This protest have brought out the very
marginalized sections of the Lebanese
society. Those who are extremely
deprived.
[Music]
Come
on. Hello.
[Applause]
So, we're standing in Martyr Square.
This is the meeting point for the
large-scale protests. People are coming
from all over the country to show their
anger with the government and its
incompetency and its corruption. It
started with a trash issue and it's
evolved into a much bigger
disappointment with corruption and lack
of government
services. This is an unprecedented
protest cuz people are coming for the
first time down to the streets
irrespective of religious affiliation.
[Music]
We are from different sectors of
society, from different age groups, from
different regions and we all want the
same thing. We want to get rid of this
rotten corrupt system. They're stealing
all our money and they're not giving us
like the basic rights like electricity,
water, the garbage is on the street. We
cannot have them run in the country like
this.
[Music]
There's no jobs in Lebanon. I'm not I
don't have any money. You're the
minister,
right? About
somebody here.
[Music]
[Applause]
We're basically like leaving the family
vi over there and going to a completely
different scene here. It's a lot more
young guys who are like energized, who
are angry, who have a lot to a lot of
grievances. They feel like the
government is doing absolutely nothing
for them. This all signal.
[Music]
[Applause]
So this is the front line. Uh last week
the security forces were lined up here.
There was nothing barring the uh the
protesters from the security forces.
This weekend there are three layers of
barbed wire to prevent uh the protesters
and security forces from mixing. But the
protesters are throwing things over the
barbed wire trying to aggravate them
trying to get a reaction because they
feel like they don't want to just be out
here with no response to the government.
There has been a bit of a problem when
it comes to sort of organizing and being
clear about what, you know, the
intentions and the motives for this are.
Honestly, it's it's not it's not enough
of a percentage of the population for it
to qualify as a popular uprising, which
is what people are essentially calling
for. Okay.
Do you think that there's going to need
to be violence in order for there to be
gains? I mean, no one thinks violence uh
as a necessity per se, but you have to
keep in mind that this protest have
brought out the very marginalized
sections of the Lebanese society. Those
who are extremely deprived, those who
are not uh concluded in the government
policies, those uh marginalized
societies come here and they face state
oppression with defiance. And and keep
in mind that these police were trained
by the American aid programs that
Lebanon gets from them. So instead of
Lebanon getting eight programs to make
the life of everyone better, we get
eight programs where the police can be
trained efficiently to control us every
time we descent. And that's why people
are angry. The problem is that this
government doesn't get that. So So what
Lebanon is importing from uh the US is
police brutality, police training. I
mean, we saw what happened in Ferguson.
We see how many black people are getting
killed every day in the United States.
[Music]
So, everyone is pulled out from this
confrontation area and I think they're
moving over here because police forces
are coming onto this side. So, the new
front line, the new front line has
moved. Let's go. All right. All right.
All right. All right. We got
this. All right. The riot force has
broken into the protest area. They've
already arrested a young kid.
All right. So, the protest just got
dispersed. The riot police are picking
up young kids who are on the front line
and they're arresting them. The riot
police is explaining that these guys
that they're lining up against these
walls are going to be sent straight to
the Ministry of Interior.
They do not want any of this to be
filmed. One of the riot police just put
basically roughed up our cameraman and
put a put his hand over the the
camera. All right, so we got to move
because we got strict instructions that
the police are going to sweep this area.
They've been arresting people on the
street. There's a lot of uh there's a
lot of riot police. They've completely
closed off this area. It's filled to
replace basically the protesters who
were there. A few protesters are still
on the other side, but I think that
they're going to be pushed out.
[Music]