Montreal’s Lebanese community grapples with crisis back home [Video]

Andrew Hage might be in Montreal, but his mind and heart are still in Lebanon.

“My mom, my grandfather, my aunt, her kids — the majority of my family is back home, in Beirut,” he says.

As war persists in the country, Lebanese Montrealers fear for their loved ones.

“The families are very tightly knitted and we talk a lot – we’re very worried,” says Lamia Charlebois. “You don’t have one Lebanese in the diaspora sleeping properly at night.”

For some, what is happening back home brings up some painful memories.

“The events of October have kind of brought back to the surface trauma that I hadn’t experienced since the last time [airstrikes hit Lebanon]”, says Moustafa Chambli.

Charlebois says the trauma and the damage in her home country are beyond surreal.

“Right now, we have a country that is broken by a huge economic crisis [and] by the explosion …