Beirut 1982: The Siege That Shattered the PLO's State Within a State

In the summer of 1982, Israeli forces encircled West Beirut for ten weeks, bombarding the city in a bid to expel the Palestine Liberation Organization. This episode zooms in on the siege itself: the relentless shelling, the water and food shortages, the tense negotiations mediated by Philip Habib, and the final, fateful evacuation of Arafat and his fighters by sea. We look at how the siege reshaped Lebanese politics—empowering the Shia Amal movement as the PLO vacated, deepening the Maronite-Syrian rift, and setting the stage for the Sabra and Shatila massacre that followed. We also consider the human cost: thousands of civilian dead, the destruction of the city's cultural heart, and the enduring trauma that fuels Lebanon's collective memory.

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