2005

The Lebanese financial sector has long been dominated by commercial banks, which have grown significantly in the post-war period. Indeed, customer deposits have increased threefold since 1995 to reach the …

Ashrafieh was never meant to be this crowded. Its six-meter wide streets gave it a village appearance as it gazed sleepily on the eastern edge of the original walled city …

While the saying goes that “you can’t please all the people all the time,” it seems in our Lebanese politico-economic scene, that many ‘leaders’ and ‘leaders-to-be’ keep wishing to challenge …

There are a few points that thirty-six year old real estate developer and entrepreneur Karim Bassil wants to make perfectly clear to any reporter interested in untangling his rapidly growing …

Even as the journalist Samir Kassir lay dead in his car on the morning of June 2, politicians, journalists and analysts tried to make sense of a wantonly barbaric killing. …

Syria’s ruling Baath Party introduced a meager set of reforms at its June 6-9 congress, dashing hopes that the eagerly-awaited event would launch a more rapid process of economic and …

At George Hawi¹s funeral, nearly everyone in the front pew of the church had lost a loved one to murder or assassination. The list included Giselle Khoury, Walid Jumblatt, Solange …

Residents in the border town of Majdal Anjar broke a jar the moment the last Syrian soldier left Lebanese soil. It is a local ritual to signify that something has …

The revolutionary animals in George Orwell’s Animal Farm, once they have evicted the tyrannical farm owners, slip into the status quo, one that sees the leaders, in this case the …

Pierre Achkar has his hands full. As manager of the three-and-a-half-year-old, 112-room Monroe Hotel, ravaged by the explosion that killed former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, he has been overseeing the …