Religion, Nationalism, and Terror

HEZBOLLAH’S CREEPY NEW MUSEUM
Exhibition Game
by Zvika Krieger
The New Republic

Post date: 08.17.07
Issue date: 08.27.07
Beirut, Lebanon

Earlier this week, I found myself standing in the courtyard of Beirut’s newest museum in front of the warped propeller of a Yasur CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopter. The propeller, a placard helpfully explained, had been “destroyed by the resistance” during last summer’s war, a fate that had also befallen the half-dozen charred Israeli military vehicles surrounding it. A group of hijab-clad women nudged me out of the way so they could snap some photos with the propeller.

The downed helicopter is on display at the Spider’s Web, Hezbollah’s new war museum. The free exhibition commemorates the group’s “divine victory” over Israel last summer by offering up a professional and slickly curated collection of war paraphernalia–the work of over two dozen conceptual artists, graphic designers, engineers, musicians, and lighting technicians. Since opening last month, it has become this summer’s hottest tourist destination, attracting, mostly by word of mouth, over 200,000 visitors. “We don’t even remember the war in the Christian area where I’m from, but I felt like it is something that should not be forgotten soon,” explains Danya, a 26-year-old Christian financial consultant, as she made her way into the museum past a busload of schoolchildren. “Also, I wanted to see what all my friends were talking about.”

And that’s exactly Hezbollah’s intention. The militant group has struggled to maintain its wartime popularity since it withdrew from the government last fall, occupied downtown Beirut, and threw the country into political turmoil. The Lebanese government has condemned Hezbollah, claiming it dragged the country into war. It has also refused to mark the war’s anniversary this month. The Spider’s Web, by contrast, won’t let the Lebanese forget it.

Entering the museum, visitors are greeted by massive posters of the war’s most reviled villains. A menacing picture of Condoleezza Rice announces that “This war is part of birth bangs [sic] of the new middle east [sic],” while a jester-like George W. Bush assures viewers that “[o]ur nation is wasting no time in helping the people of Lebanon.” Former Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz, in Israel’s crowning moment of the war, gazes pensively through capped binoculars. “Hassan Nasrallah won’t forget the name Aameer Peretz [sic],” quotes the caption under his larger- than-life portrait.

The main hall is lined with a panorama of crisp, glossy photographs: scenes of the bombed-out Al Manar building (Hezbollah’s TV station); floor-to-ceiling portraits of Lebanese refugees bawling in front of their leveled homes; a couple taking their wedding pictures in the rubble of south Beirut. One of the installations contains photos of bloody Lebanese children and infants covered in bandages and IV tubing, all surrounding a teddy bear recovered from a bombed-out Lebanese house. Lest anyone fail to realize who could possibly be so bloodthirsty, another display–which includes pictures of Israeli children excitedly signing missiles and a Hasidic man pumping his fist in front of an Israeli tank–proclaims, “This is their culture, this is their belief.”

The museum simultaneously tries to portray Hezbollah as helpless victims and brave warriors. The Spider’s Web draws its name from a Nasrallah speech in which he boasted that Israel is “more feeble than a spider’s web”–a theme he reiterated in a speech to tens of thousands of screaming fans outside the museum this week. Throughout the exhibition, glass cases sunk into the ground display some of the Israeli spoils captured by Hezbollah: helmets, boots, machine guns, radios, oxygen tanks, and even personal items such as iPods and tefillin (Jewish prayer straps) looted from dead Israeli soldiers. “Watch it burn,” proclaims a poster of a capsized Israeli warship. “It will sink taking with it dozens of Zionist Israeli soldiers.”

Perhaps fearing that the deaths of just dozens of Zionists won’t make enough of an impression, the Spider’s Web design team has made sure that pictures of bloodied and limbless Israeli soldiers make up the largest part of the exhibit. Some are digitally altered to be surrounded by hellish flames; others are rendered with anguished faces into art deco portraits; still others are engulfed in spider webs constructed with Koranic verses. “The invincible army!” gloats one of these montages. “It’s Lebanon, you fools,” reads another. A Warhol-esque portrait of Nasrallah presides contentedly over the display.

The museum’s main event is a sound-and-light show around Hezbollah’s prized artifact–a Merkava tank bombed during the war–displayed in a recreated bomb crater lined with mannequins of (what else?) dead Israeli soldiers. Every few minutes, the lights dim for an effects-laden video extravaganza that shows the explosion of the tank, up-close shots of Hezbollah militants launching Katyusha rockets, and Hezbollah’s missiles raining down on the Israeli city of Haifa. After the show, the lights come up on posters of crying Israeli soldiers.

Following this grand finale, visitors are quickly ushered out of the museum to a grassy, serene “Martyr’s Oasis.” This installation is filled with white pillars and a white staircase leading up to a white doorframe, perhaps a subtle nod to the glorious fate in store for those who died fighting for Hezbollah last summer (and whose pictures line the streets surrounding the museum).

The museum’s visitors, however, are relegated to worldly pleasures for the time being: The Hezbollah gift shop is located conveniently near the exit of the museum. For sale are fashionable Hezbollah hats, DVDs of Nasrallah’s speeches, and Hezbollah’s latest video game, “Special Force 2: Tale of the Truthful Pledge”–available in Arabic, English, French, and Farsi.