Souhaib Ayoub Imagines Love Story Amid Israeli Bombardments and Displacement in Wadi Khaled

Souhaib Ayoub is a novelist, playwright, and journalist, and in a literary text published in L’Orient-Le Jour he imagines a fictional love story unfolding amid war between a protagonist from a stateless Bedouin community in Wadi Khaled and his Beirut-born lover, Ralph.

“Romans Le loup de la famille Dans un immeuble délabré d’un quartier populaire de Tripoli, plusieurs histoires s’entrecroisent : celle de Hassan, d’abord, adolescent fantasque, insomniaque et mutique, loup solitaire maltraité par ses congénères et qui prétend entrer en communication avec les morts ; puis celles de son père Ziad, tombé follement amoureux dans sa jeunesse d’une prostituée transgenre ; de sa mère Saadiyé, le seul être qu’il aime au monde ; de sa grand-mère surtout, Chamsé, issue d’une tribu bédouine, dont le cadavre mutilé sera découvert dans le fleuve qui traverse la ville”

Etonnants Voyageurs

The story is set against the backdrop of Israeli bombardments and the forced displacement of part of the population, and the bond between the two characters is presented as offering a glimpse into divisions within Lebanese society under the shadow of exile.

L’Orient Today frames the piece as “A night of feverish kisses,” and it identifies the lovers through “The lovers. (Artist: Souhaib Ayoub)” alongside the byline “By Souhaib Ayoub, 16 May 2026 07:26.”

In the same L’Orient-Le Jour text, the narrative moment is rendered through the line “He slipped his wet tongue into Ralph’s mouth,...” as the fictional relationship plays out amid the conflict.

The work is also linked to Ayoub’s broader authorship, including “Rajol min Satin (Hachette Antoine, Lebanon, 2019)” and “Dhi’b al-ʿā’ila (Hachette Antoine, Lebanon, 2019), translated into French by Actes Sud in 2025.”

Alongside the fictional plot, L’Orient Today includes a “Voices from the Middle East” prompt attributed to Samah Karaki: “We cannot count on empathy to save us.”

Karaki’s line is paired with the question “Weren't they the journey itself?” in the same section, positioning the relationship’s emotional stakes against the broader conditions of displacement.

“VOICES FROM THE MIDDLE EAST A night of feverish kisses L'OLJ / By Souhaib Ayoub, 16 May 2026 07:26”

L'Orient Today

The L’Orient Today framing ties the lovers’ bond to “some of the divisions within Lebanese society under the shadow of exile,” while the war setting is explicitly anchored to Israeli bombardments.

In the same publication, the byline and timestamp “By Souhaib Ayoub, 16 May 2026 07:26” situate the text as a contemporary literary intervention rather than a historical retelling.

The article’s presentation also repeats that the protagonist is from a stateless Bedouin community in Wadi Khaled and that Ralph is Beirut-born, keeping the central contrast between origins and belonging at the center of the “A night of feverish kisses” framing.

Etonnants Voyageurs describes Ayoub’s novelistic approach as interweaving multiple stories in “un immeuble délabré d’un quartier populaire de Tripoli,” where Hassan claims to “entrer en communication avec les morts.”

“VOICES FROM THE MIDDLE EAST A night of feverish kisses L'OLJ / By Souhaib Ayoub, 16 May 2026 07:26”

Today

That same description places Ayoub’s work in a broader style marked by “beaucoup de tendresse” and “une remarquable liberté de ton,” while also noting “une ironie mordante” as the narrative “oscille constamment entre passé et présent, rêve et réalité.”

It further credits Ayoub with “calquant son récit sur les chemins de traverse, impasses, réseaux et strates enfouies de Tripoli,” and it highlights how he “Brouillant les frontières entre les sexes, les générations, les espaces géographiques et les formes narratives.”

The Etonnants Voyageurs account also specifies that the cadaver of Chamsé, “issue d’une tribu bédouine,” is discovered in the river that crosses the city, and it names the translator as “Traduit de l’arabe (Liban) par Stéphanie Dujols.”

Taken together with the L’Orient-Le Jour piece, the two portrayals keep Ayoub’s settings rooted in Lebanese geography—Tripoli and Wadi Khaled—while centering characters whose lives are shaped by violence, displacement, and the boundaries between reality and imagination.