هل كانت الحرب حتمية؟

Was the War Inevitable?

The war was not inevitable: the Lebanese Front militarized the conflict, the bourgeoisie blocked reform, and social pressure burst through the sectarian fault.

أزمة الانفجار وانفجار الازمات اللبنانية

The Explosion Crisis and the Explosion of Lebanese Crises

Bidayat

The Beirut explosion, a "crime of negligence," laid bare a system of corruption and unaccountability, whose repercussions are now escalating into political, economic, and sovereign crises.

تقديم كتاب “دم الاخوين”

Introduction to the Book "Blood of the Two Brothers"

Civil violence and art from the Cathars to drones — the Cathars' tragedy: they convinced themselves the world is evil, so they became the evil.

القتل من السماء تاريخ موجز للطيران الحربي ضد المدنيّين

Killing from the Sky: A Brief History of Military Aviation Against Civilians

Bidayat

Churchill proposed mustard gas on Iraqis as "more humane" — killing from the sky began against the colonized before Guernica. Daraa's people answered barrel bombs by drilling for water.

العنف في الحروب الاهلية: القنّاص والمنتقم

Violence in Civil Wars: The Sniper and the Avenger

Bidayat

In civil wars, the language of war singularizes the enemy to justify collective punishment, turning the sniper and avenger into instruments of absurd violence that fragments society and makes the enemy latent within each individual.

العنف في الحروب الأهلية: القبيلة والمقدّس والمعجزة

Violence in Civil Wars: The Tribe, the Sacred, and the Miraculous

Bidayat

In civil wars, sects transform into monsters that draw justifications for violence from tribalism and the sacred, redefining the "stranger," beatifying leaders, and manufacturing miracles to purify the "sanctuary."

… والباقي سياسة

... And the Rest Is Politics

As-Safir

The story began with thousands demanding emergency law's end — the information minister says the regime "got used to massacres."

العنف في الحروب الاهلية – القنّاص والمنتقم

Violence in Civil Wars - The Sniper and the Avenger

The sniper and the avenger are two archetypes of violence in civil wars, where civilians are killed without fault, justice transforms into futile revenge, and everyone discovers that the enemy has become internalized.

في طقوس الاغتيال

On the Rituals of Assassination

As-Safir

A newspaper called Wissam al-Hassan a Mossad agent — its editor mourned him personally after the killing. The media's problem: it doesn't know how to be silent.

القاهرة ٩ اكتوبر: الحدث ليبقى حدثا

Cairo, October 9: Lest the Event Be Forgotten

As-Safir

A presenter "lost his nerve," soldiers "lost their nerves" — losing your nerve in a way that kills is a crime. The military council is the suspect saying: catch me.

الاحتقان الاجتماعي والاحتقان الطائفي

Social Tension and Sectarian Tension

As-Safir

"It's none of my business"—the last words of the Ain el-Remmaneh victim, killed for his sect. Small privileges between the poor hide the vast ones between rich and poor.

سؤال أمني بسيط

A Simple Security Question

As-Safir

Militias terrorize neighborhoods celebrating their masters' appointments—the masters then order their own supporters arrested, and the republic races toward hereditary rule.

Cruelty and silence in perspective – on Kanan Makiya’s book

Makiya cuts quotes to prove a uniquely Arab "cruelty"—while he himself worked for Saddam's regime: "somebody had to do it."

Beirut-Guernica: A City and a Painting 

Middle East Report (MERIP)

Parallel to Guernica, Beirut shows how besieged cities transform into concentrated laboratories of modern political crisis, where the contradictions and catastrophes of Arab history are condensed into a single image.