There must be something we can do to help the people in Bierut

[mosquitofeast]

We can't just sit and watch this city descend into anarchy, tear gas, rubber bullets, live fire, old soldiers setting fire to the foreign ministry, food shortages, water shortages, no apparent presence of any trustworthy relief organisation that we could pay money to to help.

What have I missed, there must be something we can do, isn't there?

YANBU - yes, there is something we can do and this is what it is....

YABU - there is nothing we can do to help

The second thing you might do is write a letter of protest to the Lebanese ambassador in the UK, protesting the state intransigence, incompetence and violence since 4 August - let alone the chain of events over the last seven years. If millions of people did that, it might have some small effect.

I would like to do that, is there a template that you know of anywhere?

In some ME countries it is the Red Crescent I believe so perhaps not everyone would be aware the Red Cross would be operating there

I've donated.

I've actually been to Beirut and the Lebanese people were sone of the warmest, funniest, nicest people I've ever met. It's a fucking tragedy that this has happened. It could have been an absolutely fantastic city.

and OP, well done. You are coming from a good place 👍

Lebanese family have suggested this place for donations, they are active and honest. You can donate by card but only is USD or LBP.

nusaned.org/en

They’re non political, not aligned with any religion.

The government there is corrupt. Even it’s own people are asking other countries not to put money into the hands of the government as it will disappear into a black hole, never to be seen by the people who need it. If I could hand over money direct to someone who has lost their home and possessions, I would do so in a heart beat, but I won’t be donating money to corrupt governments.

I also think the government is corrupt and the money will never reach those who actually need it.
I also think(and am sure I'll get flamed for this) that we should be helping people in our own country first. You know the people with nowhere to live and the children who s parents can't afford to feed them. Once that's sorted then we should be helping others.

I made a small donation to this charity that supports LGBT people in countries where they are still heavily discriminated against. They have put out an appeal for help after the Beirut explosion.
I don't think it matters that people's sexual orientation or gender is. Everyone involved needs help.
World leaders are meeting at an Internatonal Aid Conference today (it's on BBC news as I write this) with a view to getting aid to those on the ground who need it and not to the country's politicians.

Money needs to go to those organisations with the greatest experience of handling disasters to get aid to the masses quickly.

I've donated. The people in Beirut are far, far worse off than anyone living in this country.

I wouldn't bother donating to LGBT groups I must say. Weird to prioritise aid by sexuality. Its a very privileged Western outlook

I’ve donated to the Red Cross appeal, and I think this country could do more than £5m.

What makes the explosion so devastating is the state that Lebanon was in before that. Not only because of the fighting, but because for such a tiny country, they have taken on a disproportionately huge number of the worlds refugees. They are literally inundated with Syrian and Palestinian refugees. Maybe if the western world, including us, didn’t so actively condone the creation of so many Palestinian refugees by the Israeli government, then Lebanon’s struggle might be less severe.

hear hear nails

Why can't you uptick comments on MN?!

It doesn't matter if no one is suffering as much in this country. There are still children who don't eat regularly, still people on the streets or in temporary accommodation and it will get worse because of Covid. Not to mention people who lost their homes due to flooding.
Donate to them if you like. It won't get to the people who need it. I just find it strange that we feel obliged to donate to other countries when ours is in an awful state.

@Rosebel

It doesn't matter if no one is suffering as much in this country. There are still children who don't eat regularly, still people on the streets or in temporary accommodation and it will get worse because of Covid. Not to mention people who lost their homes due to flooding. Donate to them if you like. It won't get to the people who need it. I just find it strange that we feel obliged to donate to other countries when ours is in an awful state.

nobody in the UK faces death by starvation in the immediate future

No one in the Uk will have to die of infections in untreated injuries either, there is no comparison

Thanks for the Red Cross link - have donated and shared.

It doesn't matter if no one is suffering as much in this country

It really does matter. People are people and human suffering is human suffering. People in this country already got lucky just by being born here. People here are not more important than people elsewhere. As humans, we should all have equal value.

I genuinely can't believe people think poverty in this country is in anyway comparable.

I have a close family member with addiction issues leading to homelessness late last year. She's been supported by the state the whole way and a flat was found for her and her dd within a week. Absolutely no comparison to what is happening in the Lebanon

I made a donation to the Red Cross appeal OP, heartbreaking situation.

Doctors without borders (MSF) work in Lebanon if people want to give, I think Save the Children have an appeal also.

Lebanon (popn 5 million) took in 2 million Syrian refugees over the past few years. That's incredible if you think how much fuss people in the uk make about accepting a couple of hundred.

Wow. You cannot compare the needs of British people to the situation in Lebanon! I hate this phrase but for those people that think our country is more important, educate yourselves!

Thanks for this post OP. I've donated to one of the smaller charities mentioned (I also regularly donate to UK based charities!).

Devlesko, what a silly, ignorant post.

I know Beirut very well. I have family and friends in Lebanon. And some of these posts seem somewhat misguided as to what Beirut, as a city, actually is.

The traditional convention is that Beirut is a mix of 1920s Paris and 1950s Alexandria, but I'd suggest it is now more like a Mediterranean mash-up of Miami and Manchester.

I'd say Lebanon is noticeably wealthier, more developed, and more educated than Cyprus, and Cyprus is an EU country. The politics and governance are, on the whole, pretty comparable between the two -- I mean, Cyprus managed to blow up a £4 billion new power plant by its port in Larnaca in pretty similar circumstances to the recent explosion in Beirut.

And Beirut is a party town. The bars and clubs are phenomenal (as are the cocktails, which Beirut is famous for). I know people who've taken ideas from Beirut clubs to Greek and Spanish tourist resorts.

There's also a lot of wealth. You would struggle, in the UK, to find a city with the same ratio of supercar as Beirut. The shopping and dining around Place de L'Etoile? You'd be looking at Knightsbridge for something comparable.

Remember, Beirut is a small place. You can walk from the Hamra district to the Achrafieh district in about 40 minutes, not that you would because no-one walks anywhere there.

I've been to Italian industrial cities in a far worse state than Beirut.

The problem with Lebanon is that it has a confessional political system, so politics in the country is basically a constant spat over whether one religious group benefits from a policy more than another. This creates strange bedfellows: many Orthodox Christians tacitly support Hezbollah (Shia Muslim), for example. Sunni Muslims are kinda out in the cold, despite having the Prime Ministership and the current occupant of that role is a chap who is independent and didn't receive any backing from Sunni Muslim groups.

Add to this, political players and sentiments in the country on a spectrum from hard-core Marxist to Fascist (ie. proper Mussolini-style), and welcome to the politics of Eastern Mediterranean.

I have an old friend who bravely did his PhD on Lebanese politics and, by the end, said he couldn't understand how the country managed to exist.

The poverty in Beirut is crushing. This disaster is awful. They deserve aid.

I know there are some who would like to give the impression it doesn't require help.

@BoxhillBertha

The poverty in Beirut is crushing. This disaster is awful. They deserve aid.

I know there are some who would like to give the impression it doesn't require help.

Beirut needs help to sort out the mess left after this explosion; it does not need westerners to continually promote Lebanon as a hell hole of extreme poverty, religiosity and backwardness.

I've been there. I know it's not a hell hole.