A whole month after the Beirut port explosion on 4 August, the Lebanese capital seems to have not recovered from its misfortune, and while the Lebanese judiciary investigations have not yet disclosed the circumstances of that huge explosion, the death toll has risen to 191 in the latest toll announced by the Lebanese Ministry of Health. After it had left more than 6 thousand wounded, and official estimates indicate that at least 7 are missing.

The explosion of the port, the material losses of which were estimated at 15 billion dollars, according to unlimited official figures, the repercussions of which are unfolding in the streets of Beirut day after day.

In the neighborhoods of Gemmayzeh, Mar Mikhael, Al Saifi and Karantina, thousands of homes are still open to their destruction despite the approaching winter, and hundreds of homeless families are searching for alternative shelters, while thousands of workers and business owners are mourning the ruins of their destroyed livelihoods.

The most prominent event that occurred on the eve of the one-month anniversary of the terrible explosion, was that a dog belonging to the Chilean rescue team felt the presence of a "pulse" under the rubble of one of the old destroyed buildings in Mar Mikhael, yesterday, Thursday, 3 September.

Immediately, thermal monitoring and scanning devices were used, and rescuers discovered evidence of life, represented by a heartbeat beating 18 times per minute.

Destroyed homes in the Mar Mikhael area (Al-Jazeera Net)

A delicate operation


and a mission that seemed impossible due to the destruction of the building, which was deserted and threatened to collapse, the Chilean volunteer and rescue teams and the Lebanese civil defense are still cooperating manually and through a crane from Thursday evening, in an attempt to find that body, even if it was not vibrating.

From the early hours of the morning today, Friday, the people of Mar Mikhael and the surrounding areas gathered around the building, which was cordoned off by the army, to facilitate the work of rescue teams in difficult conditions that required bringing in machine hoses intended for removing sand.

In front of the rubble of the Mar Mikhael building, the director of operations in the civil defense, George Abu Musa, stands exhausted to follow the work of the rescue teams. He told Al-Jazeera Net, “We are still trying to remove the rubble from Thursday afternoon, without reaching any result, because the operation is delicate and poses a threat to the lives of rescuers. We had to work manually. "

This operation, which Abu Musa describes as "arduous and frightening,". About 25 members of the Civil Defense, 15 members of the Chilean team, and about 20 members of the Beirut Fire Brigade and other volunteers worked to accomplish it.

On Thursday evening, Abu Musa notes that the rescue teams stopped their work for a few hours, after sensing the danger, until a deliberate plan was drawn up to remove the rubble.

Rescue teams are searching for a possible pulse under the rubble in Mar Mikhael, a month after the explosion (Al-Jazeera Net)

"Heart" under the rubble


despite what Abu Musa explained, the stopping of rescue teams from working sparked great popular anger in a country that does not have disaster management equipment, prompting the use of external relief teams, and citizens expressed their anger at what some described as "a state incapable of rescuing survivors from The explosion, "and the slogans" a heart under the rubble "," officials without a heart "and" Beirut beats "rose.

At the strip separating the citizens from the rubble of the Mar Mikhael building, Rose Saeed (64 years old) stands shackled with fear and anxiety. She told Al Jazeera Net, "I came from Ashrafieh to be a witness to saving a living soul from under the rubble, and I feel that it is like a miracle that came to assure us that we live in a country His authority is not keen on our lives or saving us. "

The Governor of Beirut, Judge Maroun Abboud, had indicated, during his escort with the Chilean team, that there was a person who was still alive.

Abboud attributed the failure of the Lebanese state to search for missing persons and victims, as “the lack of trained local teams that can uncover the bodies and survivors under the rubble,” and that the lack of a list of the missing means, therefore, “the inability to determine the number and identities of people missing due to the explosion.” While the Chilean team continues its search for missing people under the rubble of Beirut and in the vicinity of its devastated port.

Displaced people and without work,


and while this explosion prompted the government of President Hassan Diab to resign on August 10, the Lebanese are still waiting for the formation of the government of President-designate Mustafa Adib, after Lebanon turned into an arena that attracts various regional and international parties to visit, and the French President Emmanuel was at the forefront finally Macron, who waved sanctions to the authorities if reforms were not achieved within 3 months.

On the other hand, he addresses the Lebanese people of power that they are seeking to achieve the required reforms that would allow them to obtain the financial aid that Lebanon needs, to get out of the worst economic crisis in which it is living and to deal with the repercussions of the port explosion, but it seems that the Lebanese have no hope of all internal and external promises.

Thousands of homes are still destroyed a month after the tragedy (Al-Jazeera Net)

On the outskirts of the Gemmayzeh region, Maher al-Labban (46 years) sits in front of a large photocopying and printing shop in which he has been working for 25 years. This shop has destroyed all its contents. The explosion.

He told Al-Jazeera Net, "We started repairs despite our limited financial capabilities, because after a month of tragedy, we do not trust the country that comes to uncover the damage without providing any assistance, and is in a coma about our suffering and the loss of our livelihoods and our customers."

It is as if after this age we are establishing to start from scratch in an insecure country.

From the Rumail area, Raghda Zureik (68 years) comes to walk daily in the streets of Gemmayzeh and Mar Mikhael, after her house was completely destroyed, and she miraculously escaped death, as she put it, because she was leaving on August 4, angrily saying to Al Jazeera Net, "If it was our country You respect human beings when they kept living souls under the rubble, so we do not wait for our help after a month. The authority did not turn to compensate for our heavy losses, while our money is being held in banks. "

At this time, the search continues under the rubble of the Mar Mikhael building. As for Raghda, who moves every night to sleep with one of her relatives after her house has become uninhabitable, she considers that what the authority itself was unable to do during the previous decades, "will definitely not achieve it within 3 months." ".