Blog
Lojine Kamel

Lebanese Civil War: Flash Back to 1982

These days, it seems like Lebanon is forever on the brink of war.

Saida and Tripoli seem almost cut off from the rest of the country, and headlines are constantly reading “deaths, bombs and gunfire“. Though many of us weren’t born before the Civil War ended, intense situations such as what happened this week can’t help but remind us all of a time when Lebanon was actually at war.

Such was the time during this poignant photo, captured by photographer Steve McCurry. Depicting a veiled woman nonchalantly peeling potatoes with her daughter sitting at her side, the photo could easily pass as a normal daily activity in Lebanon—had it not been for the rubble filled background. Behaving almost normally, the woman stands true to the Lebanese mentality—that, whatever the circumstances and through war or not, life goes on.

This message rings true throughout the history of Lebanon, and is part of what makes us such a functional (and at the same time, dysfunctional) society. Yes, clashes might be erupting everyday and people might be dying, but as Steve McCurry so cleverly depicted, the Lebanese will always find a way to survive.