيها… فأنتم أرباب بيروت ولستم جواريها!

Filed under: Lebanon Tagged: #بيروت_مدينتي, لتبقى بيروت لأهلها, الانتخابات البلديَّة, السِّياسيَّة الُّلبنانيَّة, بيروت, دونالد ترامب, سعد الحريري

The first lesson we are taught back in our school’s civics class was the following: you, as a citizen, have rights and duties. Voting is a combination of both – it is the only way for you to hold those in power accountable.

We, as Lebanese, haven’t had the chance to hold those in power accountable for more than half a decade now. Starting this Sunday, and for a month, is our chance to do so.

Beirut Madinati is running against the “Beirutis List,” an agglomeration of 24 candidates that represent every single party in power. Yes, every one of them. The Tashnag are there. The Hanshak are there. The FPM and LF, in their new found love in a hopeless place, are there. Berri and the Future Movement are also there.

The Future Movement, which had up until a month ago accused Hezbollah of being the party behind killing their founder and Saad’s father, is now in bed with those same people in Beirut, not that that would stop them from using Rafik Hariri’s memory in all kinds of vote sympathy mongering.

The FPM which was a few months ago calling the Future Movement “Lebanon’s ISIS” is now in bed with them as well. All for one single reason: to kill a movement for the people, by the people, asking for change.

The reason why it is of VITAL importance to give your vote for Beirut Madinati on Sunday is to say that the current situation as is will not be tolerated anymore. As the saying goes: voting for it “zayy ma hiye” will keep the situation “zay ma houwe.” Their electoral tactics are zayy ma hiye: intimidation, fear, hate and sectarianism. 

Voting for Beirut Madinati is not a vote for a simple municipal election. It is our chance as a country, through Beirutis, to vote against the establishment that has been screwing us for years. It is our chance to say enough is enough. It is our chance to challenge the entire political establishment that is united in trying to bring us down, again, and our chance to start reclaiming our country, starting with its capital.

If you’ve forgotten, let me tell remind you of the situation you’re living in:

– The city of Beirut currently has no water. It’s only May, and it’s still raining. I literally bought water yesterday to be able to shower. I see this becoming a worse pattern as summer rolls by.

– The city of Beirut is stinking of garbage. Its people are going to hospitals with all kinds of respiratory problems because of the smell. The pollution because of the garbage crisis will take years to resolve.

– Many of the youth of Beirut not only don’t live in Beirut anymore, but have left the country, as is the case with many Lebanese, for better opportunities. Hashtag My Dubai. Maybe we should just keep calling Dubai Madinati instead so el sheikh Saad ma yez3al?

– The city’s Centre, Nejmeh Square, is currently off access to its people and all Lebanese. Why? Because our parliament that is not even working is present there. Spoiler alert: foreigners are allowed to enter.

– You, as Beiruti and Lebanese, are always under the mercy of whichever politician you have the displeasure of encountering. If you’re on the road driving and you come by one of their convoys, they will run you over to move ahead. It is the way things are when entities feel they are always above reproach.

– You, as Beiruti and Lebanese, are worth nothing more than $100 on Election Day for your politicians.  They don’t care about planning for a better future for you and your children. They only care about you voting for them on Election Day.

– The situation is so comically sad that clubs in the country are being forced to close the day before each mohafaza votes, which happens to be on the day those places make the most money: on Saturday. The system doesn’t even know how to function without killing your livelihood.

– The political establishment has worked tirelessly to sell your land to the highest bidder, to ban you from going to the beach that is your public property, to wall off Raoucheh from its people to turn it into a construction site, to destroy your heritage.

– The political establishment has made your economy such a mess that your child is born with $15,000 in debt.

– The political establishment has made your reality in such a way that you and your children are limited by where you are born, the sect you are born into, who you know, and how much money you have.

– The political establishment has not been able to give you a president. It’s been two years. It has stolen your right to vote two times so far to keep itself in power. It has not managed to come up with a decent electoral law.

– The political establishment tried to KILL you in August when you protested against their trash. They were not even sorry.

– The political establishment funds its own wars, as was the case in Tripoli, and you’re the last of their concerns. It takes tax money out of you but gives you nothing in return but hell.

Do you want to keep the status quo as it is? Do you want to give the politicians that have been ruining your life a free pass for more years to come? Do you want them to keep running unchecked, aware that no matter how horrible they are, no matter how badly they treat you, no matter how little a bug they see you, no matter how many times you curse them over the years, they can count on you falling in line when it counts, on Election Day?

Say no to keeping the country braindead, and vote Beirut Madinati.

The results of Beirut’s municipal elections are out. Beirut Madinati did not win, but Beirut, the city, is tonight’s biggest loser.
The electoral process was an abomination to say the least. Voting rates were abysmal. Is that how exasperated people have become? Or is that what happens when all political parties unite and give the semblance of no contest taking place? Or could Beirutis just don’t care that hundreds of thousands of Lebanese who live in the city and can’t vote counted on them to bring forward change?

Voter fraud was present in full swing, without any attempts to hide it and, with the people committing it knowing they are well protected, it will go without repercussions. Voters, especially those voting for Beirut Madinati, faced severe intimidation. Votes were being bought, as is typical for Lebanese elections. People with disabilities were met with officers telling them their vote was “useless,” ironic given there was a list – Beirut Madinati – with a person with disability running.

If they want to see this as them winning, then let them have it. Let them have Beirut Madinati votes being ripped and not counted, let them have their voter suppression. Beirut Madinati may not have gotten any seats, but they have plenty to celebrate tonight. We all have plenty to celebrate tonight.

No, this is not something to say just because Beirut Madinati did not win. Breaking into the Municipal Council would have been beautiful, but Beirut Madinati – and the Lebanese that supported them – should be proud tonight.

We are allowed to be disheartened, yes. I never expected Beirut Madinati to win, or at least whatever logical side of me thought so. But I’ll be damned if I wasn’t full of hope, as I roamed the streets of Beirut yesterday, to see those young volunteers spend the entire day unpaid, under the scorching sun, trying to do everything that they could. I’ve been hearing “zayy ma hiye” being said since I was 15, and we’ve only been going backwards since. I hoped for change, but change in the age of Lebanese politics is hard to come by.

Let’s celebrate getting every political party in power to unite against us, unite against their own personal history in which they were at each other’s throats only last month, to use all means possible in their capacity to win and do so with lesser numbers than their 2010 outing.

