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Showing posts with the label Iraq

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Omran, the unwilling hero of war marketing

on August 22, 2016

Aleppo Daech English Iraq Marketing Omran Daqneesh Syria War

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The tragic story of Adil Faraj, the boy who wanted to fly

on July 07, 2016

Adel Faraj Daech English Iraq Terrorism

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If we want others to care about us, why don’t we care about others?

on July 04, 2016

Daech Iraq ISIS Lebanon Opinion Terrorism

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Arabs are barbarians, they say

on April 10, 2015

Algeria Christianity Daesh English Europe France Hiroshima Holocaust Iraq Islam KKK Nagasaki Racism Society Syria Terrorism US Vietnam War World

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History repeating?

on August 17, 2014

Daech Daesh English Europe Germany Hitler Iraq ISIS Islamic State Lebanon Middle East Nazi Opinion Syria Terrorism World

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I say we fight

on August 09, 2014

Daech Daesh English Iraq ISIS Islamic State Lebanese Army Lebanon Middle East Opinion Syria Terrorism World

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What’s Daesh doing in Lebanon?

on August 04, 2014

Daech Daesh Edward Snowden English Iraq ISIS Islamic State Israel Lebanon Middle East Opinion Sykes-Picot Syria Terrorism

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OVER 6 MILLION VIEWS WORLDWIDE

Claude El Khal

Writer. Filmmaker. Communication Strategist. Content & Digital Creator. Former aspiring Comedian. Occasional Cartoonist. I write in English with a slight French accent and in French with a Lebanese inflection.

Popular Posts

A New Direction

Some changes happen gradually, almost without you noticing. Others arrive with the force of an obvious truth you somehow hadn’t seen until now. This one was both. If you’ve been reading My Beirut Chronicles for a while, you know the blog has never followed a formula. No niche, no content calendar, no algorithm to please. Just one voice, sharing what felt worth sharing — analysis, opinion, observation, the occasional provocation. Over the years, that voice commented on politics, society, culture, and the particular madness of living in Lebanon. Six million of you read it. Some of you argued with it. A few of you changed my mind — sometimes because you were right, and I was wrong. Very wrong, occasionally. Then something shifted. It started quietly, almost as an experiment. In May 2025, I launched Visages on Instagram — an exploration of whether AI could create images that felt genuinely human. Not just realistic. Human. The experiment raised more questions than it answered. That felt l...

The UNMASK Series Is Here.

Something has shifted. You can feel it. The world is moving faster than the identities we built to survive it. So we adapt. We perform. We wear the mask so long, we forget it's a mask. For a long time, that worked. Now it's the thing holding you back. Thirty-six years in advertising, journalism, film, and writing taught me one pattern: people don't fail for lack of talent. They fail because they lose touch with who they are underneath the performance. UNMASK isn't a theory. It's nine truths about authentic communication — applied where performance costs the most: you. Your kids. Your business. That's why it's three ebooks. In December, a free preview of what became Vol. 1 — under a different name — passed 30,000 views. Now the ebook series is here. UNMASK Vol. 1: Surviving the End of Certainty You're performing instead of being yourself. It's exhausting — and it's stopped working. The masks that once protected you at work, at home, in every relat...

You're Wearing Masks You've Forgotten Are Masks

You don't truly know yourself. Not because you lack self-awareness, but because you've spent your entire life performing. One mask for work. Another for family. Different masks for friends, for strangers, for every social situation you navigate. You've become so skilled at shape-shifting your personality — to avoid conflict, to fit in, to meet expectations — that you've lost touch with who you actually are beneath all these performances. For generations, these masks were exhausting but functional. They helped us survive in relatively stable environments where fitting in was a viable strategy. But the world has changed. In this landscape of constant disruption — AI reshaping careers overnight, social structures fragmenting, everything accelerating — those masks aren't just exhausting anymore. They're lethal. Your authentic self is no longer a luxury. It's your survival tool. But here's where most advice fails: "Be yourself" sounds simple until y...

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