*Originally published in 2020. Get E-International Relations delivered to your inbox, free of charge. As you sign up, consider becoming a paid subscriber, or make a donation, to support our work.

Beirut, the Mediterranean port city whose history includes multiple destructions and reconstructions since antiquity, was yet again destroyed on the 4th of August, 2020 (BBC, 2020). The double explosion that originated in its seaport and rocked its capital traveled a 10 km radius east of Beirut, killing more than 200 people, injuring 7000, and damaging more than 8000 buildings. According to the Jordan Seismological Observatory, it was equivalent to a 4.5-magnitude earthquake on the Richter scale, and is considered one of the most powerful non-nuclear explosions in history (Verma, 2020). The echo of the enormous blast was felt as far away as Cyprus, about 200 km from Beirut (BBC, 2020). Local and international media outlets rushed to cover the various aspects of the blast and its aftermath. The arts and culture scene were particularly highlighted because the neighbourhoods suffering the greatest damage, Gemmayzeh and Mar Mikhael, are famous for their old historical buildings, and vibrant artistic and cultural scene. Indeed, preliminary damage assessments issued by UNESCO and the Ministry of Culture recorded 640 historical buildings damaged, 60 of which are at risk of collapse ​ (UNESCO 2020).

While there has been a great deal of attention focused on the fate of private art galleries and museums like the Sursock museum, a semi-private modern and contemporary art museum (Sursock, no date), coverage of the effects of the blast on the archaeology museums in Beirut, which too have been damaged, were almost entirely absent. The goal of this piece is thus to focus attention on the effects of the explosion on the cultural heritage of Beirut, and in particular its archaeological museums, and to consider more broadly what the current lack of attention on this sector reveals about the systemic issues facing the archaeology of Beirut that implicate local, national, and international policy alike.

Heritage in Beirut, Before and After the Explosion

Lebanese cultural heritage has endured waves of looting, vandalism, negligence and destruction over the past several decades, and in all cases the city’s social fabric, heritage, and memory have suffered (Naccache, 1998; Fricke, 2005; Sandes, 2017). Ironically, it was not the Lebanese War that caused the most destruction but rather the 1994 “rebuilding” in its aftermath, as the whole center of the city was literally and intentionally razed  with the collaboration with archaeologists and experts under UNESCO supervision, in what Naccache (1998, p. 140) has termed a “memorycide.” For a brief moment in time, Beirut was dubbed the largest urban archaeological site in the world (Haddad, 1998). A quasi-governmental company which was founded for the development and reconstruction of Beirut known by its French acronym SOLIDERE came to the “rescue” to build a new and unrecognizable Beirut, in which traces of the conflict were removed and replaced by new buildings to hide its scars and make Beirut “beautiful” again (Fricke, 2005). The systemic destruction of heritage at the hands of SOLIDERE and its collaborators was monumental; it affected its inhabitants who lost their homes and businesses, it affected its history as its archaeological sites and historical buildings were erased and built over, and affected the shared memory of the Lebanese people who no longer share a common identity. Today the remains of virtually any pre-war era are gone from the Beirut Central District (BCD), and now the historic neighborhoods of Ashrafieh, Gemmayzeh and Mar Mkhayel, which escaped the bulldozers of 1994, have been severely damaged by the seaport explosion. In light of this destruction, the importance of preserving its archaeology and history museums, also damaged in the blast, is even more crucial, as they play a vital role in preserving and celebrating the city’s heritage.

In the crypt of the Saint George Orthodox Cathedral, located in the city center, is the only in-situ archaeology museum of Beirut (Badre, 2016). The cathedral, which was heavily destroyed during the war, was again severely damaged in the 2020 explosion; however the state of the museum itself is unknown. Other archaeology museums in the city are the National Museum of Beirut (NMB) and two university museums; The American University of Beirut Museum (AUBM) and the Prehistory Museum (PM) at the University of Saint-Joseph. With their considerable collections of archaeological remains, their cultural events, and lectures, they have been playing a major role in the museum sector.

Throughout the tumultuous modern history of the country, these museums have each seen their share of misfortune. This is perhaps no truer than in the case of the NMB. Inaugurated on the 27th of May 1942, it was enriched by archaeological artifacts discovered on the various excavations carried out in Lebanon as well as by donations (Chehab, 1937; Asmar, 1997). On the 13th of April 1975, the Lebanese War broke out forcing the museum to close its doors to the public. Between that year and 1990 the museum square became a demarcation line named "the museum passage" dividing Beirut into East and West. The head of the Antiquities Service and curator of the NMB at the time, Maurice Chéhab, his wife Olga, and museum team members rescued and protected the artifacts from the dangers of looting and destruction (Asmar, 1997; Speetjens, 1997). The impromptu risk management plan and rescue operation were a success, and by the end of the war in the 1990 most of the artifacts were found intact (El Dahdah, 1995; Pharès, 2003). The damage was mainly confined to the building itself and its warehouses, and restoration works were subsequently carried out by the Ministry of Culture and the National Heritage Foundation (a non-profit organization created in 1996 by a group of Lebanese intellectuals aiming at preserving the Lebanese cultural heritage). In 1999 the museum reopened with a completely renovated ground and first floor to welcome back its visitors (Pharès and Farchakh, 2003).

The August explosion did not severely affect the NMB as the damage was mainly structural, while the collection and the museum staff remained safe. The AUBM also had some structural damages but has lost a showcase containing over 70 ancient glass artifacts ranging from the Roman to the Islamic periods. This was communicated a few weeks later on the museum’s website, which followed by a series of Facebook live videos showing the lifting of the fallen showcase and the salvage of the remaining pieces (American University of Beirut (AUB) on Facebook Watch, 2020). The PM disclosed a few details on their Facebook page (without any visuals) about the cleaning process performed by a team of Blue Shield volunteers (Musée de Préhistoire Libanaise, 2020). Other than the university museums, private museums with archaeological collections such as the Villa Audi Mosaic Museum and the Robert Mouawad Private Museum are now permanently closed, however there was no information in the news regarding their structural condition nor their collections’ following the explosion. The relative lack of information communicated by the archaeology museums can be contrasted with that of the Sursock Museum, which was quickly a focus of international media attention. The........

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