Lebanon: a legacy of anger and resentment

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

Do you remember the Egyptian TV program "mirath al ghadab"? (which could be translated as "a legacy of anger/resentment). I don't think you do.

Ok let me start with the drawbacks: In the program Mahmoud Yassin marries his highschool student Chahira (husband and wife in real life) something which might not fly today.

The upside: An incredible story about a father, two brothers, an inheritance, cousins bickering, and a dreadful climax. It all starts with the ominous theme song.

The reason I am mentioning it is because recently, a friend told me that Lebanon was cursed in the bible. There is a passage in the old testament which could allude to that, I will let you judge about it yourself. But, bible-cursing or not, one thing is for sure: We are, somehow, cursed.

I don't think there are voodoo dolls that could represent a whole nation, but what do I know?

Still, whereas I am a "little" young (though not very) when the mid-80s financial crash happened in the middle of war (I was born 6 months before the onset of the Lebanese war), I could actually really remember it well. War - the great 1975-1990 war - is still a trauma Lebanese did not recover from. Add to it decades of instability (think 2006 war for example) and all the events which engendered the 2019 crash, and there you have it. Severe, successive crashes in give-and-take literally one generation (there are 3 generations in one century).

That's too much.

Honestly, too much.

I spoke before about how unlucky we were with out set of politicians in Lebanon. But also how the average Joe is also complicit in the situation. Of course, none of this is "fair" (what fairness has to do with it, is a little stretching it I guess), but perhaps it is a recalibration of Lebanese living within their means (see here),

All of this is truly emotionally difficult to live on day to day basis. Yet, apart from going on - cursed country or not, little can be done.

On that "their" cedar video, and patriotism in Lebanon

Today a can of worms has been opened. A video is heavily circulating of two young men, putting their (deceased Iranian major general in the revolutionary Guard Corps - who was assassinated in Iraq exactly a year ago) Qasem Soleimani's photo in the heart of the Cedar which represents the Lebanese flag (the video is not clear where this happens) but what is clear is that - apart from one of the men saying whose photo it is - the other man says "yes, plaster it on their cedar" - emphasis mine (see video here).

Which naturally brings the "their" to the forefront. It might seem shocking that these two men - or at least one of them - does not feel any belonging to the symbol present on his country's flag (and that the other does neither as he also tends to think it is fine to put such a photo there). But - and here is the big but - the cedar has been mentioned 103 times in the bible. And whereas yes, Lebanon is indeed known for its Cedrus libani species, and for its forest trees (which were much more numerous than they are now), put yourself in the shoes of the Moslem MPs when the first Lebanese flag was drawn.

In 2009, and within the realm of me teaching a class on current events I asked my students (about 35 of them) about what makes us Lebanese. What these youth, which came from different backgrounds and places and faiths, agreed upon in the end were two things "tabboule and Fairouz". The rest which included the flag, national anthem, dabke, Rawche, etc... did not make the cut.

Once more, oddly I am neither surprised nor angered about the "their" cedar reaction (presumably, that of the Christians). One should place things in their contexts. And by the way, please let us not file this (the flag, the presence of the cedar in the bible) as something "from the past" (and ergo no longer up for debate or opinions at this stage).

Nothing is from the past. When Abbas al-Moussawi was assassinated on February 16, 1992, there was an Egyptian ad during the news for Lord Shave (a brand of disposable razors) which aired on (Lebanese TV channel) LBC and which ended with "na3iman ya Abbas" (hope you had a good shave/cut Abbas). The ad showed barely a few minutes after the report on al-Moussawi's blown car (and his assassination) in one of those innocent mistakes that happen without premeditation. The sentence "na3iman ya Abbas" became a catchphrase among certain Lebanese (of course, the Christian part). Please watch the ad here.

When Lebanese politician Gibran Tueni was himself assassinated on December 12, 2005, there were at the time heavily manifestations in downtown Beirut (among which certain manifestations of shiia demonstrators) and on one of those large banners was written "na3iman ya Gibran".

As I said, nothing is in the past. All is today and nothing is forgotten. Or to better quote William Faulkner, "The past isn't dead. It isn't even past".

Just to be clear again, "patriotism" is incredibly complicated in Lebanon. And the more you live here, the more you understand how nuanced it is.