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As Beirut recovers from a large explosion that killed at least a hundred other people and injured thousands of them, we received an update of the box from the pediatrician and Dr. Seema Jilani, who treated his own daughter for injuries after the explosion. “It was incredibly busy because we just got out of a four-day blockade,” Says Jilani. “Everyone was out.” Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab called the explosion a “national disaster.”
AMY GOODMAN: A warning to our listeners and viewers: we will describe graphic scenes, while we are now heading to Beirut, Lebanon, where more than a hundred people died after a major explosion in the city’s harbor. The videos of the explosion show a shockwave enveloping high-rise buildings, leaving a pink fungus that emerges far above the Beirut skyline. More than 4,000 people were injured. Hundreds more people are missing. The explosion swept down buildings, knocked down cars, broke windows miles from the blast site. An estimated 300,000 people have lost their homes.
Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab called the explosion a “national disaster.” He said this was caused by 2,700 tons of highly explosive ammonium nitrate, inexplicably left unattended in a warehouse for six years. An investigation has been launched into what caused the explosion. The explosion caused the force of a 3.5-degree earthquake and felt as far away as Cyprus, more than 160 km from the Lebanese coast. Lebanese director Philippe Aractingi said Beirut looked like a war zone.
PHILIPPE ARACTINGI: I saw the war. I filmed the war. In 2006, I went to southern Lebanon to see this. But it took 30 days to do the same destruction. We had him in an explosion. It’s a mess. I’ve never realized that before.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Lebanese director Philippe Aractingi.
The explosion completely destroyed the port of Beirut, Lebanon’s main economic livelihood. The explosion occurred at a time when Lebanon is already facing an economic, political and public aptitude crisis with increasing COVID-19 cases.
Now we go to Beirut, where Dr. Seema Jilani joins us. She is a pediatrician and cared for her own daughter, who was injured in the explosion. Seema was able to share with us this tragic video that her husband filmed from inside a crowded ambulance while she cradled her daughter and sang to keep calm.
Dr. SEEMA JILANI: [singing with background voices and sirens]
AMY GOODMAN: The scenes and sounds of an ambulance in Beirut after Tuesday’s explosion, where you can see and hear our guest, Dr. Seema Jilani, who now joins us by phone from a hospital where her daughter is being treated.
Seema, can you tell us where you were when the explosion happened and what happened next?
Dr. SEEMA JILANI: I was on Armenia Street, which is a main thoroughfare, on the street where I live, in a small community called Mar Mikhael, full of department stores and restaurants, lively, lots of nightlife in one day. I was incredibly busy, because we just got out of a four-day lockdown, Friday through Monday, so everyone was out, unlike before, even with more traffic than before. My husband and daughter were home. We have floor-to-ceiling windows. The explosion destroyed absolutely all the windows. He went to protect her, and shards of glass flew towards her legs and arms, much deeper in the inspection of the moment than I thought at first.
I was in a car. I heard the explosion, without delay crouching down in the fetal position. And, you know, time is running out and it doesn’t mean anything in those moments, so I have no idea how long it’s been. But the driving force came here and said maybe I’d leave. Left. I found out I left my keys, went back and get them. And the scenes I saw walking from this block to my space were people, dotted with debris and garbage, overturned doors, glass everywhere.
A young woman came up to me to use my phone, and when I looked at her for a moment, her ear fell off. So I without delay entered my type medically, as we do, I tried to locate if there were other bleeding resources and tried to make phone calls for her and stabilize her. But in the meantime, I had made contact with my husband. My husband said, “Go home now. Go home now. Your daughter wants you. And for the first time in my career, I’ve never done that, and it turns out so contrary to everything I am,” and I said to the young woman, I said, “I’m sorry.” I stabilized it and had to go.
I ran downstairs – I ran a block, ran the stairs to scenes in my apartment complex – we live on the third floor – absolutely open and broken doors, windows, glass everywhere, other people bleeding down the stairs, blood flowing down the stairs, a woman subconscious. And all that I shout Array “Is my daughter okay?” Is my daughter okay?
I fall into an apartment I don’t recognize, and our things are affected by an earthquake. And there she is, naked in a towel, and my husband is pressing two very deep wounds that I can see at first.
Then we descend after a lot of chaos, downstairs to take an ambulance. And we’re crammed into the ambulance you just saw, one of the last people who luckily got in that ambulance. And we don’t move anywhere for at least 10 minutes, because everything is standing. Then there is nothing yet depression and destruction. Nothing moves. And other people are in chaos in the ambulance itself.
And then, for me, I become a mother, part doctor, what you saw, and part of that means calming you down and making a song for your son to fall asleep or whatever, and part of it means waking her up when he goes to sleep. . make sure you’re not unconscious. So you’re in [inaudible] to tiptoe.
AMY GOODMAN: And how’s your daughter, Seema?
Dr. SEEMA JILANI: It’s years old.
AMY GOODMAN: What did you do at the hospital when you brought her there?
Dr. SEEMA JILANI: We went to a hospital called Hotel-Dieu de France, and that is, we discovered widespread chaos. They were doing as productive as possible under the cases, and their cases come with the exit of a revolution, which began in September, which then stopped with the coronavirus, which was then reversed through an imminent and developing economic failure, which now leads to what I can describe, I am not an analyst, but as an almost failed state. As a result, they have overwork and lack of funds.
And now we’re entering the season of bronchiolitis, influenza, and none of them are detectable or distinguishable from COVID. And then, in this hospital, you see excessive trauma, layers of trauma inside the hospital staff, who are calling to see if their own children and their circle of relatives are fine, and other people looking to volunteer on the street. His own hospital has been attacked, so there are suspended beams, electrical wires everywhere. Looks like a construction scene. And there’s dust and beams, so everyone’s looking to protect themselves as well.
Then it reaches other people and genuine patients, and they’re everywhere. You’re way beyond other people. They’re each other, you know, I’m wearing my daughter, so I’m looking to make sure that at some point her legs don’t disturb a doctor who sweats in the hallway. There are patients in the areas of the doctor, which is almost never seen. I mean, just bodies on bodies. And not everyone is dead, but they do have blood, wounds, open wounds, shards of glass, crying children. My daughter thinks she identified a little woman from her school. But a lot of attitude at the time, where he says, “Okay, my daughter has wounds and cuts, and we can treat that, but please start doing CPR on the next patient.”
AMY GOODMAN: Dr. Seema Jilani, I need to thank you very much for being with us. All ours for your 4-year-old daughter, Iman.
Dr. SEEMA JILANI: Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: And, of course, for everyone right now in Beirut. More than 4,000 other people were injured, missing charges, at least a hundred dead appeared. We will continue to cover this scenario after the break, when we join through Rami Khouri. Dr. Seema Jilani is a pediatrician and founded in Beirut. She cared for her own daughter, who was injured in the explosion, who joined us from the hospital. Stay with us.