Let’s celebrate that Beirut Madinati not only got the political establishment to be afraid, it got them to put women on their ticket, and to adopt a platform that we all know they won’t actually do, but to adopt a platform anyway. In doing so, Beirut Madinati changed the rhetoric of political talk into talking about issues, not emotions.

Let’s celebrate that Beirut Madinati changed the dynamics of a race that was considered by many pundits to be dead on arrival. Beirut was alive – those that voted at least – and it was alive in the ways that count. Democracy is always great, unless you’re voting for Donald Trump (or the Bierte list of course).

Let’s celebrate that Beirut Madinati shook the political establishment to its core so well that they fought in the only way they knew how: fear, hate, sectarianism, the memory of Rafic Hariri, and zayy ma hiye slogans that, ironically, their leader couldn’t even do as he put his vote in the wrong ballot box. Irony of the day, guaranteed.

Let’s celebrate that on election day, Beirut Madinati acted as winners. They did not litter wherever they went, like the political parties did. They did not fight among themselves, like the political parties did. They were exemplary, young, hopeful, and damn beautiful. They helped those disabled get out of their cars, go to wherever they wanted to go to, whether they voted in Beirut or not, and whether they had intended to vote for Beirut Madinati or not.

Let’s celebrate that Beirut Madinati gave Beirutis the chance to tell the whole system: go screw yourself, allowing many Lebanese, Beirutis and otherwise, to have a breathing space, an alternative, one that promises to be better as the years go buy: people defined by who they are, not how they pray, by what they’ve accomplished and not who they know. Change in mentalities is gradual, and it started on May 8th. Or at least one hopes.

Let’s celebrate that in the heart of our capital, there are thousands of people who want change, who voted for change. Let’s rejoice that in Achrafieh, Beirut Madinati won and it was the establishment’s list that was fighting for votes. Some political forces have adopted a war-time slogan to say: Achrafieh is the beginning. Yesterday, Achrafieh was the beginning of change. Achrafieh’s voters should be immensely proud.

Let’s celebrate that Beirut and Lebanon’s political landscape has changed, in smaller increments that we had hoped, but changed anyway, to the better. Let us hope that by forcing them to do so, political parties in power will not keep a reserve of people they’ve forced to remain hungry and poor so they could be summoned on election day in droves. Let us hope that by speaking up, in ballot boxes or otherwise, we’ve shown that this country has people who will not succumb to the status quo of being told that they are irrelevant. We are relevant. We make the discussion, and we will not be silenced anymore.

In 2010, when the political establishment ran in Beirut last, they won with a difference of around 50,000 votes. This time, that difference has shrunk substantially to 20,000. This is a victory. Beirut Madinati got 60% of the vote in Achrafieh. This is a victory. Celebrate it as such.

But it does not end here. This is where it starts. 

As we move forward, the most important thing to realize is that we do not exist in this country alone. We can’t parade ourselves around as being those who are “educated,” who have Facebook accounts they know how to use, and blogs they write on, and believe that that should be enough, that the bubble we’ve made for ourselves is enough. We need to come to the realization that we share this country with people who do not exist in the same framework that we believe everyone exists in.

May 8th should be our wake up call to pop that bubble and reach out to the people in Tarik el Jdideh, Mazeraa, and other Beirut areas that were not supportive of the change we want to ask them: what do you need? how could we be there for you?

It starts by not calling them sheep. It starts by understanding that them voting in the way that they did is much more complicated than just them being “followers.” Understanding their pain, their woes, their daily struggles which are entirely different than yours is the radical shift we need into making the change we saw stick, and take it to higher levels.

Until next time.

After more than 36 hours, Beirut’s results have been revealed and Beirut Madinati, the little list that could, ended up getting 40% of the Beiruti vote, in an election where the super low voter turnout was probably the loudest voter.

The race turned out to be much closer than the Future Movement’s electoral machine said it was. On the same day of the elections, they called victory theirs with a difference of 25,000 to 30,000 votes. The actual result turned out to be half that.

In fact, the difference between the lowest vote getter on Hariri’s list and the highest on Beirut Madinati is only 7000 votes.

The results per Beiruti region are as follows:

This translates to the following:

Beirut 1: BM 60%, LB 40%;

Beirut 2: LB 65%, BM 35%,

Beirut 3: LB 64%, BM 36%.

This shows that change is possible. If 6 months’ work ended up with such a massive result, it shows that people are willing to go beyond their political lines to choose that they find would be better for their future.

As I said yesterday, Beirut Madinati are victorious even if they didn’t actually win. I will write a more detailed post about the numbers later.

This post was written with Ramez Dagher from Moulahazat. 

As promised earlier, this is the more detailed look at how Beirut voted, beyond the surprisingly great outing of the civil movement Beirut Madinati’s list, which even though it didn’t get actual seats, still has plenty to celebrate.

It is important to note that in the most optimistic of cases, the chances for any list other than the list of the political parties to win was next to zero. No this isn’t retrospective analysis. 

Despite the context of the trash crisis, rising corruption, overall voter discontentment, parliament extending its mandate twice, etc… the math of the Beirut electoral equation was never in favor of any non-political movement: the division of districts, the system, demographics, the sectarian propaganda – The Bierteh list had tried to attract voters – especially Christian ones – by proposing a 50-50 Christian/Muslim list, although Beirut Madinati had also kept the same quota.

So no, the cards were not the best that could be given for Beirut Madinati, or any other movement for that matter, simply because those cards were being played on a table that served only one side: the political establishment.

As a result of all of the above, the loudest of voters on Sunday was the low turnout.

20% Voted:

This is not a historically low number. In 2010, 18% of Beirutis voted. Beirutis simply do not vote in Municipal elections, and only do so at slightly higher numbers in parliamentary ones: 33% in 2009.

This is due to many factors. Voter learned helplessness is an important one, but so is the feel that there really isn’t a contest to begin with further increasing the sense of voter apathy. 

33% voted in 1998, the first election since the Civil War, and the lower turnout since should be enough to tell you how much people lost faith.

Many partisan voters were also not willing to vote for the “zayy ma hiye” list but did not want to break lines.

Achrafieh El Bidayi:

Beirut Madinati won the Beirut 1 district with around 60% of the vote, a blow to the rallying calls of Christian parties in the area for their supporters to vote for the Bierti’s list. The 60% figure is not only exclusive to the mostly-Christian Beirut 1, but is also applicable to the Christian vote in the rest of Beirut.

