Postcard from Lebanon
I've returned to Beirut, where the moist Mediteranean air has made me nostalgic
for memories I don't even have. And the food: I think just breathing the
air is making me fat - surely I'm gaining 5 kilos a day. I'll need an
extra plane ticket for the return. It truly is the
Paris of the middle east.
Recommended: Le Chef, Gymnasie at the bottom of the big stairway. "Food of your grandmother" according to the man who is host, waiter, prep-cook, and entertainer. Anyway, not my grandmother.
I toured the southern suburbs hit by Israeli bombing. There's
about 10km square of mostly destroyed apartment blocks. The focus on civilian targets is striking, but a resistance force rarely presents a well-defined battlefield. Every bridge in the country has been damaged, and the power plant north of Beirut was bombed, spilling tons of oil along the coastline.
From Ahmed, the taxi driver whose explanation for everything is that the Jews are behind it, own it, want it, or control it, "Nasrallah did exactly what they [Israel] wanted. They need an enemy, to show that they are surrounded and helpless. With no enemy, they will fight each other."
Many people support Nasrallah, his picture is everywhere. I'm not as sure about the war, certainly the antipathy runs deep with the fear of being drawn into a larger conflict. Many people describe the 15-year civil war (beginning in 1975) as a proxy battleground of the cold war. The recent conflict is viewed as a battle between Iran and the US.