LEBANON: Photo exhibit captures changing Armenian quarter

 

 
A rare photo exhibition and film festival explores the ups and downs of Beirut's Armenian suburb as it undergoes a transition that has the potential to either help or alienate residents who have already endured decades of marginalization.

"Badguer," which takes its name from the Armenian word for "image," opened last week with a performance from an Armenian rock band and features a number of foreign and local artists. Babylon & Beyond visited the exhibition on a recent warm evening and found a lively mix of local families and young, stylish Beirut residents. Bits of Armenian, Arabic, French and English could be heard over the strains of a young man's violin. Please watch the video above for interviews and a tour of the exhibit.

Until recently, the quaint streets of Bourj Hammoud, the bustling, mostly Armenian neighborhood just east of Beirut, were practically unknown to the well-heeled Lebanese and Persian Gulf tourists that crowd the capital’s cafes and shops in summer. 

But as Beirut’s galleries, bars and cultural spaces creep ever eastward in the search for cheaper real estate, Bourj Hammoud is emerging as a destination for its distinctive food, bootleg DVDs and fine metalwork in gold and silver.

The municipality, meanwhile, is hoping this new interest will translate into sustained support for local cultural and artistic initiatives.

ISRAEL: Discussing Armenian genocide

A week before Israelis and Jews will mark Holocaust Remembrance Day early May, Armenians throughout the world will be commemorating their own tragedy.

Armenians say 1.5 million people, one third of the ethnic nation, were massacred by the Turks in 1915-1916. Turkey maintains that between 250,000 and 500,000 Armenians were killed during the minority's struggle for independence, and a similar number of Turks. The Armenians are relentless in their push for recognition of the killings as genocide, while an uncomfortable Turkey counters these efforts with international pressure.

In this bitter dispute, Israel finds itself in both a moral and diplomatic hard spot.