These photographs of Lebanon are taken 50 years apart by my father and me. Elias Hakim's B&W photos document the young Hakim family's emigration from Lebanon to the US in 1956. My color photos explore the country upon my return in 2006 after the latest war with Israel.
I returned to Lebanon barely three months after that war destroyed much of the country—over a thousand killed, fifteen thousand homes leveled, every major bridge and highway damaged or destroyed—and perhaps most damning, millions of unexploded cluster bombs holding the future hostage.
I didn’t exactly go to document the destruction—those images had made the nightly news ten times over. Instead, I went looking for what persisted in the land where I was born. Fifty years had passed since my family left Lebanon for America—my parents refugees from Palestine, my younger brother and I babes-in-arms. And thirty years had passed since my last visit. In that time, Lebanon had suffered a long civil war, several Israeli invasions, Syrian and Israeli occupation, rebuilding and re-destroying.
But I encountered what seemingly cannot be destroyed—the character of a resilient people who defied their savage and surreal world as they picked up the pieces, built devotional altars to their gods and heroes, and went about their routines—every cup of coffee enjoyed, every candle lit, every cigarette smoked, an affirmation of their will to survive. Like fishermen daily repairing their nets, the Lebanese were already rebuilding—yet again. I found their undiminished determination inspiring.
These photographs are not just images of a homecoming, but a heartfelt exploration of a people and a place, determined to exist.
