Spectre of war paralyzes Lebanon’s hospitality sector

BYBLOS: Bartender Richard Alam has poured hardly any drinks at his pub in Lebanon’s seaside city of Byblos, where once-busy streets have emptied of customers scared by border tensions during the Israel-Hamas war.
“I opened this whiskey bottle two weeks ago and it still isn’t empty,” said Alam, 19, standing behind his empty bar in the coastal city, home to a World Heritage site north of Beirut.
“Before, we would go through a bottle every day or every other day,” he told AFP.