This doesn’t mean the weight of the LF and FPM combined is 40%. Many LF and FPM leaning voters voted for Beirut Madinati more against Hariri, but it sets the precedence that politically affiliated people can go beyond their affiliations and vote in a way that breaks what they were instructed to do.

Boycotts from the bases of the FPM, LF, and Kataeb were also there on election day, as a sign of disagreement with the recent choices of their parties: The FPM electorate isn’t a fan of Hariri; the LF base isn’t a fan of an alliance with the FPM, and the Kataeb aren’t fans of anything.

This lack of enthusiasm was probably one of the causes of the lower turnout in Christian polling stations.

The context of such a vote, however, is probably not sectarian as is circulating. Achrafieh is one of Beirut’s higher socioeconomic areas, with higher income and education rates. You’ll probably see a similar phenomenon in the higher socio-economic districts of Beirut III. Those residents are more likely to vote for issues such as reform, transportation and trash sorting. Those are also the voters that are the less afraid of change.

Many if not all of Lebanon’s parties count on clientelism to widen their electoral base. In higher socio-economic echelons, the reliance of the electorate on the mainstream parties is less.  Those voters don’t need their political parties in the neo-socialist way that most parties in Lebanon function. In Achrafieh, for example, the LF and FPM do not provide medical services, free education, job opportunities for Achrafieh voters as much as other parties in other districts, so throughout the years, the electorate managed to develop an independence from traditional Christian parties.

The Example Of Tariq El Jdide: Anyone Can Be Reached

Sectarian talk is terrible, but is a necessary evil until the political system is not one where people go and vote in segregation based on how they pray. If you crunch Beirut’s numbers, you will end up with a rough figure of around 30% of the Sunni vote not going to Hariri.

This is probably as important, if not more, than BM winning 60% of the vote in Beirut 1.

I don’t believe we can call this a dissent from the Future Movement yet, but it is a continuation of the gradual and progressive Sunni dislike of the way Saad Hariri is running things, even with his rise of popularity after his return.

The reason the Future Movement won is not because voters are “sheep.” It’s because the Future Movement, through various governmental policies, has forced the people of many Sunni areas to always remain in need for their intervention to get the basic necessities that should be a right for every Lebanese citizen, which many in other areas have access to without needing their political parties: do not cut the hand that feeds you.

The political framework of the elections is important. They come at a time when Sunnis in Lebanon feel increasingly threatened by being categorized as potential-Islamists, to the background of a party in power fighting for a regime they do not approve of in Syria.

The need to not break rank was never greater. They may not approve of Hariri, but this was not the time to show it, and yet 30% did. The situation in the country is not one where sects have the prerogative to show cracks in their facade, or have we forgotten how Christians have also forced a seemingly unbreakable veneer over the past few months as well?

All of this makes the 30% figure of Sunnis who did not vote for Hariri all the more impressive and courageous. It’s the kind of percentage that breaks taboos.

Moving Forward:

The election’s overall results are telling. In Beirut I, the LF representative Elie Yahchouchi and the FPM’s Traboulsi lead their allies in the FM by around 800 votes (of around 6500 the list got). In Beirut II, with its important Shia and Armenian electorate, almost all of the winning candidates from LB are in the 9000 votes region. One candidate however, Amal’s representative, stands out as having 10000 votes. In the third district, Yahchouchi and Traboulsi are 5000 votes behind the FM’s candidates.

The difference between the first and the last of list is around 8000 votes for LB, and 3000 votes for BM. In other words, most of those who voted BM did not make major changes to their lists (“tochtib”) and were convinced with almost all of BM’s candidates, while the base of every single party in power was modifying the names.

That is the biggest proof that the ruling coalition is unstable, and that in 2017, even a minor split between the parties in power can lower that 60% and give way to an independent breakthrough. Check the results here.

But now is time to look ahead.

Our voting process needs to be modernized. 36 hours to go through Beirut’s voting results is a disgrace. There are no excuses.

The rhetoric we need to adopt should never call those who do not vote the way we want sheep or other varieties of animals. It is demeaning, and not any different than the system we want to change. Such horrific name-calling only alienates voters from your platform. The core of democracy is one where many will not vote the way you find is best.

Our rhetoric should also be more inclusive, and less elitist. Our bubble in which we believe our paradigm of Lebanese politics is scripture is exclusive to the people that are reached by our message, but the bulk of voters exist outside of that bubble. We need to be aware that what we know and believe is true doesn’t translate to others and work on reforming our message to make it holistic.

This means that calls to divide Beirut into smaller districts just because Achrafieh voted one way and Tariq el Jdide voted another are horrifyingly xenophobic. Beirut is a city that is 18 km2 with 500,000 voters only. It is too small to be divided. We need policies to bring people together, not segregate them into separate cantons.

Accomplishing so starts by championing policies to better the conditions of all Beirutis, especially those that exist in impoverished areas. Beirut Madinati did not, for instance, campaign as much as it should have in Tariq el Jdide.

Political parties in the country keep people at bay by keeping them afraid and hungry. Keep them as such, and they remain at their mercy. The first step in breaking this political hegemony is to make them need their political parties less: advocate for better schools, better and more comprehensive healthcare, fight economic inflation, raise the minimum wage, adopt a better taxing scheme, etc…

Such measures, however, cannot be done by simply complaining on Facebook. Modernizing our elections isn’t only about getting electronic voting machines, but also about having an electoral law that is fitting of the year 2016. The only law that can work to represent all different sections of Lebanon’s society is a law based on proportional representation. If such a law were adopted, for example, Beirut Madinati would have obtained 9 seats out of the available 24 on Sunday.

Proportional representation, as proposed during a cabinet meeting in 2010 tackling the municipal electoral law, is one of many reforms, such as electing the mayor directly from the people, and a 30% women quota, that are napping in parliament. The establishment is making it harder, but that shouldn’t mean that pressure should stop.

We also need to realize that, despite disagreeing with them, political parties are not going away. If we are to leave a mark, we have to find a framework in which we organize into a party that can compete better in elections, in politics and do so in unity: one of our biggest failings in this election was having like-minded people run on two different lists.

Today, we should be cautiously optimistic at what the future holds. Change in Lebanon is not a sudden process. It’s a tedious affair that needs planning over many years. Start planning for 2017’s parliamentary elections today and 2022’s municipal elections yesterday. Do not despair, and most importantly, always challenge the status quo regardless of how comfortable you are in it.

