Antoine Zaarour

Antoine was born in mid-1949, he grew up in the streets of Medawwar and Karantina in Beirut. He was a blacksmith and made beautiful doors with decorative details. He was very talented and passionate about his profession.  Antoine was very generous with his friends and family.

He was very close to his children, two boys and a girl. He dearly loved his family, and always preferred to stay home around them rather than go out, before they left his nest when his daughter got married, and his sons settled outside Lebanon, in Dubai and Cyprus.

Antoine dreamed of becoming a grandfather, and he indeed became the grandfather of a little girl –Ilaya- who lifted his spirits and refueled his love for life, since he was greatly suffering from the Lebanese economic and financial crisis.

On the 4^th of August, Antoine was home with his wife Liliane who just came back from a three days stay at their daughter's. They had lunch together, and few minutes before 6:00 PM, Liliane went in to get some fruit. When she heard the first explosion, she called her daughter who lived in Hadat to check up on her. At that moment, Antoine walked out of his room, and she asked him if he heard the sound of flying airplanes. He went to the balcony to check what was happening, and Liliane followed him. Suddenly, there was a huge explosion that blew her towards the stairs, breaking a bone in her neck. When she came back to her senses, she unconsciously ran towards the street, when she quickly recalled her husband was still home. She came back to find him on the floor, and she screamed for help. Their daughter called, and she asked her to save them. Her son in law arrived and evacuated Antoine on a bedsheet to Saint Joseph Hospital, but he was not doing well. He suffered from a skull fracture and bled too much.

Antoine was in a coma for fifty days, he passed away on September 17, on the same day his daughter delivered her second child. He couldn’t celebrate the arrival of the grandchild he was eagerly waiting.