Beirut - Page 2

Lebanese Ambassador to Germany Mustapha Adib, 48, was confirmed as the next prime minister of Lebanon in a parliamentary vote on Sunday.

Lebanon’s effort to form a new government is not going well. Virtually every administration official except President Michel Aoun resigned soon after the August 4 explosion that devastated the city of Beirut. The search for a new prime minister appears to be deadlocked by Lebanon’s factional rivalries and resistance to reform, even as the country’s already shaky economy teeters on the edge of utter ruin.

The Lebanese military released a statement on Monday that said teams of its investigators, assisted by French experts, have discovered 25 containers of hydrochloric acid and 54 containers of other dangerous materials at the Port of Beirut, which was devastated on August 4 by a massive explosion blamed on an improperly stored stockpile of ammonium nitrate.

The German newspaper Der Spiegel published a report this weekend claiming that the ship suspected of bringing 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate to the Port of Beirut in 2013 had ties to a bank involved in laundering money for Hezbollah, the Iran-backed terrorist organization and Lebanese political party.

Analysis of the historic peace deal between Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) tends to focus on Iran and Turkey as the big losers. They were certainly the loudest complainers.

The National on Thursday discussed efforts of Lebanese Christians to cope with social, political, and sectarian fallout from the massive explosion in Beirut. To the surprise of few, but the dismay of many, the catastrophe has inflamed religious tensions that are never far from the surface in Lebanon.

Lebanon’s parliament approved a state of emergency Thursday granting sweeping powers to the army.

Former Italian Interior Minister Marco Minniti has warned that potential government collapse in Lebanon following the Beirut blast could trigger a domino effect and sweep chaos across the Mediterranean.

Lebanese officials on Wednesday hastened to reassure the public that imported goods, including foodstuffs, will not be seriously hindered by last week’s massive explosion in Beirut, even though the blast destroyed the city’s vital port facilities.

A Qatari sociologist says “blasphemy” in Lebanon – including an anti-Islamic culture of gays, promiscuous women, and plastic surgery – is to blame for last week’s port explosion in Beirut.

Subhi al-Tufayli, leader of the Iran-backed terrorist organization Hezbollah in the 1980s, on Tuesday held current leader Hassan Nasrallah responsible for last week’s deadly Beirut explosion and called on Lebanese authorities to put him on trial, along with his patron Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of Iran.

A bombshell report published by Reuters on Tuesday revealed that senior Lebanese officials received warnings as recently as last month that a cache of highly combustible ammonium nitrate held at the Port of Beirut was a threat to its densely populated surroundings and should be moved.

Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab resigned on Monday afternoon, following the resignations of several other top ministers and effectively bringing the current Lebanese government to a close.

A police officer in Beirut was reportedly killed on Saturday and hundreds were injured as angry protests swept the devastated city over the weekend.

An estimated 80,000 children have been displaced by the explosion in the Port of Beirut on Tuesday, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said on Thursday.

Lebanese diaspora from all over the world are mobilizing a “financial bloodline” to the crisis-stricken country after a series of devastating explosions rocked the capital of Beirut on Tuesday, causing billions of dollars worth of damage. 

Col. Joseph Skaf, former chief of drug control for the Lebanese customs agency, wrote a letter in 2014 warning that a cargo of 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate seized from a Russian-owned ship the previous year at the Port of Beirut was “highly dangerous and constitutes a threat to public safety.” Skaf died under cloudy circumstances in 2017, while the cargo he warned about evidently detonated on Tuesday, causing over a hundred deaths and wiping out a sizable portion of the city.

Dozens of residents of Beirut, Lebanon, took the streets late Thursday to demand accountability from their government after an explosion destroyed much of the city’s port area, leaving at least 150 dead, 5,000 injured, and hundreds of thousands homeless. Security forces responded by tear-gassing desperate residents.

Lebanese President Michel Aoun said on Friday that the cause of the titanic explosion in Beirut on Tuesday “has not been determined yet,” and authorities have not ruled out “possibility of external interference through a rocket or bomb or other act.”

The U.S. “should lift sanctions imposed against Lebanese people” following the port explosion in Beirut on Tuesday, Iran’s Foreign Ministry said on Thursday.

A woman being filmed in her wedding dress on Tuesday was knocked to the ground by a massive explosion in Beirut, Lebanon, but she survived.

Iran’s state-run Fars News Agency quoted “experts” on Wednesday who said the massive explosion in Beirut, currently deemed an accident by Lebanese officials, bears a suspicious resemblance to “Israeli-style operations in the past.”

A prominent commentator in Lebanon suggested late Wednesday that a top Chinese construction firm could take up the herculean task of reconstructing the Port of Beirut after a massive explosion destroyed much of the site and surrounding neighborhoods.

French President Emmanuel Macron toured the streets of Beirut, Lebanon, on Thursday, becoming the first head of state to do so following Tuesday’s devastating explosion, including Lebanese President Michel Aoun.

(AP) — Britain is sending a Royal Navy ship to Beirut to help the city recover from Tuesday’s devastating port explosion.

(AP) — Germany’s foreign minister says an employee of the German Embassy in Beirut was killed in the huge blast that devastated the Lebanese capital earlier this week.

Beirut has endured many horrors in its 5,000-year history, but nothing like the massive explosion that ripped through the ancient Mediterranean port city on Tuesday, leaving thousands of casualties, 300,000 homeless, and over $10 billion in damage in its wake. Now the indomitable Lebanese are digging themselves out from the rumble and demanding answers from their political elites.

The government of Iran and leaders of Hezbollah, Iran’s terrorist proxy group in Lebanon, offered assistance to the city of Beirut after a massive explosion on Tuesday caused enormous damage and casualties.

The Lebanese Red Cross stated Wednesday that the gigantic explosion at the port of Beirut has killed over 100 people and injured over 4,000.

Lebanese officials said on Wednesday the massive explosion that rocked Beirut on Tuesday occurred when a large cargo of ammonium nitrate seized from a cargo ship in 2013 and left in a warehouse in the Port of Beirut for six years caught fire and exploded.

PARIS (AP) – As Lebanon reeled in shock a day after the massive blast in Beirut and counted the dead, nations around the world promised it would not be alone.

Tuesday’s explosion was devastating blow even for a city that has endured a 15-year civil war, suicide bombings, foreign bombardments, and political assassinations.

“This was not some kind of manufacturing explosion type of event,” he said. “This was a – seems to be, according to them. They would know better than I would. They seem to think it was an attack. It was a bomb of some kind, yes.” 

A titanic explosion shook the Lebanese capital of Beirut on Tuesday, shaking buildings and sending a huge cloud of smoke over the middle of the city.

BEIRUT — With Beirut’s airport partially reopening from a three-month virus shutdown, the government is hoping thousands of Lebanese expatriates will return for the summer — and bring dollars desperately needed to prop up the crashing economy.

Outspoken Lebanese pop star Elissa, one of the most popular female singers in the Arab world, on Monday accused her government of refusing to cancel flights from Iran to keep the Wuhan coronavirus at bay because officials feared to antagonize Hezbollah, a Lebanese terrorist organization and political party supported by Tehran.