Oscillating Public and Private Spaces<\/b><\/h4>\n

I\u2019ve spent the last two months in Dahiye, documenting not only the destruction left behind by the war, but the lives left behind in its wake. Specifically, the lives of women, and the different forms and sites of commemoration they have created and preserve, both in the public and the private sphere. In public spaces, the hanging images create sites for collective grief as a community, while in private spaces the survivors left behind \u2014 most of them women, children, or elderly \u2014 grieve the absence of their loved ones through personal forms of mourning and commemoration. Families huddle together, trying to heal and think about what\u2019s next.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe war isn\u2019t over yet,\u201d says Randa, 28, an artist. Her family, like so many other families in Dahiye, is originally from South Lebanon, but they moved to the Ghobeiry neighborhood in Beirut\u2019s southern suburbs some 20 years ago, seeking better economic opportunities. Randa keeps pictures of the martyrs she knew personally. She describes how her family lost countless neighbors in the war. \u201cWe sit together now as families to try and process what\u2019s next. But the war isn\u2019t over, and we will never leave our land.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In the first week of February, I shared lunch with a woman and her 25-year-old daughter in their apartment in the Haret Hreik area of Dahiye. They laughed at what look like structural cracks in the walls of their apartment, and thanked God their home was still standing. Later that same day, I took my place among several separate groups of women in a cemetery dedicated to martyrs. Their tears fell silently as they read the Quran and recited prayers over fresh graves. Their grief was still raw and unfiltered, a stark reminder of the recent losses.<\/span><\/p>\n

The next day, I found myself buying olive oil, jam and pomegranate molasses \u2014\u00a0different types of \u201cmouneh,\u201d or preserves, from villages in South Lebanon, being sold by Fatme, a woman in her late 60s or early 70s who works long hours daily, selling the goods from her village to help support her family. She beamed brightly when I made my purchase. Fatme told me she has lost countless family members, friends and neighbors to the successive wars with Israel. She accepts their ascension to martyrdom with simple joy. \u201cWe are all under the care of God,\u201d she tells me.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As an anthropologist, I\u2019m spending much of my time with women who, despite the devastation around them, are calibrating to daily life, navigating their days with solemn conviction. They speak of loved ones they\u2019ve lost, of homes that are gone, or of their former neighbors, highlighting how interconnected relations between families are in Dahiye. Every single person knows martyrs and families who lost everything. As I move through the devastated streets and neighborhoods of Dahiye \u2014 streets that were once bubbling with life, with people coming and going and young men zipping about on scooters \u2014 I see mostly women of all ages, trying to reconstitute the things of life, walking past buildings reduced to rubble. I can\u2019t tell if there are more women visible in public spaces now, or if perhaps I\u2019m noticing them more, given that fewer young men are visible than before.<\/span><\/p>\n

Conviction No Matter What<\/b><\/h4>\n

Dahiye was rebuilt from the rubble after being destroyed in the 2006 war with Israel. Now, it is rubble once again. The scale of destruction is significant. According to 2022 estimates from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Dahiye\u2019s population is close to one million, divided among its five main districts: Ghobeiry, Burj Al Barajneh, Haret Hreik, Hay Al-Sellom (and adjacent Laylaki), and the coastal strip of Ouzai, visible from the airplane when landing in Beirut. Before the Lebanese Civil War, Ouzai was home to some of Lebanon\u2019s most luxurious beach resorts. Today, it is one of the poorest districts of the country. According to a UNDP Rapid Assessment report published in January 2025, the district of Haret Hreik experienced 33% of the total destruction from among Dahiye\u2019s districts.<\/span><\/p>\n

As I continue my work, I observe above all how the people of Dahiye remain steadfast, largely thanks to their deep faith in God, and in what they perceive to be the justness of their cause. I am reminded that <\/span>resilience<\/span><\/i> \u2014\u00a0a word that is too frequently used by Western media to describe that steadfastness of the Lebanese \u2014 is not a choice made by them. In the absence of choices, \u201cresilience\u201d is a necessity. It\u2019s called survival with conviction and commitment.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The women hold tightly to their routines, their prayers, and their memories because, in the face of so much loss, they have no other choice. In their eyes, I see both the weight of their grief and their adamant determination that they will rebuild again, even if they have to do it themselves.<\/span><\/p>\n

A few days after that initial ceasefire period ended, I was leaving a friend\u2019s apartment in Dahiye. I looked up to see a picture of two martyrs taped to the wall outside the front door of the apartment across the hall. Inside the elevator, I found myself standing next to a woman. At the next floor a man entered clutching a photo of a young man. They greeted each other. \u201cI heard about your brother,\u201d she said. \u201cMay he rest in the grace of God.\u201d A tear rolled down the man\u2019s face as he nodded his thanks. We continued down to the ground floor where the door opened to four people waiting for the lift: A man, two women, a young girl. They all greeted the man with the photo and offered their condolences. \u201cMay he rest in the grace of God.\u201d The women smiled at each other and touched one another\u2019s arms. \u201cSee you soon\u201d said one. \u201cCome over for coffee later,\u201d the other replied. They smiled and parted, each going on to the rest of her day. And thus life continues.<\/span><\/p>\n

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In the southern suburbs of Beirut, women openly grieve those they have lost, in the wake of Israel’s latest onslaught.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":544,"featured_media":36431,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2386,12,4278],"tags":[323,4285,2990,4043],"coauthors":[3470],"class_list":["post-36376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cities","category-essay","category-tmr-49-love-war-resistance","tag-beirut","tag-dahiye","tag-life-and-death","tag-war-on-lebanon","entry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n