By Jessica Easthope
Dr. Nazih El-Adm called it an apocalyptic scene, something out of a movie.
“I saw a car in a wall, someone was carrying a dying guy and I saw a guy hanging on a tree and dying, and I was running and all the windows were coming down on me,” he said.
That was one year ago.
He was 20 miles away from Beirut, but his 36-year-old daughter, Krystel, was in the city. He called her immediately.
“She told me please come and save me,” said Dr. Nazih. “I am in the guest room and please come, I’m dying.”
Krystel spent Aug. 4, 2020 helping someone else. She bought her neighbor, a 10-year-old boy an iPad so he could remain in school during the pandemic. But she was supposed to be on her way to her parents’ house.
“I stopped all my work as a doctor, I stopped everything. I told them Krystel was my last patient and I lost the war. I never went back to the hospital and I closed my clinic,” said Dr. Nazih, who up until the blast had been a practicing cardiologist for nearly 40 years.
After her death, the Catholic family and Krystel’s friends started a foundation in her name sponsoring children in need of an education. They even renovated her apartment, transforming it into a school center. Later this month, inside the room where she died in her father’s arms, a statue of Krystel will be dedicated alongside The Pieta.
“I imagine myself like the Holy Lady with her son in her arms,” said Dr. Nazih.
No one has been held accountable for the Beirut blast. Dr. Nazih says Krystel’s legacy speaks for itself – never stopping the fight for justice will be his.