people mourning over a casket

Why must every Lebanese generation endure violent chaos—and its aftermath?

After the explosion in Beirut, a journalist reckons with another tragedy in her country.

A final farewell: The family of firefighter Ralph Mellehe grieve over his coffin, draped with the flag of the Lebanese Forces, a Christian political party that had been a militia during Lebanon’s civil war from 1975 to 1990. Mellehe was part of a 10-person team dispatched to the Port of Beirut on August 4 to put out a small blaze near a warehouse that stored thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate. The warehouse exploded, killing all 10 members of the team.

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