On the slope of how low some electoral programs can sink to try and attract votes, the FPM-backed “Karamet Jounieh” takes the cake.

You’ve probably seen their billboards all over the highway. From their super lame: Weina Jounieh? To them revealing it was “MasJounieh” before launching into a full blown attack about how they would bring back Jounieh’s dignity.

Now, 2 days before Jounieh votes, they went full force into the attack by proclaiming they would make Jounieh the “capital of Middle Eastern Christians.”

Out of a 9 point platform tackling various aspects of the city’s life, making it the capital of Christians in Lebanon was their #1 priority with it being the top point on their list.

How would they accomplish so? By building a multitude of Churches and religious centers for Near-East Christians to feel closer to each other so that if “Copts in Egypt are affected, we feel it in Lebanon as well.”

Because, you know, the hundreds of thousands of Muslims dying across the Middle East don’t deserve us “feeling it as well” because they don’t pray that way, or that we, as Lebanese, are supposed to “feel” with the Christian in South Sudan before we feel with our fellow Lebanese in Bab el Tebbaneh, simply because that Lebanese is not Christian.

Let us make Jounieh the capital of Christians. While we’re at it, why don’t we make Beirut or Tripoli the capital of Sunnis? Why don’t we make Tyr the capital of Shiites as well? I mean, why not? If Christians are supposed to have their own city, then why shouldn’t other sects too? Why doesn’t Keserwen then just secede into the Democratic Republic of Maronistan with Harissa in the center of its flag and be done with it?

This kind of xenophobic and horrific rhetoric has no place in elections aiming for LOCAL development in 2016. “Karamet Jounieh” claims that them wanting their city to become the capital for Christians is to face the persecution affecting Christians in the Middle East and to further solidify the importance of Jounieh with its strong Christian history.

For a moment there, I thought Daesh was at the footsteps of Maameltein and that Jesus did not come out of Nazareth but of Haret Sakher and Maronites did not get persecuted in the mountains of North Lebanon, but in the streets of Sarba.

In the face of such disgusting slogans, I invite this blog’s followers who vote in Jounieh to refuse such hateful, xenophobic notions and to vote for the list opposing “Karamet Jounieh” on Sunday, which is the list calling itself “Jounieh El Tajaddod.”

At a time when Christians in Beirut refused to be treated with the hateful, segregating rhetoric that Karamet Jounieh is giving its people in Jounieh by voting for Beirut Madinati, the last thing we need in this country is for such divisive talk to be center stage in any elections. Less fear and hate, more tolerance.

In the surge of Lebanese pride that one of their “own” is now the president of Brazil, while the country celebrates its second year without an actual Lebanese president in Lebanon, not one outlet has bothered to look into Mr. Michel Temer, beyond the fact that his parents immigrated from Btaaboura around 80 years ago.

His interviews with Lebanese media during his first and last visit to his “motherland” a couple of years ago have been circulating like wildfire. Him proclaiming to have a “Brazilian heart” but “Lebanese blood” were on a loop. He probably couldn’t care less.

What is certain, however, is that Michel Temer is corrupt, semi-fascist, just like those Lebanese politicians we all love to hate.

He Screwed Over His Own President:

The only way Temer became president was by screwing over Dilma Roussef, the now-suspended president of Brazil, in a textbook Frank Underwood-esque plot.

Through a series of orchestrated leaks, which he “claimed” not to have anything to do with, he effectively managed to throw his president under the bus so he could rise to power. For instance, he leaked a statement to the press about how he was upset he was not involved in key decisions by his president… and then said he was outraged by the leak.

Then he leaked a Whatsapp message to Brazilian parliament members claiming they needed a “new government.” He was later “outraged” by that leak as well.

Through it all, he was the main orchestrator behind the scene of the coup against the president, and in bed with big money and right-wing-run Brazilian media to further make him inevitable.

He Is Corrupt As Hell:

Temer’s ascent to power means that a political party that didn’t win Brazil’s elections is now effectively taking power. Once he is in power, he will reportedly appoint Goldman, Sachs, and IMF officials to run the economy. Those are the same people that American politician Bernie Sanders is accusing of corruption and electoral campaign fraud.

Michel Temer also has his own saga with corruption. He was ordered to pay a fine only this week for violating campaigning regulations and is being prosecuted for it. He may be banned from pursuing further office later for up to 8 years.

During his campaign for vice president, Michel Temer was also involved in other campaigning scandal when he received up to $1.5 million from a company to whom he provided preferential governmental treatment in construction contracts.

He has also been accused of involvement in an illegal ethanol-purchasing scheme which has brought him back millions of dollars.

Michel Temer is also said to be involved in the “Petrobras Scandal,” a partly-governmental owned oil company that some Brazilian officials profited from by laundering some of the profit through a Lebanese-origin intermediary called Alberto Youssef, and transferring it to secure accounts in Switzerland.

To put it bluntly, Temer is accused of more corruption than Dilma Roussef. Only 2% of the Brazilian electorate would vote for him and over 60% believe he should be impeached also. The only reason his political career is not ending is because 1) he is a man, 2) he serves the interests of corporations that want to see someone with his agenda in power.

He’s Already Targeted Women, The Blacks and LGBT People:

Michel Temer’s upcoming government is rumored to be composed only of men, a long way down from a country that just had a woman president.

It doesn’t end here. He has also been active in closing many LGBT and black rights offices, and will reportedly continue on his rampage now that he’s ascending further up the power echelons.

Let’s Not Be Proud Of Everyone Who Happens To Be Lebanese Anywhere and Everywhere?

If any Lebanese politician were accused of what Temer has done, you’d be up in arms about how disgraceful, horrifying they are, how they’re ruining your country.

Can we not pretend this is any different just because that politician has ascended to power in Brazil?

There are times and places to be proud of entities pertaining to our heritage. This is not one of them. The world finally has a Lebanese president…. That’s not really a good thing.

I find it weird that no Lebanese media has been all over the Lebanese aspect of the Panama Leaks and the names that have rose to prominence as part of those documents.

The Panama Leaks have been, over the past two months, the biggest and most extensive data reveal into the corruption that reaches up to celebrities, politicians and governments. They basically name people who have set up shell corporations in Panama for a variety of purposes.

A shell corporation is a company that serves as a vehicle for other operations without itself having significant assets or operations per se. It serves a multitude of processes, and it can be used for legitimate reasons, but they can also be used for tax evasions.

