A child’s view of Lebanon’s downward spiral

“Just close your eyes, then open them, and you’re already through it.” – my father

I was ten years old when we left for Canada and my dad would always say those words to help us brace any coming hardship. An engineer, he probably saw the actual bolts of a nation coming loose before the whole thing fell apart, and he was telling us to hold on tight. I was a child, so I held on tight, but I could only feel the loosening grips of a place that once held so much unconditional love and beauty.

We seemed to always be scrambling in Lebanon, not just to live, but to prepare for disaster. There was always some survival strategy – propane tanks for fire, cash on hand in case the banks go haywire, imminent immigration, and best of all, family. You kept family close and tight. When nationwide electricity blackouts happened routinely – almost every day and sometimes months on end – it was the time to sit around the candlelight and crack jokes.

In the day, our conversations charged the air with some impending disaster – the conflict to the south, another civil war, complete financial collapse, or shortages of fuel and water. Most of this had happened in some form within the past 20 years. Even children whispered of a future war as if in preparation, without knowing what war meant.

Discontent was tangible; radicalization was commonplace; mistrust was rampant. People had been wronged for too long, and they carried that on their faces and in their voices. People were stubborn and gritty, clinging onto a land that seemed to pull from them more than it gave. As a child, you notice these things. You don’t question them. In 2005, after a strenuous immigration process slowed by 9/11, we were accepted to come to Canada.

Lebanon was being rocked by a series of political assassinations, usually with car or truck bombs. The most consequential was the assassination of Rafiq Al-Hariri, the former Prime Minister of Lebanon and, in my teenage sister’s words, “the only good politician left.”

I would later learn that Al-Hariri was not a perfect politician, but was widely credited with pulling Lebanon out of the brutal 16-year civil war that virtually tore the country apart. He breathed new life into the nation, symbolizing hope for its recovery. So, when the 4000-pound TNT bomb hiding inside a parked Mitsubishi van detonated as his motorcade drove near it, the nation reeled backwards. An important bolt came loose.

My family took part in the Cedar Revolution ignited by Al-Hariri’s assassination. I remember chants echoing in Beirut, explosions on TV, anguished cries around blood-streaked ambulances, factional gunfire, dead toddlers in fathers’ arms. Political turmoil was the backdrop of my childhood. It blended into the rubble-strewn streets of Tripoli and honking cars in chaotic intersections. To a child, everything merged into the same noise. I did not want to leave, but I could sense perfectly why we were leaving.

The days leading up to our flight to Canada in August of 2005 felt like a funeral. My uncle burst in, eyes streaming with tears, embracing us one last time. Cousins gathered around to beg us to stay, to rebel, to speak out.

This was not how I knew them. While the backdrop of life in Lebanon was stained by political chaos, family was usually pure bliss, filled with irreplaceable memories. We scaled the Lebanese mountains, swam beneath the Mediterranean sun, hopped across freshwater ravines and picked berries from blossoming trees. “Lebanon was a piece of heaven” sang famous Lebanese singer Wadih el Safi. This was never truer than in a little town called Afesdik some 30 minutes outside of Tripoli, where my grandma lived.

My grandma’s house faced eastwards towards the Lebanese mountains and towards the rising sun. I remember the morning glow on her face as she sat on the porch, waving us in. My dad would show us the trails right next to her home filled with fossilized rock.

At night, us cousins would beg to stay at our grandma’s house together. My parents could rarely say no beneath my grandma’s watchful gaze. We would run, some ten to fifteen of us, to claim every corner of her house with her mattresses – across the living room, up the hallway, in between dining spaces. We played, fought, laughed, slept. It seemed disconnected from the rest of the country.

When we arrived in Canada, the feeling was instant: someone took my ears away, or I just went deaf. It was hard to adjust to its cold muteness. Where was the constant banter at my grandma’s house?

