Saudi Arabia Key Contributor To Lebanon's Reconstruction
Joseph S. Mayton - All Headline News Middle East Correspondent Beirut, Lebanon (AHN) - Saudi Arabia is trying once again to bankroll a Lebanese reconstruction effort. This time it is in the form of dispensing free medical care across Lebanon. At the edge of a Beirut racetrack, a horseshoe-shaped field hospital has been created in order to give the free medical services, costing hundreds of millions of dollars. "I like horse-racing but we barely have time to call our families," Saud Al Omani, a British-trained trauma surgeon from Riyadh, told AFP. He heads a team of 115 doctors and nurses from Saudi, as well as 40 Lebanese. "We are all paid of course," Al Omani added. According to him the doctors and nurses are being paid by the Saudi government. At the makeshift medical center there are 18 air-conditioned containers built as clinics on wheels painted in white with the sign of the Saudi Red Crescent Society. The center has been operational since August 5, only three weeks into Israel's 34-day war against Hezbollah that destroyed much of southern Lebanon and south Beirut suburbs. The war ended on August 14 with a United Nations-brokered ceasefire. Saudi Arabia has been the largest contributor to the reconstruction effort in Lebanon, comprising of a one-billion dollar deposit into the central bank and a grant of 500 million dollars to help the war-torn nation.
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