“It’s the Italians’ fault,” goes the common Lebanese expression, used to justify failure to resolve a certain challenge or, more often, to ridicule officials similarly passing on the buck for their own shortcomings. It refers to the Battle of Beirut in 1912, when the Italian navy bombarded Ottoman forces, wreaking havoc and destruction on parts of the Lebanese capital. Yet the chaos created by the cannons of the Giuseppe Garibaldi and Francesco Ferruccio were as nothing compared to the manner in which the Lebanese dealt with most future disasters over the ensuing years, most recently the Syrian refugee crisis.
Now well into its sixth year, the Syrian refugee crisis remains inadequately addressed by the Lebanese government, whose various lukewarm responsive measures have been inversely proportional to its extremely vocal demands to magically be rid of one million registered refugees. Every year, the Lebanese establishment uses the pulpit of the UN General Assembly to further pursue this policy, which while projecting a façade of empathy and kindness is ultimately laced with hatred and xenophobia against everything non-Lebanese, whatever that may mean.
Last week, Lebanese President Michel Aoun addressed a room full of world leaders at the UN, most of whom could play a positive role in assisting in Lebanon’s refugee predicament, either by offering much needed additional funds, or potentially by agreeing to host some of the refugees. Aoun, however, had other plans in mind. His insipid speech purposely lacked concrete proposals and avoided practical solutions, demanding instead the immediate return of the refugees to Syria. According to Aoun—an ally of both Iran and the Assad regime—given that 85% of Syria has allegedly now returned to the fold of “the state,” it is completely safe for all Syrian refugees to return at once.