This is popular front, a podcast focused on the niche details of modern warfare and

underreported conflict with me Jake Hanrahan.

Today we're speaking to journalist Kareem Chahyeb.

He is based, born and raised in Lebanon,

and today he's going to be speaking to us about the tension and the clashes that have come

about after the horrific explosion at the port there last month.

Basically since that happened there have been anti-government protests the security forces

have come down very hard on the people.

There have been armed clashes in the south of Beirut and other places.

It's all looking very tense right now. If you like what we're doing here at

Popular Front please do consider supporting us at patreon.com slash

popular front. slash Popular Front. I think we should start with the explosion, right? I think it's important to kind of put the recent tension into context with the

aftermath of the explosion you know what I mean maybe you can can talk about that like how is everybody feeling

directly after that the the explosion at the port the

port explosion you know really came you know well to be fair there's no good time for an explosion to happen but you know what

it happened we're talking about Lebanon going through an extreme economic and political crisis

when the port explosion happened it sort of just created this emotional paralysis, I would say for a couple of days.

People were extremely shocked.

Just a visual of the explosion looked like something from a movie, looked like CGI.

I remember I was in this belief when I saw what it looked like.

But the thing about the explosion which increased tensions was that the cause behind the explosion

and the impact it had sort of resembles everything that much of the Lebanese population has been fighting for since the uprising in October or the October Revolution.

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