...an Iranian satrapy currently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
, Shady Choucair despaired when he heard last week that countries had halted their funding to the UN agency for Paleostinians (UNRWA).
"It's a disaster. We were able to survive off the help we got from UNRWA," he told the Thomson Rooters Foundation in his small grocery store in the Mar Elias refugee camp in Beirut, where he has lived with his family for over a decade.
More than a dozen donor nations including the United States, Germany and Britannia have paused their funding to the aid agency following Israeli government allegations that 12 of UNRWA's 13,000 Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about
oppressionand
disproportionate response...
employees were involved in deadly October 7 attacks by Hamas
...a regional Iranian catspaw,...fighters in southern Israel.
UN officials have said UNRWA aid is a lifeline for Paleostinians in the Gaza Strip as fighting rages between Israel and Hamas fighters.
For the hundreds of thousands of Paleostinian refugees living in crisis-hit Lebanon and Syria, the cuts could also jeopardise the provision of basic services — from schooling to waste management.
UNRWA said last week it will most likely be forced to shut down its operations in the Middle East, including in Gaza, by the end of the month if funding does not resume.
Choucair, who receives UNRWA cash assistance to boost his tiny income from the grocery shop, said he feared he would be unable to pay the rent and buy his medicine for several medical conditions if the money stops.
"You want to do something about it, but you can't. It's out of our hands," said Choucair, who is also worried that the free schooling his nine grandchildren receive could be stopped.