The good and the bad of being gay in the Middle East.

[Principessa]

The good:
Beirut, the Provincetown of the Middle East
By PATRICK HEALY
August 2, 2009

THE pre-party began at 9 p.m. in Bertho Makso’s room at the Bella Riva Suite Hotel, and by 9:05 p.m. the air was awash in cologne, hair spray, cigarette smoke and gossip about the night ahead. Would a certain 20-something from West Beirut be at the beach party? Had the two men from Cairo arrived yet? Was the cute D.J. from Bardo, a gay bar here, going to be spinning? And did anyone need condoms? The last question came from Bertho, a 28-year-old Lebanese tour operator who was the host of the main event that Thursday night in June: the Bear Arabia Mega Party, at the Oceana resort about 30 minutes south of Beirut. Scores of gay men — most of them “bears,” a term used the world over for heavyset, hairy guys usually older than 30 — were coming from across Lebanon and the Arab world, as well as Argentina, Italy, Mexico, the United States and elsewhere. Bertho had been picking them up at the Beirut airport since morning, and he looked exhausted as he handed out fistfuls of condoms to the dozen men in the room.

“So many questions today about what ‘gay Beirut’ is like,” he told me. “I’m just like, ‘Wait and see, you’ll like it, you’ll like it!’ ”

Tipping back a Red Bull on the sofa was Roberto Boccia, who was in from Rome for the event. In his 40s, wearing a white T-shirt and khaki shorts, Roberto said he was surprised by the brio of Beirut compared with gay life in Rome, and said he was going to spread the word back home. “Some of my friends are still scared to come here, because of the wars, and because it’s harder to be gay here than in Europe,” he said. “But I say, we have to win this. We’re gay, we overcome things.”

and

the bad of being gay in the Middle East:
3 Shot Dead at Gay Center in Tel Aviv
By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
August 2, 2009

TEL AVIV (Agence France-Presse) — A masked man opened fire on a crowd at a gay community center in Tel Aviv late Saturday, killing three people and wounding at least 10 others, the Israeli emergency services said. A young man and a young woman were killed on the spot and the third victim died in hospital, the authorities said, and one of those who were wounded was in serious condition. The gunman, who was dressed in black, unloaded an automatic weapon as he fired on the group of young gay men and lesbians near the entrance of the center, witnesses said, and he then ran away.

No one had been arrested by early Sunday. The Tel Aviv police chief, Shahar Ayalon, ordered the closing of a nearby gay bar in the city and urged such establishments to remain vigilant. Leaders of the gay community said they believed that the shooting was a homophobic attack. “It is not surprising that such a crime can be committed given the incitement of hatred against the homosexual community,” the president of Tel Aviv’s gay and lesbian community, Mai Pelem, told reporters. In the past, swastikas had been painted at the entrance to the center. The head of Israel’s gay and lesbian national association, Mike Hamel, said: “In our worst nightmares we could not have imagined that the hatred against our community, which is hurting nobody, could go this far.” The Israeli minister of internal security, Yitzhak Aharonovitch, said he thought that the attack had homophobic motives. He promised that the police would do everything possible to arrest the gunman, military radio reported. If the motive is confirmed, it would be the worst homophobic attack against Israel’s gay and lesbian community.

Such vastly different articles posted within 24 hours of each other. Makes me wonder if the first article, which I read last night, influenced some nut job to attack. :frown1: I hope not.