One year on, the Lebanese capital remains a shell of a city; while most of the physical damage has been repaired, the scar on Beirut’s psyche remains raw and festering, its impact intensified by the anger of a people denied justice.
“Once, just once – especially now – this country could have delivered an outcome for its people,” said Fadia Doumit, as she stared at the tangled mess of metal and masonry strewn across what used to be the port, near where she works. The enormous debris field is in almost the same state as it was a year ago, a memorial to a day that has come to define the dysfunction of Lebanon and the complicity of its leaders.