Welcome, this is my summer resort now,” says Joy Mallouh, spreading his arms wide as I enter his office. The second-floor room with tall windows on two sides is bright with August sun, and airy because all the windows are blown out. Shards of glass still poke from metal window frames. Plasterboard walls are cracked and buckled. Through the open windows, the sounds of sanding and sawing rise to us, as workers below repair broken doors and pews.

BELARUS: Protests demanding the ouster of “Europe’s last dictator,” President Alexander Lukashenko, continue for a second week, with the embattled leader landing by helicopter at his residence and emerging before the crowd wearing body armor and carrying an assault rifle.

Whatever the nature of the voyage’s travails, the Cunard Line steamship company had this goal for its transatlantic steamers a century ago: “to keep the ship sweet.” 

Below deck the stokers could be working 100 men to a shift, shoveling coal to keep the boilers primed, but diners above should be able to murmur in conversation and eat from polished silver unawares. Passengers must journey unburdened by the cares of the ship.

Nearly 2,500 miles from the scene of the crime and 15 years later, a Special Tribunal for Lebanon ruled Tuesday that the main defendant charged with conspiracy to kill former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was a member of Hezbollah and used a cell phone critical in the 2005 bombing. It left Hariri and 21 others dead. 

The tribunal, meeting in the Netherlands, acquitted three other men indicted in the case.

ISRAEL and the United Arab Emirates announced they are establishing full diplomatic ties in a U.S.-brokered agreement—the first Arab country to formalize a relationship with Israel in more than 25 years. The agreement is a key victory for President Donald Trump and represents dramatic changes in the Arab world, where shared concerns about Iran have overtaken traditional support for the Palestinians.

Muthanna and Fahed worked the front desk at the Golden Tulip Hotel in midtown Beirut when they heard what sounded like a bomb. They headed toward the hotel’s floor-to-ceiling glass entryway to see what was happening when the true explosion struck. 

Nearly 3,000 metric tons of ammonium nitrate ignited in Beirut’s main port downtown at about 6 p.m. on Aug. 4, sending an orange mushroom cloud and a powerful shock wave over the city. 

LEBANON: American officials are in Beirut this week, with U.S. military transports delivering relief and medical supplies as part of $15 million pledged toward recovery from last week’s massive port explosion.