The Panama Leaks are already shuffling political cards around the world. UK PM David Cameron was faced with huge protests after being named in the leaks. The prime minster of Iceland was even forced to resign after he was named in those leaks as well.

Recently, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) made the data available for the public to see and sift through, so I went ahead and saw how many Lebanese were involved in such leaks.

This does not mean that the Lebanese companies and individuals named in those leaks have committed anything illegal. Shell corporations can be used for money laundering, tax evasions, among other things. If anything, the complete neglect that Lebanese media has put over the leaks and their Lebanese aspect is the fishier aspect of it all.

The question to ask is: why do some Lebanese banks need to establish shell companies abroad when laws in the country are extremely favorable for them to begin with? And why do Lebanese individuals need to establish such companies in the first place, given that Lebanon’s banking system is secretive, where taxes are kept at a minimum and where the economy framework is built on a laisser-faire approach, rather than an actual developmental plan, which enables the individuals who can establish shell companies from not needing to.

Of the names revealed by the Panama Leaks, I cite the following:

• Tahseen Khayat, a businessman and head of New TV,
• Neaamat Fram, a CEO of many companies around the country such as Industrial Development Company.
• Elias Bou Saab, current minister of education,
• Nader Hariri, Saad’s cousin.

Of the companies revealed by the Panama Leaks, the following are examples:

• HSBC Lebanon,
• Audi Bank,
• New TV,
• Medgulf.

I search for other politicians but couldn’t find any. Search queries for Miqati, Hariri, Safadi, and other moguls have yielded no findings. Don’t fret though, those people have plenty to be happy about in Switzerland. 

For the full names, click here.

Former Lebanese beauty queen and current actress Nadine Njeim recently gave an interview to a program on Future TV in which she was asked about sex for men and women in society.

The conversation went as follows (my translation follows the video):

Reporter: Suppose your son turned 18 and said he wants to sleep with a girl he loves. What would you say?

Nadine: Go for it, certainly. He’s a man!

R: You allow a man but not a woman to do so?

N: Yes! He’s a man. If a man doesn’t get experience, he will be a 40 year old who won’t satisfy his wife. Marriage shouldn’t happen early for a man in my books.

R: But Nadine, religion equates men and women in that they are both not supposed to engage in premarital sex.

N: Yes, I agree. But at the end of the day, this is a boy. Boys have no flaws. You can’t tell a boy not to do such things. If he doesn’t, he doesn’t mature. You feel he has a weak personality if he doesn’t sleep or date women. Sex or no sex, love or not, fun or not. This is a boy. He needs to have his adventures in order to grow.

R: You’re saying this as a girl with a strong personality.

N: Yes, I’m not with equality between men and women.

R: Why?

N: I want women to stay women. If they equate me with a man, I’d feel like a man. I don’t want to. I want to stay a woman.

If you thought we were moving away from such conversation, think again.

I wonder which vagina Nadine Njeim’s son is supposed to penetrate in order to grow and be a “man” in all the Arab, patriarchal sense of the word that she means if she does not want women to have sex too.

It’s such a shame to see a woman with her status and reach set back women in the country and the region eons in their struggle for equality, starting with the most important liberation of all: their bodies. When Nadine Njeim insists that women should not engage in sexual activity but men should for whichever reasons she cites, she is inherently demeaning her gender as entities that are not allowed to enjoy their bodies, seek out the same “growth” she wants for their penis-equipped counterparts in society and, well, become strong and independent and whatever comes with sexual liberation in a society that thrives on sexual oppression of women and men alike.

At a time when we’re fighting tooth and nail to give Lebanese women a much-needed advantage in our societies, be it in laws, political representation or simply advancing them in places where they’ve been subdued for years, it’s a shame to see one of those women take such a public stance against her own gender, and to have that woman have a megaphone as big as Nadine Njeim’s.

By proclaiming that men and women should not be allowed to have the same experiences, Nadine Njeim is inherently approving of the fact that men should have an upper hand when it comes to other aspects as well. It’s not a far stretch to assume the gender that is allowed, according to her, to sleep around before marriage would also be allowed to hold a prerogative after marriage, such as forcing his wife to have sex even when she doesn’t want to or beating her into submission because she dared oppose him.

It starts with sex. Other matters of male and female equality will fall into play as well: job opportunities, careers, salaries, economic independence. Perhaps Ms. Njeim needs to be told that women wanting better, achieving more and seeking out their own pleasures, whichever those may be, does not mean they are becoming men, but rather fulfilling everything that them being women entails?

For a woman who has made millions playing strong independent women in horrid soap operas, she sure does not do that in real life. Someone give her an Oscar for going so hard against her grain.

I pity the daughter who’s gonna have her as a mother. She may inherit her mother’s good looks, but that mentality will not get her to the places she deserves to get to.

Lebanese women, don’t listen to Ms. Njeim. You deserve more than what she wants you to get.

Edit: Nadine N. Njeim explained herself in the following way:

via Lebanese Memes on Instagram.

It’s horrific she thinks this is an enough excuse for her objectifying of women, turning them into nothing more than pleasure toys for her son.

A source of mine just sent me the line-up of this summer’s Byblos Festival, in an otherwise very quiet lead up.

This same time last year, the festival had already confirmed John Legend and I had leaked Alt-J performing. Many had thought the festival was out of big names for this summer, but it seems we’ve all been wrong.

Sia, the Australian super star behind songs such as Chandelier and Titanium, will be performing on August 9th. No words yet on whether she will show her face, but her voice will more than suffice either way.

This will be Sia’s first performance in the entire Middle East. It will be a recreation of her critically acclaimed showcase at Coachella. 

In a surprisingly disappointing line-up, Sia seems to be the main draw when it comes to international talent. 

Other acts that will also be in the festival are Mashrou’ Leila, Hishik Bishik and Carole Samaha as Lebanese performers and renowned saxophonist Kenny G as well as Grace Jones.

The full line-up is present at the above picture and ticket prices will be as follows:

Standing:

– Regular: $75,

– Golden Circle: $125.

Sitting: $70, $90 and $150.

The saga of Lebanese women and high profile people who think they are not worthy of things that are their right continues, and this time it’s with Ali Noureddine, a reporter on conservative Hezbollah-affiliated TV Al-Manar. A few days ago, a beauty queen whose rise to prominence was solely due to her sex appeal decided women should not engage in premarital sex, but that men should. I guess Ali and Nadine would fit well in the circle of people taking Lebanese women back eons.

