- To be #Lebanese is to be born in a country that has not known peace for decades — a country repeatedly devoured, divided, and burned until its identity itself became scarred. A country that emerged from a long civil war but never truly escaped the logic of war.
Generations grew up on its ruins, then found themselves living under Syrian occupation, and later under Syrian–Iranian dominance. Lebanon was rarely left alone to decide its own fate.
To be Lebanese also means living through years of assassinations and the constant anxiety of explosions. Since 2005, when the assassination of #RaficHariri shook the country, a long chapter of blood and fear began. Assassination followed assassination, slowly eroding hope.
It also means living in a state gradually seized from within by He*bollah and its allies, where weapons outside the authority of the state became stronger than the state itself, and where the country was repeatedly dragged into wars it never chose.
Then came the October 17 Revolution in 2019, when people took to the streets demanding a normal country. But the dream faded quickly. The economy collapsed, people’s savings disappeared, poverty spread, and the #COVID-19 pandemic added yet another layer of hardship.
Then came August 4, 2020 — the day the soul of the country shattered. The #BeirutPort explosion devastated an entire city, killed hundreds, and shattered what remained of trust in the state. Justice has yet to come.
Yet the Lebanese kept trying to live, still searching for fragments of hope.
Until October 8, 2023, when He*bollah opened a new front in the south under the banner of “supporting #Gaza,” pulling #Lebanon once again into the shadow of war — bombardment, displacement, and daily fear.
Today, Lebanese people live on a land that burns beneath their feet. No one knows what tomorrow will bring — an ordinary day, a wider war, or another tragedy.
To be Lebanese today means living in a country whose face is scarred… and going to sleep each night not knowing whether tomorrow will still resemble yesterday.
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