في وداع زياد الرحباني

Farewell to Ziad Rahbani

Ziad created the lingua franca of post-war Lebanon — through it a generation found each other across front lines and carried their innocence to October 17.

في صداقة الياس خوري

On the Friendship of Elias Khoury

I have not yet said goodbye to Elias Khoury — for him, culture was a moral act and friendship its highest commitment.

غواية النجوم – «حجابه نور» (قرآن كريم)

Starry Temptation - "His Veil Is Light" (Quran)

Between a colonizer desiring to occupy the stars, a little prince who sees them laugh, and a Sufi mystic seeking their unification, the allure of the cosmos is revealed in humanity's diverse ways of approaching the heavens.

الفن الجيّد يوحي أكثر منه يستوحي

Good Art Inspires More Than It Draws Upon

The body thins to fly, merging with trees and birds — no death, only the dialectic of transformation, and bullets have lost to colors.

غواية النجوم

Starry Temptation

Rhodes wanted to colonize the stars; Ibn Arabi wanted to unite with them: between greed and vision through the heart lies the meaning of the world.

Starry Temptation

Between Cecil Rhodes' colonial ambition to annex the planets, Muhammad al-Maghut's refusal to own a home in the stars, the Little Prince's vision of them as laughing joys, and Ibn Arabi's Sufi "marriage" to them, different dimensions of the relationship with place and the cosmos are revealed.

كارل ماركس – مقالات عن سورية ولبنان، ١٨٦٠

Karl Marx - Articles on Syria and Lebanon, 1860

Bidayat

In his articles on the 1860 events in Syria and Lebanon, Marx exposes French and Russian imperial ambitions behind the pretext of protecting Christians, and reveals the "Arab Kingdom" project.

سحر التسمية ووهم الخرائط “بناية الأسُود” في بيروت و”وعد” سايكس-بيكو

The Magic of Naming and the Illusion of Maps: "The Lions' Building" in Beirut and the Sykes-Picot "Promise"

Al-Quds Al-Arabi

The "Lion Building" has no lions and "Sykes-Picot" is not the partition map — naming is the power of erasure. Naming kills.

من المكبوت الفلسطيني-اللبناني نشأة المخيّمات الفلسطينية في لبنان

The Palestinian-Lebanese Taboo: The Genesis of Palestinian Camps in Lebanon

As-Safir

We put them near the cities — to serve businessmen's need for cheap labor: the repressed Palestinian-Lebanese history.

سودان: الثورة السلمية في عظمتها وحدودها

Bidayat

A train departed Atbara carrying a revolution. Eight months later, crowds celebrated a constitutional document — joyful yet wary of what the generals might concede.

اول العلاقات مع النفط: حسين عُوَيني والشبكة السعودية

Bidayat

Before Rafic Hariri, there was Hussein Oweini — the first Saudi-naturalized citizen to become Lebanon's prime minister.

لبنان البدايات في سيرة مثقف حداثي — مراجعة كتاب جاد تابت

Lebanon's Beginnings in the Biography of a Modernist Intellectual - A Review of Jad Tabet's Book

Tripoli was annexed to Greater Lebanon to prevent it becoming Syria's port — it remains the poorest city on the Mediterranean.

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.

عكس السير – القراءة السياسية للاقتصاد. سلطة المال وسلطة السياسة

Against the Current - A Political Reading of the Economy: The Power of Money and the Power of Politics

SifR

Reverse direction: the political reading of economics — the ruling class uses power to build its interests, and the state is a tool of accumulation, not development.

مجموعة «لبنان الاشتراكي» السنوات الأولى ١٩٦٥-١٩٦٨

The "Socialist Lebanon" Group: The Early Years 1965-1968

Bidayat

From the heart of the "Lebanon Socialist" experience and its self-critique, a contemporary question emerges: Can social justice, by ensuring equal opportunities and fair resource distribution, socio-economically hollow out sectarianism and curb sectarian grievances?

بدايات تختتم عيدها العاشر وتعلّق الصدور مؤقتًا

Bidayat Concludes Its Tenth Anniversary and Temporarily Suspends Publication

Bidayat

After ten years of publication, “Bidayat” magazine is temporarily suspending its work due to funding challenges, hoping to find a qualitative shift that ensures its continuity or concludes its venture.

ذاكرة 6 حزيران (يونيو) 1967: إعادة الاعتبار إلى تفسير الهزيمة عسكرياً

The Memory of June 6, 1967: Rehabilitating the Military Interpretation of the Defeat

Al-Quds Al-Arabi

Dominant interpretations of the 1967 defeat blamed culture or society, ignoring the actual military events, whereas this article uncovers the decisive military moment that led to it.

المبادئ الاقتصادية والاجتماعية في الدستور اللبناني

The Economic and Social Principles in the Lebanese Constitution

SifR

The Lebanese constitution was neoliberal before the word existed — we beat Pinochet by decades.

هذا العدد

This Issue

Bidayat

200 individuals control Lebanon's economy and the "consortium" connects to the president's family — corruption is a capital-power partnership.

الثورة والسياسة الثورية في فكر لينين

Revolution and Revolutionary Politics in Lenin's Thought

Bidayat

Lenin developed his revolutionary theory by adapting Marxism to Russia's reality of being "economically backward yet politically advanced," considering it the "weakest link" where revolution could precede advanced nations.

أوكرانيا على مذبح المعسكريَن أوقفوا هذه الحرب!

Ukraine on the Altar of the Two Camps: Stop This War!

Bidayat

The Cold War ended by dissolving one alliance and enlarging the other, but Russian aggression remains aggression — and Ukrainians are paying the price. Stop this war.

لينين والكومنترن والصهيونية – المؤتمر الثاني للكومنترن آب/اوغسطس ١٩٢٠

Lenin, the Comintern, and Zionism - The Second Congress of the Comintern, August 1920

Comintern 1920: the Zionist project as a prime example of colonial deception — subjecting Arabs to British exploitation "under the pretext of a Jewish state."

الاقتصاد السياسي: اين الاقتصاد؟ وأين السياسة؟

Political Economy: Where Is the Economy? And Where Is the Politics?

SifR

Where is economics in Arab politics? Absent behind "resistance." Where is politics in economics? Confiscated by the World Bank. Neoliberalism severs the link to control both.

لينين والكومنترن والصهيونية

Lenin, the Comintern, and Zionism

The Comintern in 1920: "Under pretext of a Jewish state, Arab workers are subjected to British exploitation" — Britain expelled Arabs then turned them against settlers to monopolize control.