“We will apply disproportionate force on it (village) and cause great damage and destruction there. From our standpoint, these are not civilian villages, they are military bases.” – Israeli army general Gadi Eisenkot, Israel invades Lebanon in 2006

Up until then, Israel felt more like a nightmare – the kind of looming threat only heard of in stories, like the boogeyman. Teachers showed us footage of Palestinian children shot in the streets, cities torn apart by war, recounted stories of massacres and executions, images of Palestinian children armed with nothing but rocks facing tanks. Israel and the death it wreaked was ever-present.

These images made us aware of the political era we were living in: if one day a child found themselves trapped beneath the rubble of a building destroyed by Israeli rockets, they wouldn’t be caught entirely by surprise. After witnessing the devastation in Gaza today, I understand this education more deeply.

But no matter how many times you hear about the boogeyman, nothing compares to the chill of its arrival. When the war broke out in July 2006, that arrival reached us even across the Atlantic ocean.

At eleven years old, I was overwhelmed by feelings of guilt, shame, and helplessness, emotions I had never known so deeply. Living in Canada, far removed from those directly affected, I didn’t know what to do. Should I cheer for the FIFA World Cup, in which Israel was partaking?

“Lebanon recedes in the background as it spirals.” – memories from 2007-2013

My memories of Lebanon blurred with life in Canada. Assimilating into a Canadian reality became essential. Lebanon, no matter how much pride and love I held for it, receded into the background. It was as if I were packing it away like an old toy box in the basement.

At thirteen, I built a model of the Baalbek temple for a school project, proud to share our ancient history — the legacy of the Phoenicians and the wealth of traditions woven over thousands of years. It took courage to “come out” in an environment where Arabs were often reduced to stereotyped uncivilized desert nomads, a view that even my own classmates, unknowingly indoctrinated, held without question.

I put my heart into making the model perfect, and the project brought me a deep sense of peace and connection. I’d never been to Baalbek; as a child and archaeology lover, I must have asked my parents a hundred times to go. We visited Lebanon in 2012-2013. It seemed the country was traveling backwards in time, back to the civil war era.

I joined a group of hopeful young leaders who dreamed of revitalizing war-torn Tripoli, brimming with progressive ideas for the city and nation. They carried an air of change, hopeful smiles, a natural power in their ideas. One member suggested writing inspirational or hopeful quotes on our paper bills to pass along with payments.

“Every bill you have should have an inspirational quote,” he said. “Could be something simple like “keep going, we love you”.”

Another proposed painting parts of Tripoli, bringing color and unity. They wanted to help the poor, bring peace, transform Tripoli’s face.

Once, we set up tables for a community iftar during Ramadan, where many from the city’s impoverished areas were invited to dine together. The event took place at the heart of Tripoli, in a closed-off central roundabout with a famous religious monument. Tables formed a large circle around the central monument, lights cast a festive glow, music played, and crowds – the homeless, those living in the area, formal invitees – were softly ushered in.

But this was also an area known for factional violence. The Lebanese army stood by to maintain order. Before we could even serve the food, factional extremists arrived with weapons and threatened to throw grenades if we didn’t clear the area. Within seconds, people were running in all directions, overturning tables. The Lebanese army did nothing.

I had been caught in a crossfire once before. Instinct just tells you to run. The upheaval was hope and chaos — it was the Lebanon I’d locked away returning in full force to help me survive.

“Israel strikes historic Lebanese city of Baalbek after ordering evacuation” – BBC, Oct 30, 2024.

I rarely visited Lebanon again. My life became fully occupied by my post-secondary education in Canada. Lebanon would return to me only in brief calls to family or when I’d hear some news – like the explosion in Beirut in 2020 that trembled across the world.

Now, once again, Lebanon is steeped in war. I look back at my memories. I take out the toy box from my parent’s basement and start looking at the stuff I have.

Baalbek is being bombed again. I look at the structure of the Temple model I built. I think about the Lebanon that receded in my memory. How far should it recede? I look at how much I have changed.

I read, once, that during the civil war, big parts of the historic sites around Baalbek were destroyed and never repaired again. I think about that now.

Another disaster. I close my eyes, I open them every day.

I wonder when it will end.

Amer El-Samman is a graduate student and political activist based in Fredericton, Canada.