Lebanon’s dark days of hunger: The Great Famine of 1915-18 (By Rym Ghazal)

Lebanon’s dark days of hunger: The Great Famine of 1915-18

The harrowing images from Mount Lebanon as death stalked the streets in 1915. Courtesy Archives and Special Collections, Jafet Library, AUB

“My people and your people, my Syrian

Brother, are dead … What can be

Done for those who are dying? Our

Lamentations will not satisfy their

Hunger, and our tears will not quench

Their thirst; what can we do to save

Them between the iron paws of

Hunger?”

– From Dead Are My People by Gibran Khalil Gibran (1883-1931)

Almost 100 years ago this month, as the First World War raged across Europe and beyond, a dark chapter unfolded in what was then known as Greater Syria.

The first culprit: the relentless locust. Following a bad harvest caused by a drought, in April 1915 dark clouds heralded the arrival of swarms of locusts, descending to feed on plants, whether green or dry.

For over three months, the tiny but insatiable creatures devoured whatever had been left behind by the Ottoman authorities, who had prioritised food and grain reserves to feed their soldiers as part of the imperial war effort.

This marked the beginning of a period that is now often just a footnote in the history books: the Great Famine of 1915-18, which left an estimated 500,000 people dead. With a lack of accurate data, estimates range from 100,000 to 200,000 deaths in Mount Lebanon alone.

March 14 and the Myth of the Cedar Revolution (By Marina Chamma)

March 14 and the Myth of the Cedar Revolution

If March 14 2005 would happen again, I would be exactly where I was – in the middle of the chanting and exuberant crowds in Martyrs’ Square – when it all happened.  It was history and I was part of it, along with thousands of others who gathered there. The excitement of screaming Ya Bashar, ya *******, Tal’le Jayshak min Beirut (Oh Bashar, Oh [expletive], Get Your Army out of Beirut) straight into the face of a Lebanese soldier without the fear of arrest. The indescribable feeling of dignity restored, standing in an ocean of Lebanese flags singing along to Julia Boutros’ Ana Bitnaf’as Houriye (I Breathe Freedom). The emotion of seeing the sheer crowds gathered on one day, in one place, for some sort of hope for a better future, which few, if any, knew what would look like. At the same time, it was the implicit awareness, even in the midst of the protest, that such a sight of unity and the seeds of a possible revolution that may come with it wouldn’t survive.

But was it really unity? It is true that March 14, 2005 was one of the biggest, if not the biggest, demonstrations in contemporary Lebanese history, with an anti-Syria common denominator. However, people also had other reasons for being there. Some where there to mourn Rafik El Hariri and avenge his death, while others were there as part of their ongoing opposition to the Syrian regime (it being the prime suspect behind the Hariri assassination at the time). Others were there because they opposed the gathering of March 8 (the day in which pro-Syrian Lebanese gathered to “Thank Syria” for all it has done, a show of solidarity while it was being accused to killing Hariri). Others were there to call for an end to Syria’s occupation of Lebanon, while others called for a drastic change to the political system and its leaders, which until then, was nurtured and protected by Syria itself.

New Revelations on the Armenian Genocide: The French College in Aintoura, Lebanon or Jemal Pasha’s Orphanage where Armenian Children were to be Turkified (Nora Parsekhian)

The Armenian nation lived the most horrible phase of its history in 1915. The Ottoman authorities executed the Genocide which resulted in the killing of over 1 million Armenians, while most of the Armenians remaining on the western parts of historic Armenia were compelled to leave there cities and villages and deported, marched towards the deserts of Iraq and Syria. Parts of the deported Armenians reached Lebanon where they believed that they were left in peace without realizing that in one of the not-so-far villages of Lebanon, namely Aintoura, near Zouk, Keserwan, which is about half an hour drive from the capital city Beirut, a plan of Turkification of Armenian orphans had been put in motion in 1915. Such a new page in the history of the Armenian Genocide was recently discovered by Missak Keleshian, who is an avid collector of all kinds of photos of the Armenian Genocide.

The monument is erected in In ‪‎Antaura‬, ‪‎Lebanon‬, in the memory of 300 ‪‎Armenian‬ children who were placed in this orphanage in 1915 for the purpose of converting them to Muslim ‪‎Turks‬.
The remains were discovered in 1993.

The Middle East’s own 30 Years War has just begun (by Douglas Murray)

The Middle East’s own 30 Years War has just begun

In January, Douglas Murray explained in The Spectator how relations in the Middle East were becoming increasingly tense. With northern Iraq now in turmoil, following the advance of Islamist militant group Isis, Douglas’s insight seems prescient.

Syria has fallen apart. Major cities in Iraq have fallen to al-Qa’eda. Egypt may have stabilised slightly after a counter-coup. But Lebanon is starting once again to fragment. Beneath all these facts — beneath all the explosions, exhortations and blood — certain themes are emerging.

Let me refresh your memory! (By Yeghig Tashjian

Let me refresh your memory!

“Study the past if you would define the future.” –Confucius

During my visit to Vienna in 2012, I was discussing Middle Eastern politics with some friends. The conversation then shifted to the history books of our respective countries; however, I became silent when it was my turn to talk about Lebanon’s history book. What was I supposed to say? That the history textbooks used in schools in Lebanon end with the withdrawal of the French troops in 1946? Or that the country does not have an accurate and unified history book that covers the country’s post-independence years? Normally, history textbooks are updated every 5-10 years, but not in Lebanon’s case.

