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| Artwork by Tarek Chemaly |
Never a dull day in Lebanon. Severe uptick in Coronavirus cases? Check. Explosion listed as third powerful in humanity's history? Check. Unofficial banking controls? Check. Social unrest? Check. Crumbling structure and infrastructure? Check. Do I go on? Oh yes, international tribunal that cost and arm and a leg (800 Million Dollars to be specific) pinned on a member of the Hizbollah but not on the party itself with the incriminating evidence being the use of multicolored phones? Check. During the war, when a ceasefire would be declared yet sporadic skirmishes continued here and there, the blame would be put on "rogue elements" or in Arabic the more poetic "3anaser ghayr mondabita". In essence that is what the whole international tribunal was about: One specific individual who happens to be a member of a party a la 9 to 5 but has outside hobbies on his own, to which, like luxury company Hermes, he is allowed to use the company logistics and hardware so long he does not sell a competing product. Never a dull day as I said.