Lebanon’s first pride week underway despite terror threat

Lebanon’s first-ever Pride celebration is underway in Beirut, despite national laws that deem homosexual acts a crime and terrorist threats at the start of the festivities.

Organizers planned to kick off Pride with an event run by Pride Lebanon, but they received threats from the Association of Muslim Scholars in Lebanon, a Salafist group.

‘On Saturday (13 May) we started getting information that some of the radical groups were not happy,’ Proud Lebanon’s Bertho Makso told Middle East Eye.

The hotel hosting the event later received ‘serious security threats’, which led them to cancel the entire event.

Fortunately, the scare hasn’t completely shut down Beirut Pride, which foregoes the traditional pride parade in favor of film exhibitions, storytelling and parties.

May our true colours shine and beam.

In love and pride. Always.#BeirutPride for #IDAHOBIT pic.twitter.com/ZFlJn5ORow

— Beirut Pride (@BeirutPride) May 17, 2017

LGBTI in Lebanon need visibility

Organizers of Beirut Pride said people around the world have failed to see the social schism between the socially conservative and the socially liberal in Lebanon.

They said in a statement: ‘The Lebanese Civil War might have ended in 1990. The social war, on the other hand, is wreaking havoc, and the speech that calls for hate and for the rejection of the other is still ongoing.’

The law works against them

The country’s penal law prohibits sexual activity under Article 534, which says sexual acts which ‘contradict the laws of nature’ are punishable by up to one year in jail.

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