Rita Hayek: If your humanity shows on the card, then throw it in the trash!

“Don’t let your humanity vary based on the religion, beliefs, skin color or community affiliation of the person you have in front of you. If the compassion you show depends on these factors, then please throw your humanity in the trash. » These words which smack and whip the conscience, Rita Hayek throws them fiercely in the face of her followers in a video filmed with a bare face and posted at the top of her Instagram feed since September. As a declaration of war to all those (Lebanese and foreigners) who only see in Israel’s murderous bombings on the villages and neighborhoods of Hezbollah in Lebanon an operation to eradicate a party labeled terrorist, without worrying thousands of innocent victims they cause.

Indignant and supportive

Artists are citizens (almost) like any other. In times of war, there are those who get involved, are indignant, criticize, take sides… And those who, out of egocentrism, or because they prefer to apply the Arab saying which advises them “in periods of upheaval of save (their) heads”, refrain from any comments and actions.

Rita Hayek is definitely not one of the latter. The actress, known for her audacity on stage, is not lukewarm, indifferent, nor even cautious. Even less a calculator who renounces taking clear-cut positions that could harm a cinematographic career that is opening up internationally.

Screenshot of the video Rita Hayek posted on her Instagram feed the day after the beeper explosion in Lebanon. Courtesy of Rita Hayek

The young woman has the courage of her opinions. And she has already demonstrated this by repeatedly expressing her personal convictions on sensitive subjects in our Eastern societies, such as couple relationships or marriage bonds, without fearing the controversies she could arouse.

She proves it once again by not hesitating to get involved in this new Israeli war against Lebanon, both on social networks and in concrete aid actions for displaced families.

Rita Hayek entertaining children from displaced families from South Lebanon in an accommodation center in Basta.

The actress, already white-hot by what she describes as “Palestinian genocide in Gaza”, exploded with anger on September 18, the day after the pager attack in Lebanon, seeing the media and analysts around the world ecstasy over the technological prowess “attributed” to the Israeli intelligence services, in total indifference to the horror of this carnage. “No one cared about the innocent victims that this operation of explosions of communication devices connecting the Hezbollah executives had caused among the population while they were in public places, stores or at home,” he said. she indignantly.

And to immediately launch a rant, a cry from the heart, in a video recorded (in Arabic accompanied by English subtitles) and posted on Instagram from the French capital, where she was then, for the -film premiere The Barbarians by Julie Delpy in which she had played.

“If this atrocity had taken place anywhere other than Lebanon, the entire planet would have frozen”

“I was in France for the release of this film which tells the story of the inhabitants of a village in Brittany preparing to welcome Ukrainian refugees when they see a family of Syrian migrants disembarking instead. I felt so happy to have participated in this film which defends humanist values, denouncing with humor ordinary racism and the difference in how people are viewed based on their identity. And while I wanted to share my enthusiasm on social networks, I learned what had just happened in Lebanon, through the horrible messages that were being spread there,” relates Rita Hayek to L’Orient-Le Jour. Continuing: “I could never have imagined that one could write such violent comments towards human beings who had suffered something so monstrous. I called my husband, who is a doctor, and who was in the emergency room of the American Hospital of Beirut (AUBMC), and just from his voice I understood that what he had seen was truly unbearable. . While in the streets of Paris, where I walked like a sleepwalker crying, I saw people peacefully installed in cafes, or going about their ordinary lives, as if nothing had happened in Lebanon. »

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“If this atrocity had taken place in New York, Paris or any city in the Western world, the entire planet would have frozen,” protests the young woman. If this operation had taken place under other skies, by sponsors other than the Israelis, would we have spoken of a technological exploit? Wouldn’t it have been better described as a terrorist attack? »

A contagious momentum

Faced with the indifference of the world, faced with the double standard of compassion and empathy for the suffering of populations victims of Israeli bombings, Rita Hayek decided to transform her Instagram account, followed by nearly 340,000 followers of different nationalities, into a platform engaged. To alert the public to the thousands of deaths, the daily bombings, the displacement of more than a million people, the destruction of villages and entire neighborhoods… “Because as a public figure, I have the responsibility to ‘call out to foreigners who follow me to make them aware of the cause of Lebanon; and my fellow citizens to encourage them to show even more solidarity. »

On the actress’s Instagram feed, the engaged reposts obscure the glamorous photos from before the war. Courtesy of Rita Hayek

From now on, there is no more room for self-promotion, for glamorous photos of a star on the rise, these are contents denouncing the daily violations of the rules of international law by Israel in Lebanon as in Gaza, reposts committed, which follow one another on its story. Between two images of his actions to help displaced people in South Lebanon. Because, particularly sensitive to the distress of women and children traumatized by the bombings and thrown onto the roads, Rita Hayek spares no effort to respond to the various requests from the associations which take care of them. “I participate in food distribution activities, I personally take care of certain cases and above all I try to help cheer up the children who have always been my weak point,” says this mother of a six-year-old boy. Who claims to publicize his actions not to gain publicity, but in the hope of showing “the true united nature of the Lebanese”.