On a sleepy Tuesday morning, Martyrs’ Square stands temporarily empty of the hundreds of thousands of protesters who have made downtown Beirut the centre of their uprising since 17 October.
For nearly three weeks, Lebanese have taken to the streets across the country to denounce the political class' corruption and grip on power, amid an ever-worsening economic crisis.
But that morning, only a handful of people are present, and they are prising heavy concrete flagstones from the pavement and digging into the topsoil. Near the volunteer diggers, a variety of native Lebanese trees sit in pots.
Soon they will be placed into the freshly dug holes where the planters hope they will become self-sustaining within two years. This symbolises a physical manifestation of the protesters’ ambition to reclaim the city’s public spaces.
Due to rampant privatisation and quasi-nonexistent urban planning, Beirut has few public spaces that are not at risk of vanishing, and even less vegetation.
Full story on Middle East Eye.