Ali Nour Eddine doesn’t think women are good enough to run for elections and take on political work. Why? Because she’s supposed to “stay home, finish her chores and then come preach.” Why? Because “religions have never had female prophets or female philosophers.” Why? Because “it’s not her job nor is it her capacity.”

What would the female presenters at Al Manar say to a person like Ali Nour Eddine when they’ve been leading the news reports for years? What would Ali’s mother tell him when he’d look her in the eye and tell her that she is not good enough? What would all those mothers who gave birth to all of Ali’s employer’s martyrs say when he tells them that they are good enough?

I wonder, how can Ali Nour Eddine look all his women teachers in the eye, over the years, and tell them that they are not good enough just because they were not born with a penis between their legs.

Ali Nour Eddine seems to forget that women have had a role in religion. Has he forgotten about Mariam? Has he forgotten about Khadija or Aisha or Zainab? If you want to be religious in your argument, read your own religion.

Either way, since when is religion the indicator of whether a gender should be allowed to enter politics or not? Even Saudi Arabia has allowed women to vote, and run, and thousands of them have and won. Ali Nour Eddine’s mentality is worse than that.

If the only thing you know of women Mr. Ali Nour Eddine is for them to cook for you, open their legs for you, clean for you, and do whatever you think is right and whatever it is you want, then not only are you mistaken, but you’re just another Lebanese man who has made it his duty to subjugate the other sex into nothing more than a shell of a person whose entire purpose is to serve him.

Let me tell you, Ali, about my Lebanese women.

They are people who want to seek office, and change lives for the women you’ve ruined. They’re people like the 12 courageous souls that ran with Beirut Madinati less than 3 weeks ago and changed Beirut’s political landscape alone.

They are people like my own mother who has never let a man put her in place, who has shown she can stand up for herself and more in a world solely run by men.

They are people like Therese, who is running alone for elections in my hometown Ebrine and who wants to show women that yes, they can also do so.

They are our school teachers, and our professors who shape our lives with their knowledge and kindness like few men can.

They are the people who have fought for women to be protected from men who think like you, who think that women are second class citizens who can be forced to bed whenever they want, who can be slammed around just because they can, and managed to pass a law to give those women a fighting chance.

They are the women fighting for better electoral laws to make sure that there’s more than single digit percentages of them seeking office, to make sure that the numbers don’t agree with you, to make sure that you are wrong in every single way.

They are the women who make me proud to be Lebanese when I’m horrified that I share the country with people like you, and people who “like” what you have to say.

As of writing this, Ali Nour Eddine has deleted his status, but social media always remembers.

Around 3 weeks ago, many of us had one thing on our minds: Beirut’s municipal elections and how the independent civil movement list Beirut Madinati would do against the agglomeration of all political parties in power.

We had high hopes, not for them to win, but for a good showing that would cause a ripple in Lebanon’s political stagnation. Beirut Madinati delivered. For many, that may have been the end of Lebanon’s municipal election talk, but it’s far from the case.

Today, it’s time we turn our attention towards a city that needs it much more than Beirut, a city that has the potential that Beirut does but is entirely forgotten, assumed to be a sectarian haven of extremism and is ruled by billionaires with a feudal mentality who see its streets as nothing more than sectors for their taking.

Today, we need to talk about Tripoli and the vote the city is coming to this Sunday on May 29th.

To put things in perspective, let’s talk facts:

–   Tripoli is the 2nd biggest city in the country.

–   It’s home to around half a million people, the majority being Muslim Sunnis.

–   It’s home to the richest man in the country, Najib Miqati. He has been a prime minister two times.

–   It is one of the oldest cities in the country, and has the biggest old souk in Lebanon, far bigger than Jbeil’s or Saida’s. The old Souk has fallen into disrepair.

–   The port of Tripoli, once one of the region’s most important ports when it comes to trade, has fallen way behind and is now a shell of what it used to be.

–  The previous municipality that ruled Tripoli over the past 6 years came about from an agreement between the different political parties of the city, notably the Future Movement, Safadi and Miqati. It was the worst municipal board the city has ever seen, from their worries about banning alcohol ads in the city at a time when the city was being ravaged by war, to them letting the reputation of their city become, slowly and surely, that of a city no one should visit.

–  Tripoli is Lebanon’s poorest city, with around 30% of its people living in severe poverty. The Bab el Tebbaneh neighborhood is, according to all UN-led research, Lebanon’s poorest. The area didn’t even have a functional school at a certain point a couple of years ago.

–  Tripoli has one of Lebanon’s highest unemployment rates, especially when it comes to its youth, despite it having relatively high education levels given its proximity to many universities. Latest statistics place that number at around 36%.

The reality is much more horrific than to be summarized by a few bullet points. And, as they’re used to, Lebanon’s political establishment is trying to take over the city once again for 6 years by coming together against all of the other component’s in the city in an attempt for self-preservation.

After an uphill climb and very tough negotiations, Miqati and Hariri managed to come up with a list of 24 candidates, of various backgrounds, to try and keep the municipal board. Those 24 people have nothing to do with the previous board, but as the famous saying goes: “Insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Is it fair for Tripoli and for us as Northerners to have our capital stay the way it was for the next 6 years? Stagnation is not different from falling back.

Hariri and Miqati’s list, “For Tripoli,” is faced by three other lists. The first: “Tripoli’s Decision” is backed by Rifi, and has the highest chances of breaking into the municipality. The second: “Tripoli Capital” is backed and headed by former MP Mosbah el Ahdab and has 15 other people from various backgrounds, most of whom are from the civil society. The third list is: “Tripoli 2022” and has four candidates from the civil movement.

On Sunday, May 29th, the people of Tripoli have a real chance at taking their city back from the clutches of those who haven’t known but how to cause it harm for the past 6 years. It’s time to say that their unity only serves their own interests and not the interests of our city. It’s time to say that enough is enough, that the city needs a mayor who’s worried about its youth than about stupid beer ads, that the city needs people with a vision, people who want to give its people healthcare, a better reputation, education, people who want to make Tripoli great again.

The need to vote against those that turned Tripoli into a war zone couldn’t be higher. For that reason, this blog endorses the list “Tripoli Capital” along with the four members of “Tripoli 2022” for the municipal board because they’re a combination that has the most potential to set the city on a path that befits it.

