Beirut Is Calling on Cincinnati

Here, today, we are not going to put forward an analysis of the many crises that Lebanon has gotten itself caught up in, nor even their latest developments. That is done regularly and with talent in these very pages, and it feels like everything has already been said. At least, up until now.

Today we are at a total stalemate. No glimmer of hope, neither when it comes to the cabinet member themselves, nor when it comes to reforms. We certainly saw Nabih Berri’s show at the time of the framework agreement concerning the maritime border with Israel. We had already been wondering if this progress was a sign that the Shiite coalition, under pressure from the American government, was going to back down in one way or another.

No matter what it is in regard to, everything, including the new extension granted by Emmanuel Macron during his stern speech last Sunday [Oct. 4], seems to lead to the same conclusion: We are in for a muddy, weekslong waiting period. Four weeks, to be exact.

For today, it is in the hands of Americans, everyday Americans, that our fate seems to be placed. Today, all we can do is wait for voters, big and small, thousands of miles from Lebanon, to decide whether or not they will send an incoherent and unpredictable man back to the White House.

As we wait, in Beirut, in Sidon, in Nabatieh, in Tripoli and in Baalbek, we sink deeper and deeper as the future withers away. And, filled with a horrible sense of impotence, we watch Lebanon disappear—a possibility that the French minister of foreign affairs warned of over a month ago.

This is what a country disappearing looks like.

A country disappearing is a county whose best and brightest flee, often with a heavy heart. Educated young people, full of ideas that they will sow … somewhere else. Doctors, some of the most talented in the world, who will care for patients … somewhere else. Architects, engineers who will build cities … elsewhere. Artists who will cover gallery walls … somewhere else.

A country disappearing is a country where pharmacy shelves are empty because it has become impossible to import medications. A country where it is hard to find a box of Panadol and where tracking down diabetes medication for your mother and filters for your father’s dialysis is a full-time job.

A country disappearing is one whose inhabitants are treated like children when they want to access their own money. It is a country where a text from the bank arrives like a punishment, with “no credit card” taking the place of “no dessert.” A country whose inhabitants are confined when their means of travel are locked up.

A country disappearing is a country whose most vulnerable citizens are willing to leave in makeshift boats, under the eyes of lawless ferrymen, with children’s lives at risk.

A country disappearing is a country where a degree and a career carry less weight and have less value than a salary in dollars, however crummy it may be.

A country disappearing is a country whose educational system, the very system it was once proud of, is collapsing.

A country disappearing is a country where too many no longer have the energy or the will to go on fighting.

A country disappearing is a country held by the wealthy and political elites who operate behind closed doors. Elites too hung up on ineffective, though seemingly powerful, titles and positions to make even the slightest amount of room for those who could work for the common good.

Yet, there are numerous men and women, throughout Lebanon and elsewhere, who are capable of dreaming, thinking, envisioning and constructing a new world. So many Lebanese are prepared, in spite of everything and after having lost so much, to work at it. So many Lebanese are working at it already, those who reopened their stores and restaurants that were destroyed in the Beirut port explosion on Aug. 4, those who use their skills, their money, and their time to serve others.

“We are at an impasse, without a government, without a plan to get back up and running, without reforms, without respect for the constitution, without shame, and this should force us to find an opening without waiting for foreigners to deliver,” declared Cardinal Bechara Boutros Rai.

Today, we have been reduced, in our sad city of Absurdistan, to imploring voters in Cincinnati, Ohio — deep in the Midwest — to vote wisely. Even if no one really knows what it means to vote wisely. Even if people are doubting that a “good vote” is all it will take to get us off this highway to hell.