Why should we care about having an unbiased and objective history book? And why is it so important?

Why we remember, 99 years after the Armenian Genocide (By Yeghig Tashjian)

Why we remember, 99 years after the Armenian Genocide

“For your freedom we have lived and for your independence we are dying.” —Abdul-Karim el-Khalil, with a rope around his neck, May 6, 1916.
Every year, Armenians all over the world — in Armenia and the diaspora — commemorate the anniversary of the genocide on April 24. On this day in 1915, around 400 Armenian intellectuals were arrested by the Turkish gendarmes and were all executed. The plan of the Central Committee of the Young Turks Party was simply to annihilate the Armenian nation and to create a Pan-Turkic Empire, which would extend from Istanbul to Central Asia. During this Genocidal campaign, around 1,500,000 Armenians perished and hundreds of thousands of Assyrians, Syriacs and Greeks were slaughtered. Henry Morgenthau, the US ambassador to Turkey who witnessed the massacre, quoted Ottoman ruler Talaat Pasha as saying, “What Sultan Abdul Hamid failed in 30 years, I have accomplished it in just 3 months.” The genocide was done.
This year, the Lebanese-Armenian committee of the 100th anniversary of the genocide organized a candle-lit march on the eve of the genocide’s Remembrance Day. It started from the Bourj Hammoud Municipality Square and headed towards Martyrs’ Square in Downtown Beirut. Thousands of people, young and old, lit the streets with their candles and shouted “Justice!” as they marched. By 9 pm, Martyrs’ Square was filled with both Lebanese-Armenians and non-Armenians, with Lebanese and Armenian flags, and guest speakers gave their speeches.
In his speech, former Interior Minister Ziad Baroud insisted that no matter what, the truth must be recognized, because denial can’t erase or heal the wounded memories of the Armenians. He added, “Today I see the tears of pride in the eyes of the young generation, the tears that you inherited from your grandparents.” The next guest speaker was Haigazian University President Rev. Dr. Paul Haidostian, who stated that although 99 years ago, Armenians were deported from their land, leaving behind their homes, properties, memories, history and were marched to the desert towards an ambiguous future, our ancestors didn’t lose hope. They founded and built new homes around the world. He ended his speech with the following: “Before 99 years, Armenians were scattered like ashes right and left in dark, but today, today my fellow people and youth, you have overcome on the dark, with the candles in your hands, you have lightened the Martyrs’ square, this square which was also covered with dark when the same criminals executed the (Lebanese) intellectuals.”

Lebanon: Being Gay Is Not a Crime Nor Against Nature (By Dan Littauer)

Lebanon: Being Gay Is Not a Crime nor Against Nature

Lebanese in a demonstration last year demanding greater LGBT rights

A court in Lebanon has made a historic ruling stating same-sex relations are not “contradicting the laws of nature” and cannot therefore be considered a crime, said a statement only revealed today.

Lebanese Jews in New York: Longing for Home (By Dalal Mawad)

Lebanese Jews in New York: Longing for Home

A general view shows the Magen Abraham Synagogue, currently undergoing restoration, in the Lebanese capital Beirut on 19 October 2010. Located in the former Jewish quarter of Wadi Abu Jamil, the synagogue was abandoned during Lebanon’s civil war. (Photo: AFP – Joseph Eid)

As her brother drove her through the streets of downtown Beirut on a balmy January day, 76-year-old Suzette Sasson felt like a stranger in her own city. Captivated by the new places and unfamiliar faces, she failed to notice they had reached Wadi Abou Jamil, the neighborhood she had longed to return to for years. But when her brother stopped the car and pointed to a four-story building, Sasson was shaken out of her limbo. She stared, drowning in silence.

“Go up mama,” said her 40-year-old son Raymond, sitting behind her. “But what should I say?” she muttered nervously.

When a woman opened the door of the apartment on the third floor, Sasson told her in Arabic: “I grew up here, can I see the house?”

A New Feminist Wave in Lebanon or the Path to Democratization (By Pamela Chrabieh)

A New Feminist Wave in Lebanon or the Path to Democratization

The study of Feminist/Women’s movements not only contributes to our understanding of women’s experiences of political and social change, but also helps to bridge the gaps between local activism and feminist theory. Feminist claims and organizations in Lebanon and most Western Asian countries are not new, and credit for the growth of new Feminisms must go to its pioneers, the women who first came to see their inferior status in society and to understand that such inferiority was not a divinely ordained fate that they were obliged to accept.

I have recently published a book in Arabic on women’s status, experiences and situations in Ancient Western Asia (‘Womanhood in Western Asia, A Journey to the Past’, Beirut, Dar el Machreq, 2013), proving the long-existence of Patriarchal systems and mentality, but also, gender equality ‘spaces’ within ancient cultures and religions. Still, feminisms as social-political movements arose at the end of the nineteenth century, coinciding with that of the reformist movement. What those pioneering women achieved was not negligible, even if they focused on charitable work – except for Egypt with its Women’s Educational Society founded in 1881, and the Instructive Women’s Union in 1910, raising public awareness of women’s rights as a key objective. A second wave could be identified during the 1940s, a period marked by the resistance of Arab societies under imperialism, with most of the claims focusing on issues such as polygamy and women’s right to education. In Lebanon, the Lebanese Women’s Council came into being in 1943 and the Committee of Lebanese Women’s Rights in 1947.