A few days ago, Tripoli became the first Lebanese city to have a bike lane. The potential is there. The city can become a capital for the North and the country again. The city can be the great city it once was again. I hope its people see the potential in them and their hometown and act on it.

Robert Fadel, you have failed your city. 
Lebanese media, you have failed Tripoli yet again and the country once more.

Lebanese people of all kinds, you have fallen once more to your preconceptions about Lebanon’s poorest city and turned it, once again, to a sectarian haven where those scary-Christian-hating Sunnis reign supreme.

On Sunday, May 29th, Tripoli entered the Lebanese history books by being the only major city this election cycle to deliver what everyone can’t but call the biggest democratic political upheaval in Lebanon.

With a dismal 26% voting rate, the people of that city shut down a list that included Hariri’s Future Movement, Miqati, Safadi, Karami, and other factions from the city, sending them to a deafening loss facing a list backed by Rifi.

Their list was running under the slogan of uniting the “Sunni ranks.” To do so, they were backed by the Mufti of Tripoli and had Islamists in their ranks. If Tripoli were sectarian, it would have voted for them. And yet it didn’t. 

Say what you want about Rifi, and I’m not a fan in the very least, but there is a special air to one man single handedly beating giants who thought they could get people to fall in line once more, vote them in once again, and watch them do as they please to the place they call home, which is ruin it and make sure it never amounts to its full potential, which is what they’ve been doing all together for the past 10 years.

It is also the epitome of irony that Rifi beat Hariri, with him being a man who embodies the values that Hariri used to stand for before selling out. It is the mother of failures to be beaten by a man who promises to be harsher on those who killed your father than you.

But that’s not the full story.

Tripoli voted for change. It did what no other major city in this country did. It refused its status quo. It told the country and its major politicians with all their billions and might to go screw themselves. You can’t but salute that.

In voting for change, though, Tripoli’s municipal council turned out to be purely constituted of Muslim Sunnis. The outcry from such a council was immense. How could they? Lebanon’s media cried. I am so upset I will quit, wept now-resigned MP Robert Fadel.

It is also immensely ironic that an MP who was probably spotted in his home city around 5 times in the past 7 years resigns from a parliament in protest of Christians not breaking into that city’s municipal council, but not because he has utterly and irrevocably failed his city in his entire parliamentary tenure. Where was Mr. Fadel’s outrage when the people of Tripoli spent sleepless nights under the barrage of mortar missiles? Where was the outrage when his city’s reputation became that of a place only known for terrorism? Where was the outrage when his city became the Mediterranean’s poorest city? 

The fact of the matter is that Mr. Fadel is a continuation of the horrific Lebanese mentality that an MP is only a representative of their sect, and not as the constitution says, of the entire country. Mr. Fadel, that Sunni you’re upset has taken the spot of a Christian in a municipal board is as much as your constituency as that Christian. 

You can’t blame Robert Fadel much, however. He did something that 126 of his colleagues should have done years ago. It’s a shame he’s doing it under the pretext of setting himself as a Christian figure for the context of an electoral law that might see him need the votes of Christians outside of Tripoli.

But I digress. The fact of the matter is that the Sunnis of Tripoli voted for Christians and Alawite municipal members in droves. Those candidates simply did not win.

On Sunday, May 29, 700 Christians voted in Tripoli out of tens of thousands of registered voters. Christian candidates got over 15763 votes total result. The last winning candidate got 15914. That’s a 150 vote difference only that’s getting everyone to panic. Yes, those 15,763 votes are mostly Sunnis. But never mind, they’re scary.

Tripoli has sectarian people, like any other Lebanese city or town, but it’s not a sectarian city. No city with its history of diversity can be as such. 

How can we cry sectarianism in Tripoli when property sale ads in Christian areas in the country specify the buyer needs to be a Christian? 

How can we cry sectarianism in Tripoli for fear of the fate of the city’s Christians when they didn’t even bother to vote? Also please note that Tripoli’s Christians probably couldn’t care less and have more faith in their Muslim neighbor and friends than someone like Robert Fadel who is supposed to represent them but couldn’t even manage them to get them to vote? 

How can we cry sectarianism when another major city had the list that won wage the following campaign: 

A municipal council should not be defined by the religion of its members. I’m sure the new municipal council in Tripoli will work for the whole city.

Tripoli, you may not have voted the way I wanted on Sunday, but you should be immensely proud in you saying no to your reality and seeking out change. Beirut Madinati tried in Beirut. It did well but did not succeed. Other alternatives to the political hegemony tried in other places and did not succeed as well. Political hegemony was brought to its knees on your streets. Respect. 

News of an explosion in the Verdun area of Beirut is currently the most horrifying thing to happen in Lebanon in a long time.

The positive aspect of things is that the damage seems to be only material with BLOM’s HQ being the apparent target. As of now, there are no casualties. The attack happening around Iftar time means that few people were around the area as well.

At a time when some entities want this to become a reality for us in Lebanon, no casualties is a sigh of relief.

One has to wonder though, how did the UN, Canadian and French embassies know that such a thing would happen over the weekend and we, as Lebanese, had no inkling or warning whatsoever?

The pictures at the top of the article are two statements issued by the UN and the Canadian authorities respectively to their constituents to avoid the specific area of Beirut that was targeted, and Hamra in general.

Two days ago, the French Foreign Affairs ministry escalated Lebanon’s security status and warned its citizens from visiting the country.

The above also applies to the instructions workers at international NGOs operating in the country received this weekend.

The question therefore begets itself: where was our entire security apparatus from all of this? Why is our worth as Lebanese always less than every single other nationality in our own country? If international agencies and foreign countries had suspicions that such a thing could happen, were our security forces not aware or were they not in the loop to begin with?

No casualties is no excuse for us to let such a thing pass by unnoticed. It is our right as Lebanese to live in our country with the utmost levels of security, not to be second class entities in our own land and in our own homes.

Right now is not the time to discuss the politics of such an attack and whether it occurring is obvious or not, or whether the context of such an attack and the bank it targets points fingers. Right now is the time to hope that no innocent life has been lost in this country for being at the wrong place at the wrong time once again, for us being perpetual victims of our existence in this land.

Stay safe everyone.

The National Centre for Marine Sciences, based in Batroun, has been doing a study over the past several months about the quality of the water at several Lebanese beach areas, from the tip of the North to Naqoura in the South.

