On the second anniversary of the explosion, the victims of the "Port of Beirut" recount their continued suffering to Al Jazeera Net

Beirut -

On her way to the (physical) treatment that she regularly attends, the Lebanese woman, Inam Kayyal, tells the story of her tragedy after the bombing of the Port of Beirut on August 4, 2020, which turned her life from an employee in the public sector, to a woman who is unable to move independently, As a result of the injuries, her right eye was shut off, her face and neck were injured, her left hand was paralyzed, and her nerves were damaged.

Two years ago, Inaam was reticent to appear, because "the words do not match my pain, my brokenness, and my feeling of betrayal in a country where I did not find anyone to support me morally and materially with my great affliction."

She reluctantly recalls the last moments before the explosion, and the hours that followed, she heard one of the doctors telling her brother that she had died.

Minutes before the explosion, Inaam was in her office at a public institution near the port.

Seeing the clouds of smoke, she went to the window to film the scene. Within seconds, the explosion resounded and pushed her hard against the wall. She was hit by shards of glass and she was covered in blood.

She tells Al Jazeera Net that she forced herself to get up minutes later, and went to her partially wrecked car, an employee helped her and transported 3 wounded people with her, and she went to 5 hospitals before finding a place for emergency operations that lasted 8 hours.

Inaam suffocates in speech, with about 200 stitches on her body, and suffers from a balance problem, as she cannot move, move and shower without anyone's help, and "the pain of disability will accompany me for the rest of my life."

Inaam did not receive any financial assistance from the state and the relevant ministries to receive treatment that she incurs at her own expense.

She needs 400,000 Syrian pounds (about $13) per day for physical therapy, as well as exorbitant sums of money for medicines, ointments and eye drops.

And he followed with great sadness, "If I were in another country, I would have performed the operations I need to recover at the expense of the state, and this fate is harsh."

Inam Kayal before and after the explosion and how the accident changed her life (Al Jazeera)

obstruction of investigations

Like her, Melvin El-Khoury (33 years old) was heading towards the balcony of her house in Ashrafieh with her brother, to take pictures after the first explosion.

Melvin was a presenter on one of the local religious channels, so her tragedy doubled after her face was deformed, in which iron will remain internally throughout her life.

She told Al Jazeera Net, "I did not think that I would live with such physical and psychological pain, and that I would have 7 orthopedic operations in two years."

She believes that the shock changed her vision, as "there is no longer anything material that concerns me after God gave me the opportunity to live again."

Melvin considers herself, her brother, and all the victims of the bombing as living dead who are left without support. "The pain was not enough, until we fell into a financial impasse for costly treatment because the state did not sponsor us because we were injured in a national massacre."

This abandonment - according to Melvin - is an extension of "another crime that is embodied in obstructing investigations, so we feel that we have been killed twice just to deny us the right to justice."

Melvin El-Khoury was a media reporter for one of the religious channels before and after the explosion, and how the injury prevented her from continuing her work (Al-Jazeera)

Watch Amber 12

The Lebanese Muhammed Daqduqi (41 years old) survived when he was a few meters away from ward 12, in which tons of ammonium nitrate stored since 2014. This miracle - as he calls it - made him come out with the amputated right foot, with his left eye removed, his right hand burned and his body shredded. by glass.

Muhammad was working as a driver for one of the shipping companies in the port, and he remembers daily August 4, 2020, “as if it was just happening.”

He told Al Jazeera Net that he was preparing to leave the port at six after his shift ended, "until 3 of the company's managers called me to go near hangar 12 to withdraw our goods and our vehicles near it after the smoke rose."

And talking about a sound like flying he heard, everyone was afraid and everyone rushed in their direction.

He recalled the scene by saying, "I ran towards my car, and my manager shouted: Get in the back seat, after intense moments like hysteria we didn't feel anything, and we knew that our colleagues at the port had found them in pieces and that we were the only survivors inside."

Muhammad, a father of 3 children, traveled to his friend in the UAE, in search of a treatment for paralysis of his right hand. He says, "The official authorities did not support me with treatment, and we have no hope for any material and moral compensation."

Muhammad al-Daqduqi before the explosion and how the explosion amputated his leg and paralyzed his hand and burned his face (Al-Jazeera)

shy support

This is a sample of 3 stories about the situation of hundreds of wounded people as a result of the August 4th explosion, as they commemorate the second anniversary with physical pain that broke them psychologically, and dozens of them became disabled and lost their jobs, because they lost movement, sight, hearing, or one of their limbs and organs.

Most of them agree that the state - represented by its relief and governmental bodies - has not fulfilled its duties towards them in the treatment journey that will accompany many for life.

They are like thousands of families in Beirut whose homes were destroyed by the explosion. They restored them either at their own expense, or with the support of some NGOs, outside the framework of a comprehensive national policy for reconstruction and fair compensation for the wounded and the families of the victims and the affected.

A few months after the explosion, the Lebanese Parliament passed a law stating that those who were killed in the port explosion (more than 200 people) are considered martyrs in the Lebanese army.

The law also considered that the wounded with partial or complete disability are covered only by the health benefits of the National Social Security Fund, and they can benefit from the rights of people with special needs.

Noting here that the Guarantee Fund is almost bankrupt, and subscribers do not actually benefit from its offerings after the collapse of the value of the lira, because it depends on the official exchange rate of (1507 liras), which is inconsistent with the costs of treatment and hospitalization in Lebanon, which are now measured at the dollar exchange rate on the black market (about 30 thousand pounds to the dollar).

Aid lost its way

The Ministry of Social Affairs does not currently have any support program for the wounded and the affected, and its Minister Hector Al-Hajjar justified this - to Al-Jazeera Net - that all governmental social support programs concern the Lebanese in general, and do not belong to one group without another, given the scarcity of revenues in the current economic crisis.

For his part, the head of the High Relief Commission, Major General Muhammad al-Khair, told Al Jazeera.net that the commission paid symbolic material compensation to the families of the victims after the explosion, and distributes material and in-kind aid periodically to the owners of the damaged houses.

Here, the academic and lawyer specialized in disaster compensation, Nadine Arafat, considers that all the symbolic aid received by the wounded and the families of the victims and the affected, whether from the state or most NGOs or international non-governmental organizations, perpetuates the culture of "subsistence" that violates human dignity with such disasters, especially since it came Sporadic that does not take into account the needs, and without a clear compensation system that takes care of the various material and moral aspects.

Arafat recalled - via Al Jazeera Net - a massive influx of millions of dollars from abroad after the explosion, which were managed and spent by multi-polar non-governmental organizations, and they did not achieve their goals at the level of relief.

The researcher believes that corruption has been rooted and continued as a result of this catastrophe, and the state and various non-governmental agencies did not take the initiative to collect funds and push for the establishment of a "national fund to compensate the victims and victims of the port bombing disaster."

It clarifies that governmental and non-governmental agencies also failed in their role in terms of putting pressure on insurance companies to give the affected groups their rights before the two-year deadline for the claim expires.

In the expert's opinion, the legal infrastructure associated with the state is absent;

Hence, "the Lebanese state did not practically recognize the actual rights of the wounded and affected and was satisfied with meager financial compensation and an ineffective health guarantee. This is a reflection of its position as a completely absent state that does not fulfill its duties and denies the most basic of its citizens' stolen rights."