President Reagan said sending troops to Lebanon was his ‘greatest regret.’ Other presidents left office with similar misgivings. Could leaving troops in Syria and Iraq be the next strategic mistake?
Devastation: the blast killed 2018 people and destroyed a large area of Beirut’s port district.
EPA-EFE/Wael Hamza
What do ammonium nitrate and iodine have in common? Both substances are of immense service to humankind, and the history of their discovery is closely linked to that of the production of explosives.
French troops help unload boxes of French Red Cross humanitarian aid in Beirut on Aug. 17.
(AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
In 1917, two ships collided in the port of Halifax, resulting in an explosion similar to the Aug. 4 blast in Beirut. Port explosions have devastating effects far beyond the site of the actual blast.
A PhD candidate retells the moving stories of Syrian women, as they try to find a place in their new neighbourhoods.
In Egypt, the Great Pyramid was illuminated with the French, Russian and Lebanese flags in solidarity with victims of terrorist attacks, but most of the focus in the West has been on the victims in Paris.
EPA/Khaled Elfiqi
Selective sympathy raises troubling questions. If you neglect suffering in other places, it is much more difficult to mobilise political actors to take it seriously.
In the next few weeks we may see a resurgence of rhetoric calling for more resources to fight the War on Terror following the Paris attacks. Islamophobia may take deeper root in Europe as a whole.
Chief Research Specialist in Democracy and Citizenship at the Human Science Research Council and a Research Fellow Centre for African Studies, University of the Free State