A forgotten warehouse with 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate in the port. This is the presumed starting point of the two deadly explosions in Beirut. The port is a highly symbolic place since it embodies both the economy of Lebanon, thanks to the eight million tonnes of goods that pass through it each year, but also a hub of the black market and smuggling, symbol of the corruption.
"The port is above all Hezbollah"
A business manager confirms that bribes are regular to eliminate customs taxes. In particular, because the management of the port has been entrusted to a private group. According to Rabih El Chaer, lawyer and leader of the anti-corruption NGO Sakker El Dekkene, (closes the grocery store), the Lebanese state "is infiltrated by mafias who put their hands on particular sectors".
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In the case of the port, "it is above all Hezbollah" which is in control, as explained by Rabih El Chaer. The political party, close to Iran, is considered a terrorist organization by the United States. "It is very strategic to pass its weapons and its ammunition and to feed what Hezbollah calls its resistance". Saad Hariri, Lebanese Prime Minister until January 2020, also went last September to promise better control of the docks.
The protest rekindled by the tragedy
Since the tragedy, discontent has been mounting in Lebanon against the political class, considered responsible for the state of the country. On Europe 1, the photojournalist Maher Attar said he was in the grip of "a muffled anger against this corrupt, rotten, incompetent political class, which has been in power for generations".
A well-known Lebanese journalist, Marcel Ghanem, whose television program enjoys a large audience, said: "Go all! (...) You are corrupt, negligent, destructive, immoral. You are cowards. It was your cowardice and carelessness that killed people. " It is in this context that President Emmanuel Macron goes to Beirut on Thursday to meet "all the political players".