Beirut decadence 2.0

byHabib Battah
Aug 16, 2011

Forget the Lamborghini, come by yacht and “Get Low” with Flo.

MTV has just published my piece on the latest innovation in Beirut nightlife with Flo Rida (above), Ke$ha, Fat Joe and Eve all performing to a select crowd of “A class” clubbers at Pier 7.

But private gigs are the rage among elites worldwide, even with high-level officials in Iran. See my full piece at MTV Iggy for more details.

(This photo will make more sense when you read the article.)

Habib Battah

Habib Battah is an investigative journalist and founder of the news site beirutreport.com. Battah has covered Lebanon and the Middle East for over 20 years and teaches journalism and media studies at the American University of Beirut. He is a contributor to Monocle, The Guardian, BBC World, Al Jazeera and others, a former fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford University and two-time recipient of the Samir Kassir Press Freedom Award. Battah's investigative work was recently recognized for outstanding local reporting by the Columbia University Oakes Award for Environmental Reporting. Battah earned a B.A. in Journalism from the University of Texas at Austin and an M.A. in Near East Studies and Journalism from New York University.

2 comments

qazionqulture says:

Oct 1, 2011 at 12:05 pm

This article was outstanding, Habib! I wish I’d known about it when I was writing the blog post about the Times article the other day. Yours drips with humorous outrage and irony, and is a perfect example of what responsible reporting looks like, instead of what we too often see, the equivalent of a pat on the head for the country’s richest, least socially conscious citizens. Must check your blog regularly!

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Habib Battah says:

Oct 2, 2011 at 10:29 pm

“Pat on the head”–nicely said. Thanks!

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