Trash splash: Heavy rains over Beirut spawn rivers of garbage across capital

The street trash situation in Beirut has reached breaking point. Despite the summer’s citywide “trash protests,” which later morphed into a general desire to do away with the current government, the trash predicament is worse than ever, as heavy rains hit.
Parts of the Lebanese capital currently look like some Venice or Amsterdam nightmare scenario.

 People are poking out of their windows with mobile phones, recording the creeping spectacle, like the following video from the Bauchrieh neighborhood.

Mountains of garbage have been piling in the city for months, as the waste collection crisis escalated, leading over the summer to thousands of poster-wielding Lebanese organizing the You Stink movement.

This followed the capital’s biggest landfill closing, as politicians failed to agree on revenue allocation.