Lebanese Anxiety

A BBC reporter’s experience with the Lebanese people

It is not very often — at least I have never experienced it — that within 24 hours of arriving in a country, you are repeatedly asked by inhabitants whether you think they should flee or not.
A typical gambit goes something like this: “So you’ve just arrived; how do you see the situation? Do you think there will be war? What’s your advice? Should we leave?”
In the swirling rumours and jumpiness of Beirut, people seem to think that someone who has followed events from outside the country might be able to read the crisis more clearly.