Arab Life Blog

Above, a glimpse of Nabatieh in 1955, the way my mother remembers it.

My aunt called me last week to ask, “Is it true they are going to deport Shiites to Iraq?”

I am told by a friend that the stench of the dead envelopes every mad man and woman who venture into Shaqra, his village in the south. Israel’s bombs did not even spare his parents’ graveyard.

You’re looking at Ayman Baalbaki’s painting, Untitled, 2011

When the war is over and the economists are done with the calculations, the magnitude of the losses will probably shock even the most pessimistic among us. The baseline, I suppose, would be the last major clash in 2006, whose toll is estimated at $3.5 billion.

You’re looking at a snapshot of displacement. The caption at the top reads: Oh, sea! Oh, you father of the orphaned!

Does war have its routines?

Of course it does. Mayhem’s very disruptions are routines: mass murder, assassinations, razed neighborhoods, massive displacement, the insecurities of existence without shelter, food, water, electricity, medical care, schooling, mother, father, son or daughter…

You’re looking at the border between Lebanon and Israel, the so-called Blue Line.

As I write this Saturday morning, we still do not have confirmation if Hassan Nassrallah, General Secretary of Hezbollah, was assassinated in yesterday’s massive Israeli attack on the Southern Suburbs. But we do know that, so far, 300 people were killed and tens of thousands terrorized.

You’re looking at Picasso’s Pursuit of Peace

What’s so absurd about a single democratic Israel-Palestine?

Is it too early or too late to ask this question? Is it idiotic? Naïve? Utopian? Is it clueless, cruel, to pose it to Israelis after October 7; to the Palestinians in the throes of a year-long genocide?

You’re looking at Jenin in the late 19th century.

Every topic was thrown around the dinner table. Israel’s ambitions in Gaza and Lebanon; Hamas, Hezbollah, and resistance under the banner of لا إله إلا الله (there is no God but God); Hezbollah’s role in shoring up Bashar Assad’s regime and adding to Syria’s torment; colonial legacies and imperial designs; the US as an agent of chaos or a mere opportunist on welcoming landscapes; we Arabs as victims or lead authors of our rolling predicaments.

You’re looking at Burj Square, Beirut, in 1954.

“I sat there alone crying,” she said.

Not her habit, my mother. It’s a mighty tear that dares show itself on the cheeks of this 94 year-old matriarch.

It was a casual morning visit, and we were chatting to the tinkle of coffee cups. I had landed in Beirut the night before after a long absence. The topic of the week was war, the scare of the day Israeli planes’ sonic booms.

He went to the US Congress to prolong Israel’s war on Gaza; to get the green light for a new one against Hezbollah in Lebanon. He went to ensure the flow of weapons; to show the folks back home how he “maneuvers” America; to wade into its politics yet again, rub President Biden’s nose in it along the way, and get away with it. He went there for all these reasons.

You’re looking at Israel’s Ariel Sharon in full and, no doubt, very complimentary gear in Lebanon, in 1982.

It was May 5, 1982, exactly one month before Israel’s invasion of Lebanon. Nicholas Veliotes, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs, and Adnan Abu Odeh, Jordan’s Minister of Information and one of King Hussein’s point men on the Palestinian-Jordanian dossier, were lunching at Dominque’s in Washington D.C. During the conversation, Veliotes offered this insight about Israeli policy towards the Palestine Liberation Organization

You’re looking at the St George Hotel in the 1950s.

A week ago, Saturday afternoon! They stood there, in the middle of the street, posing, this young man and woman. He was in a tuxedo, she was in a backless white party dress. He held her low as if to kiss her, she grabbed on to him as her long hair fell to the cobblestones below. Their three female friends, all in chadors, merrily snapped photos as he swayed her between this arm and that.