‘We Are Heading Toward The Unknown’: Lebanon PM, Cabinet Resign Posts Amid Furor Over Beirut Blast

Lebanon’s Prime Minister Hassan Diab resigned along with the rest of his cabinet on Monday amid pressure from Lebanese protesters outraged over last week’s explosion in Beirut that killed dozens of people.

“I set out to combat corruption, but I discovered that corruption is bigger than the state,” Diab said in a televised announcement, according to The Wall Street Journal. “I declare today the resignation of this government. God bless Lebanon.”

Lebanon’s capital city of Beirut was rocked on Tuesday by an explosion that killed over 150 people and left thousands more injured. The blast scarred and warped buildings around Lebanon’s main port, affecting thousands of homes and businesses. The blast threw shards of glass roughly two miles from the blast site. An estimated 300,000 people were left homeless.

The country was already drifting toward collapse under severe financial strain and an economy in a tailspin. Inflation has skyrocketed in the Middle Eastern country, pushing the wealthy to invest all their money in real estate, art, and other hard assets as the value of Lebanese currency plummets.

The Lebanese people, already fed up with their political leaders, held demonstrations calling for the ouster of those in power, blaming them for the explosion at a government warehouse filled with explosive chemicals. In a poignant demonstration, protesters hung Diab and other members of the political elite in effigy. Protests have often devolved into violent riots and battles between angry crowds and security forces.

مشانق رمزية معلقة في وسط بيروت تطالب بمحاسبة الطبقة السياسية على جريمة انفجار مرفأ بيروت والقتل والدمار الذي تسببت به … pic.twitter.com/Ti9lV0ig2K

— ديانا مقلد Diana Moukalled (@dianamoukalled) August 8, 2020

Experts on Lebanon and the Middle East have warned in the aftermath that the port explosion may send Lebanon over the edge after spending the last several years on the brink of civil war. Now, with sudden exit and dissolution of the cabinet, a failed state is almost guaranteed.

“Not only do we have an absence of government and a political vacuum, but we’re going to have a severe problem with the function of the state of Lebanon,” Imad Salamey, a political scientist at Lebanese American University in Beirut, told WSJ. “We are heading toward the unknown.”

Previously, Diab had promised to find those responsible for the tragedy and bring them to justice.

“I will not rest until we find the person responsible for what happened, to hold him accountable and impose the most severe penalties,” Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab said soon after the explosion.

The Daily Wire previously reported that experts believed Lebanon was quickly moving toward “failed state status”:

The Middle East country was already struggling under a plummeting economy and skyrocketing inflation. The coronavirus pandemic had dashed any hope for a recovery coming any time soon. On Tuesday, “the last nail in the coffin” came after a government warehouse stocked with 2,700 tons of ammonium nitrate exploded in the middle of Lebanon’s main port in the capital city of Beirut, one former Lebanese government adviser told The Wall Street Journal.

“It’s the last nail in the coffin,” said Henri Chaoul, who resigned in June after advising Lebanese officials negotiating a potential bailout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The Lebanese government defaulted on a $1.2 billion loan from the IMF in March.

“[Lebanese government officials] were incapable of running a much smaller crisis. How are they supposed to handle this?” Chaoul asked.

“I think Lebanon is fast approaching failed state status,” Lina Khatib, who studies the Middle East and North Africa at the Chatham House think tank in London, told WSJ.