Many of us have seen the meme about working during wartime in Lebanon: Lebanese people carrying on, going to work under fire, as if routine itself were an act of survival. I often think about that image. In many ways, I feel privileged. I work in a supportive environment where management becomes flexible in times of war and instability, making space for fear, displacement, and emotional exhaustion. But even with that support, the deeper dilemma remains unresolved. Does flexibility solve the question of productivity? Does it answer the question of relevance?
For those of us working in research, civil society, and knowledge production, war forces uncomfortable questions to the surface. What is our role in such moments? How do we define productivity when daily life is structured by violence, grief, and uncertainty? In a world that consumes data instantly and produces commentary by the second, what counts as meaningful knowledge creation? And what determines whether taking a position at a given moment is actually useful, rather than simply adding to polarization and the overproduction of information?
The turn toward relief: Immediate but insufficient
I have been struggling with these questions since the war in Lebanon in October 2024. My first instinct, like that of many politically active people, was to shift toward relief work: to support those with urgent needs, to contribute to local initiatives, to help however possible on the ground. From what I have seen, this response is common among politically engaged circles. Existing initiatives are revived, dormant networks are activated, and people turn toward direct forms of solidarity and survival. This instinct makes sense. In moments of catastrophe, relief feels immediate, tangible, and morally clear.
But is relief our only avenue for relevance and impact at such times?
This question becomes even more pressing when placed against the dominant public discourse. A quick look at mainstream media and social media reveals two rigid, opposing positions. One insists that unconditional support for the “resistance” axis and its confrontation with Israel is the only legitimate anti-imperialist stance, the only way to stand with Palestine and reject American and Israeli domination in the region. The other responds with unconditional condemnation of Hezbollah, treating the current violence as the inevitable consequence of its politics and military role, and sometimes implying that the devastation of parts of Lebanon is an acceptable price for weakening that force.
The violence of polarization: Refusing the binary
To witness your country being bombed while your society remains deeply divided is, in itself, soul-crushing. But what haunts me is not only the division. It is what comes after. What kind of society emerges from a moment when so many people are pulled toward mutually exclusive and morally totalizing positions? How do we come out of this without carrying even deeper fractures into the future?
What kind of society emerges from a moment when so many people are pulled toward mutually exclusive and morally totalizing positions? How do we come out of this without carrying even deeper fractures into the future?
The division has reached a point where it sometimes borders on the legitimization of massacre and displacement. For some, the destruction of a part of the population becomes tolerable if it promises eventual peace and stability through a weakened, passive posture toward US and Israeli power. For others, the violence of the present is absorbed into a narrative that asks us to forget years of struggle against Hezbollah’s domination, the crimes committed against the Syrian people, the repression of the Lebanese uprising, and the broader militarization of societies across the region in preparation for a future “divine war.” In one direction lies submission to global and regional hegemony; in the other, the promise of liberation through a sectarian, militarized, and culturally oppressive order.
I refuse to be trapped between these two positions.
But refusing both does not immediately produce clarity. On the contrary, it opens another set of difficult questions. If I reject both the passive acceptance of imperial violence and the authoritarian logic of armed domination, then where do I stand? What is my role? Who are my allies in this society today? And if the state itself reproduces one of these positions, can it still be treated as the legitimate authority through which advocacy and public action should be organized?
A potential third path—rethinking roles and responsibilities
Amid all these reflections, I find myself certain of only a few things, realities that, I believe, should guide both our personal and institutional thinking at this moment. Any actor seeking to play a meaningful role in critically serving the country and its people must reflect on at least three levels.
First, if one’s positionality, strategy, and political reading have remained unchanged since before October 7, 2023, and through the previous and current war in Lebanon, then an essential process of reflection, revision, and learning is missing. As political actors, we cannot overstate the importance of rethinking our assumptions and revisiting our positions in light of everything that has unfolded. There is no serious way to engage with this moment without acknowledging how profoundly it should reshape our political understanding.
Second, our work and what we produce must be humbled by the scale of people’s sacrifice and loss. I feel that every word I write, every opinion I formulate, should be haunted by those who have been displaced, left without shelter, lost loved ones or homes, and who now live with uncertainty about the future of their land, their communities, and the threat of occupation or permanent displacement.
Finally, if we find ourselves merely repeating and reproducing a political stance fully aligned with one of the two dominant camps, or with the traditional social and political forces that have shaped the local scene for decades, then we risk preventing the emergence of a much-needed counter-narrative and alternative forms of organizing. Regardless of where the moral balance appears to tilt between these forces, falling into a ready-made, rigid, and divisive position should itself be a warning sign: it should push us to critically reassess and expand our political imagination. What is needed in this moment is a third path, rooted in solidarity, continuous reflection, and a refusal of the binaries of submission.
