This is Beirut

Well, it had to happen. I’m out of fresh material from the Middle East until I go back and get more. Iran is next on the list…if the mullahs will let me in. It will be a while before I know one way or the other.
In the meantime, I have more than a thousand digital pictures that no one has seen yet. Here are 30 of them. All were taken in, of, and above Beirut, Lebanon, my favorite city in the Middle East by far.

Mount Sannine rises above the Mediterranean and Beirut’s northern suburbs. Photo taken from a hot air balloon over downtown.

I saw this lovely view of the Mediterranean every single day from the balcony of my apartment above the American University of Beirut.

And I saw this lovely view every night. I doubt I’ll ever have such a view again from my house.

Downtown Beirut from the air.

Downtown Beirut from the air.

The top of the Green Line that divided East and West Beirut during the civil war. That big empty space you see was the part of downtown that didn’t survive. Martyr’s Square is down there. When a million Lebanese demonstrated against Syrian occupation last year, that’s where they did it. They filled the whole space. Then they overflowed it.

Solidere, downtown Beirut.

Solidere, downtown Beirut.

Solidere, downtown Beirut.

Solidere, downtown Beirut.

View from an Italian restaurant, downtown Beirut.

Lots of new construction next to the restored downtown.

East Beirut from the air.

A street in Achrafieh, East Beirut.

A street in Achrafieh, East Beirut.

Cemetery, East Beirut.

Claudia’s, Achrafieh, East Beirut.

A gangster-themed trattoria, Gemmayze, East Beirut.

Off Monot Street, Achrafieh, East Beirut.

A bohemian bar named De Prague, Hamra, West Beirut.

Fishing off the Corniche, West Beirut.

New construction, West Beirut.

Lots of people I know were surprised to hear Beirut has Starbucks. (Lebanon isn’t Afghanistan, okay?) There are three Starbucks coffeeshops in Beirut. This one is on the shore of the Mediterranean in Rouche, West Beirut.

My old neighborhood of Hamra, West Beirut.

An AiZone advertisement riffs on the Independence 05 movement.

A war-shattered Holiday Inn.

A war-shattered Holiday Inn.

War damage along the old Green Line. One of my neighbors in Oregon used to live near this building. His old house no longer exists. He does not know which militia destroyed it.