A Nation of Martyrs

If Times Square embodies the essence of New York, Trafalgar Square that of London and La Place de L’Etoile that of Paris, then the heart of Beirut is Martyrs’ Square, a square marked by a bronze statue of the nation’s first celebrated martyrs, that is.
During World War I, the occupying Ottoman forces hanged six nationalists in Beirut’s central square. Later, an epic statue, representing these six heroes holding the flame of freedom, was erected at this site to commemorate a sort of pioneering sacrifice for the nation.
But like in tragedies, the statue of martyrs turned out to be a sort of a curse tainting, for many years to come, the fate of the whole country with misfortune. It’s like ever since this original incident, Beirut was doomed to become a “factory for martyrs.”
From Hezbollah militants dying in fights along the borders with Israel to anti-Syrian politicians assassinated in car bombs, Lebanon was stockpiling martyrs. And the martyrs’ category was ever growing to encompass a wider range of people.
A blameless child kidnapped then killed is a martyr. A common passerby who involuntarily happened to be at a bomb scene is a martyr. A woman blown up in a bus while on her way to buy groceries is a martyr.
And this is only to mention recent “types” of martyrs, who became recurrent since the “martyrdom” of the country’s modern uberhero, former Prime Minister Rafic Hariri, assassinated in February 2005. The long-drawn-out 1975-1990 civil war is full of other examples of martyrs.
Beirut seems to be more populated with the spirits of all these new and old martyrs -their photos along with lyrical odes to their memories are pasted all over the city- than with living Lebanese.
A new concept, that of “the living martyr”, was even invented to glorify those who survived assassination attempts.
Today, whatever your believes, your age, your profession are, if you happen to die accidentally in Lebanon just because you were inadvertently passing near a blast site, you are immediately branded as a martyr of freedom, independence, resistance or any other political cause.
Recently, the brother of a 27 year-old man who died in a car bomb made a symbolic cry from the heart on television when he said, “My brother Charles is not a martyr, he’s a victim.”
Charles Chikhani, was a dynamic middle-class young Lebanese, not really interested in politics, and apparently leading a normal, happy life among his friends and family. He was returning home from work when a bomb targeting another Lawmaker killed him.
Few days later, photos of Charles, a smiling happy man and, for once, a victim and not a martyr, were displayed all over Beirut. A march was organized to honor the memory of Charles, who became the symbol of any ordinary man killed and not martyred. Thousands of people from all backgrounds walked with candles that day in an unprecedented apolitical, free-of-slogans march.
It was a simple reminder to all of us, Lebanese, that we’ve become martyrs - living, dead or ready-to-die - against our will. After all, most of us are not heroes seeking sacrifice for a greater noble cause but simply normal people who are after the common joys of life. © El Periodista