On Sept. 17, just before 3:30 p.m., the small waiting room of Dr. Nour’s three-room pediatrics clinic in southern Beirut was packed. A mother was waiting to get preschool checkups for her three children. Two elderly patients were booked in for cataract treatments at the ophthalmologist office next door. Sitting next to them was a young couple whom Nour, whose name has been changed for security reasons, had not met before. The father bounced a 10-day-old baby on his lap. Clipped to his belt was a Gold Apollo Rugged Pager.

Nour brought the young couple into her examination room. She pulled out a blank file for the newborn and wrote his name: Aiman. She placed him on the scales: a little over 7 pounds. She lay Aiman on his back on an examination table and began to record his weight. As she did so, the man’s pager beeped twice.

“Excuse me,” he said, and reached down to silence it.

As he did so, about an ounce of explosives concealed within the pager detonated, sending shards of metal and fragments of its thick plastic casing out in all directions. The shrapnel tore deep wounds in the man’s abdomen, lodged in the ceiling of the clinic and lacerated the face of the baby as he lay on his back. Nour was thrown backward as the room filled with dust. She could not see through the smoke, but she could hear the woman’s voice shouting: “Aiman!”

  • NatakuNox@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Isreal wants a war in the middle east to force America’s hand. Their main goal is to sway more evangelical Christians to vote for Trump who will wipe every adversarial Muslim country off the map. I’m not saying Biden does not have a hand in the ongoing conflict and genicide in the area. Right now the democrats are the party enabling these atrocities right now. I’ll never complain about those that make this fact a sticking point on how they are going to vote. Outside of the globe environmental catastrophe that will doom all humans, I don’t see a bigger issue to get behind than stopping an ongoing genicide. I’m voting for the democrats but I’m also protesting against the democratic party that is helping genicide. I’m marching with my fellow Palestinian brothers and sisters. Don’t just shout down those with legitimate hangups about voting for Harris/the democrats. Try to understand why they feel that way and push your representatives to publicly support Palestinian rights and now Lebanese rights. Even if the dems win if they don’t change course on this issue, we’ll all pay one way or another.