War and cardamom coffee

Dear readers,

I am starting the Friday newsletter slightly differently this week.

In the news, there is no shortage these days of emotionally harrowing stories. George Orwell said that the role of a journalist is to hold a mirror to society because: « If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear. » And in this mirror, we hold up today we see Lebanon and the region in multiple crises: war, displacement, climate change, and relentless economic malaise. But as Leonard Cohen sang: « There is a crack, a crack in everything / That's how the light gets in. » And through our cracked mirror we can also see stories of hope, resilience, love and tradition – that help bind us together, and bring us out, even if just for a brief glimmer of a moment, from the depths of despair.

During days of good or bad news, ahweh is always served at L’Orient Today. The ritual of sitting down to write with a freshly brewed coffee infused with cardamom beside me is something sacred to me as a journalist. From raqweh to flat whites – I’ll happily drink whatever is poured. I’ve often wondered where Lebanon’s strong tradition of coffee drinking comes from. Luckily my colleague Amanda Hayder has helped me answer this. She visited key Beirut coffee houses Cafe Younes and Kalei to find out more. By the way, did you know that the world’s first coffee houses appeared in Damascus and then started popping up throughout the Ottoman Empire, (of which present-day Lebanon was part) rising in popularity in the 16th century ?

Another forever war ?

It seems this week that the war is without an end. Hezbollah and Israel continue to trade rocket and artillery fire daily – with multiple militant and civilian deaths reported on both sides. Among the latter was Rafik Qassem, a civilian from Aita al-Shaab who had decided to stay and take care of the village’s stray cats and dogs during the conflict. He was killed in an Israeli drone strike. Read more from Malek Jadeh’s report here.

Meanwhile, as the intensity of the cross-border combat remains high, Hezbollah says it has further « surprises » in store for Israel. Could this, Mounir Rabih poses, be a signal of the Party of God’s intentions to use surface-to-air missiles that can bring down Israeli fighter jets, a threat long hinted at by the party yet never confirmed ?

Rafah, Gaza and our editorial line

This week we witnessed international condemnation of Israel’s military offensive in Rafah after it carried out two strikes within 48 hours killing Palestinians seeking shelter in designated humanitarian displacement camps in in southern Gaza, areas that Israel itself told them to flee to. Reporting on this war poses daily editorial questions for us as a Lebanese daily newspaper based in Beirut. L’Orient Today and our sister French-language publication, L’Orient-Le Jour, aim to remain fair, objective and accurate in reporting the facts. But this war is of such a heinous nature that there are some things we cannot stay impartial on, as the Editors in Chief of L’Orient-Le Jour, Anthony Samrani and Elie Fayad, explain.

To report responsibly on this war in Gaza and in southern Lebanon, we must constantly take into account its wide-reaching impacts – some direct, some ancillary. From displacement and the social and economic dislocation that this brings ; to the sudden splintering of village communities, schooling and support systems ; to the mental health impact of grief, loss and anxiety of the unknown. Another, often underreported impact of war is the environment. As Sally Abou Aljoud reports, war-torn southern Lebanon faces a high risk of wildfires this summer due to Israeli munitions, including incendiary white phosphorus and flare bombs remaining in the soil. Experts describe the situation as an « environmental massacre. » Read more here.

Syrians in Lebanon

Another story that continues to fill the front page of our website is the status of Syrians in Lebanon. This week our reporters Lyana Alameddine and Michel Hallak went to the northern Lebanese town of Kouba, situated between Batroun and Selaata, where security agents forced approximately 1,100 undocumented Syrian refugees to leave by the end of the day. It is part of broader measures taken by the authorities to organize, either voluntarily or by force, the deportation of Syrian refugees from Lebanon. A woman, who we are calling Fatima to protect her safety, is one of the Syrian refugees among those ordered by State Security to leave the town, is unsure what to do. Her husband, a farmer, had left two days earlier. « He's now in the Bekaa. We're scattered all over the place, » she says. She fears that if she returns to Syria, her children, aged 15 and 16, will be forced into military service. « I don't want to send them to their deaths. »

Finally, if there are any French speakers reading this, I encourage you to watch L’Orient-Le Jour’s excellent and insightful documentary on the war in southern Lebanon. This important contribution to the historic record, was produced by Lucile Wassermann, Jad Abou Jaoude and Mohammad Yassine. Click here to watch it.

Whether you read this newsletter with or without a coffee, we are so grateful to have you with us.

With thanks,

Olivia Le Poidevin

Head of L’Orient Today