Much has already been written about this summer’s scandalous international defeat in Afghanistan, which suddenly left the Afghan people, especially women, in the hands of illiterate and obsessive butchers.

Since Aug. 4, 2020 — the day of the tragedy at the port of Beirut — many have looked on at Lebanon’s pain, a slow agony so deeply inscribed in its contemporary history that many are unaware that Lebanon was once the peaceful and prosperous Switzerland of the Middle East.