Cherine YAZBECK

Jan 22, 2025 | abc.net.au | Matthew Doran |Cherine YAZBECK

Leila el Arja is sitting amongst rubble, looking far into the distance, trying to comprehend. She's surrounded by twisted metal, smashed concrete and broken wood. This used to be a happy place for Leila and her family. Now, it's a painful reminder of the the past 15 months of war in Gaza. "We left Rafah on May 6. I left and I was afraid," she told the ABC this week. "I wanted to take something, anything, from the house, but there was no time. I grabbed the children and left in a hurry.

Dec 1, 2024 | abc.net.au | Eric Tlozek |Cherine YAZBECK

In Beirut's southern suburbs, the cost of 'victory' is devastation. Destroyed and damaged buildings are everywhere. Some of the ruins still smoulder and the air is filled with dust that makes the eyes sting. Few parts of Dahiyeh, Arabic for "the suburb", are untouched, but its residents are outwardly unconcerned. "Don't look at the rubble.

Nov 27, 2024 | abc.net.au | Matthew Doran |Cherine YAZBECK |Eric Tlozek

Roads were jammed and celebratory gunfire echoed across southern Beirut as tens of thousands of displaced Lebanese returned to their homes as a ceasefire between Israel and the militant group Hezbollah held for its first day. Despite the celebrations in the Hezbollah-dominated Dahieh district of the capital, many residents who fled Israel's intense bombardment of Hezbollah sites and personnel, returned to find their homes badly damaged or destroyed.

Nov 15, 2024 | abc.net.au | Eric Tlozek |Cherine YAZBECK

When Donald Trump walked his youngest daughter Tiffany through an enormous bower of hydrangea flowers at her wedding at Mar-a-Lago, few people might have recognised this as a key moment in United States and Middle Eastern politics. But it was Tiffany Trump's 2022 marriage to the son of Lebanese-American tycoon Massad Boulos, Michael, which joined two powerful political families and would help Donald Trump in his second run for the White House and shape his future Middle East policy.

Oct 16, 2024 | abc.net.au | Cherine YAZBECK

Lebanon's second-largest city, Tripoli, has largely been spared the Israeli air strikes smashing the country's south, Beqaa Valley and southern Beirut. But the influx of refugees has exposed ongoing tensions in the country between its Shia, Sunni and Christian communities. Tripoli, from which many Australian Lebanese immigrated, is mainly home to Sunni Muslims who oppose the Shia militant group Hezbollah.