by Oliver St John

     The human toll of war is a well-known and much-lamented fact. Inevitably, innocents are caught in the crossfire, livelihoods are lost, families torn apart. The mindless machine that is war continues to rage, perpetuating its atrocities for generations, an expression of everything wrong with the human psyche.

     One aspect of war which is less frequently spoken of is the environmental impact. The fumes from missile launches, the smoke of burning oil fields, the collected trash and debris of hundreds of thousands of soldiers and their armaments.

     The "other" Middle Eastern war - that currently being waged between Israel and Hizbollah - has caused perhaps the largest environmental disaster to hit that region in many years.

     The Jiyeh power station, approximately 20 miles south of Beirut, Lebanon, was bombed by Israeli jets on July 15th. Subsequent military action has prevented any repair to the facility, and to date approximately 15,000 tons of heavy grade fuel oil from this facility has spilled into the Mediterranean Sea.

     The oil slick caused by this has spread for 100 miles, causing widespread death and destruction to marine life in the area. The town of Byblos - a beautiful Mediterranean town and possibly the oldest continuously inhabited settlement in the entire world (per UNESCO, which has declared it a World Heritage site) - is an empty, oil-blackened mess. Renowned seafood restaurants in Byblos' harbor now catch fish so dirty it is amazing they are alive.

     The contamination is continuing to spread even as we speak, and even by conservative estimates, the cleanup will cost in excess of $200 million, with further millions being added every day. Even then, any cleanup operation is likely to be imperfect.

     It is outside the scope of The Green Room to discuss the folly of war, however much we abhor it, but when it impacts the environment and causes catastrophic damage to life, it adds the further outrage of another wound to the planet we all call home.