Highly surprised to find the “looks like Beirut” phrase being used just across our borders:
In a second day of violence, the flash point city of Hama came under assault Monday by Syrian troops.
While several cities were targeted in the bloody weekend crackdown, Hama appears to have suffered the worst carnage.
“It looks like Beirut,” Hama resident Saleh Abu Yaman told the Associated Press, likening the city to Lebanese capital that still bears the battle scars of almost 20 years of civil war.
My Twitter alerts recorded at least 15 tweets mentioning that quote in the first hour the Associated Press released the article. That excludes the tweets that linked to the article (well articles since it was picked up by a number of news outlets) thus resulting in what may be the most publicized use of the cliche this year. Not good.
I never thought I would be flagging the “looks like Beirut” phrase so close to Beirut. As always, you can track the phrase around the world via Google Maps.
View Looks Like Beirut – Mapped Across the World by Jad Aoun in a larger map