As such, they’ve come up with the following infographic about which beaches to go to and which ones to avoid this summer:

As expected, the best beaches in the country are in the Batroun area in the North and the Tyr/Naqoura area in the South, which has the country’s cleanest shores.

This means that it is our responsibility as Lebanese to avoid the beaches in areas marked as severely polluted, for the better health of ourselves and our loved ones. Polluted water may not have immediate effects from one swim, but recurrent exposures are bound to have detrimental effects on our well-being.

As such, the resorts in areas affected by high pollution rates should take it upon them to clean up their water if they still want people to pay the horrifying amounts of money they charge for entry. And if not, then we have entire areas in the North and South where many free beaches exist and where the water is as pristine as it is clean.

Dear Lebanese parents that couldn’t believe their son or daughter passed their brevet exam so they figured the best way to celebrate, in between the ten kilos of baclava consumed, was to fire a few rounds of M249 up in the air,

Yes, your child is special. I mean, how could your child not be special if he or she passed 9th grade and will continue to high school? In Neanderthal times, that’s akin to your child being ready for marriage or leading a life of his own! Yes, your child is unique, him and the other 75% of applicants that presented this year’s exam and passed.

Were you firing rounds up in the air because you couldn’t believe your child passed? You do know that doesn’t really reflect confidence on your part for your child’s capacities? I bet your child is going to grow up into such a terrific young man or woman knowing that his parents never truly believed in him or her and were utterly dumbfounded, a few AK4 rounds-dumbfounded to be exact, that they passed an exam that 3 out of 4 of those who take it actually pass it. If more information is needed, let me refer you to some good psychologists who will work on mending your child’s traumatized psyche from having his own flesh and blood not remotely believe he managed to pass an exam.

But how does this whole celebratory gunfire thing work exactly? I mean, you people seem to do it at every corner. Your child passes an exam, you bring out the riffles. Your politician goes on air, you bring out the machine guns. You manage to pass stools after a serious bout of hemorrhoids, you bring out the guns. Is there an algorithm you follow to delineate the mechanism behind this enigma?

Is it two rounds, for instance, for a simple pass grade? Three rounds in case all those “rachat points” were used as an “allahou akbar zamatna” hail Mary of sorts? What about those coveted “mentions” that were all the rave back in my old days? Did he or she get “bien” or “tres bien?” Did you fire thirteen rounds instead of six because your child got 230 instead of 196 points? I’m a doctor here who is more confused by the way your brain works regarding this, than by the diseases I have to address on daily basis.

Now tell me, what if your bullets end up killing someone? Is it okay because “fida hal brevet?” Or is it also okay because if God didn’t want him dead, he wouldn’t have died anyway? How do you convince yourself that your summer rains of shells are totally fine, wholly acceptable and utterly, irrevocably awesome to do?

Or maybe, just maybe, if you were a parent who felt the need to celebrate, for instance, their child passing an exam as stupid as a brevet exam, then you shouldn’t be a parent to being with? Maybe it’s the perpetuation of those genes that have a big contributory factor to why this country is a hell-hole, one round at a time?

I have so many questions that I hope you answer. Until then, see you in world war 3 next June when your other child graduates from kindergarten.

The town of Al Qaa in the Beqaa was the scene of a true horror show yesterday as 8 suicide bombers took to its streets to wreck havoc and spread fear among its people.

The town is home for around 2500 Lebanese, mostly Christians, and currently inhabits around 25,000 Syrians who came there seeking refuge from the war taking place in their homes. A few days ago, many didn’t know what Qaa was. Today, it is forever etched in our collective memory as the kind of mayhem that we can easily slip through.

Five people died in Qaa yesterday. Learn their names. Look at their faces.

Faysal Aad.

Georges Fares.

Joseph Louis.

Boulos Al Ahmarm.

Majed Wehbe.

Over and over again, the need to see these people as victims and not martyrs couldn’t be higher. These are men who had families they wanted to be there for. None of them wanted to die. The only cause they were partaking in was to live, let live and provide for their families in a town that is forgotten by the government, and by fellow Lebanese, at the outskirts of a country whose Northern border many believe is Kaslik.

Calling them martyrs absolves us of any guilt in their deaths, but we’re all guilty. We’re guilty of accepting areas like the North and the Beqaa to be as deprived as they are, and not bat an eye. We’re guilty of not demanding equality for every Lebanese, no matter how far from Beirut they are. We’re guilty of not demanding our own government take the security of its own people more seriously. We should do more than hashtag Je Suis Qaa or Je Suis Blom Bank and call it a day.

In a land of perpetual ironies, the biggest of those is definitely that Al Qaa was hit with terrorist attacks at night yesterday, four of them to be exact two of which were targeting the Church where many had gathered to plan the funeral of the victims, while the city was cut off the electrical grid.

Picture this: thousands of people in a small town that, a few hours prior, was witnessing the worst suicide bombing since the Civil War, not being able to see where the terrorists were coming from, who they were targeting or where they were fleeing to.

Picture this: thousands of innocent Lebanese, gathering in a town targeted by suicide bombers, who were not even given the prerogative of having their night of horror actually have a lamp light.

Maybe it shouldn’t come as a surprise from a governmental system that has failed over and over again and keeps excelling at failing, but let me ask this: if Qaa’s day had been in Beirut or Jounieh or any other “more important” place for the Lebanese collective, would that place go the night without electricity?

How do we go from here? We need to demand more out of our government. The Lebanese army is not supposed to use flare guns at night in order to see where the terrorists were coming from or fleeing to. Our people are not supposed to beg for light in order not to die in pitch darkness. The fact that after the day it had yesterday, the town of Al Qaa still had no electricity is disgraceful. The fact that after being the victim of 4 terrorist suicide attacks, and security officials asking the people of Al Qaa to remain indoors and vigilant, our government did not think that something might happen after sunset is horrifying.

This is not the time for hateful rhetoric. We should not, as a country, sink to the level they want us to, start pointing hands at people whose only fault was being a victim. This is not the refugees fault. They are not those to blame. This is not their attempt to “turn Lebanon Muslim” as I’ve seen many parade around. This is also not your chance to “bring the Crusaders back” as many seem intent on doing. This is precisely the kind of talk we should avoid.

Don’t blame the refugees. Blame those that made them as such. Blame those that maintain the status quo keeping them refugees. Blame those that made our country part of the Syrian war equation. Blame the government that can’t protect its own people.