He held up a bank to get his own money

By the time Walid al-Hajjar stormed his bank armed with a jug of gasoline, four lighters and a willingness to set himself on fire, his wife's bone cancer was too far gone for him to save her.

But he wanted to make her more comfortable in the time remaining - treated with painkillers in a hospital rather than writhing in agony at home, he recalled. And the family had already accumulated tens of thousands of dollars in debt from friends and relatives that needed to be repaid.

Al-Hajjar, 48, had the money to pay for his wife's treatment. But like so many other Lebanese, his life savings was being held hostage in his bank account: The central bank has not allowed depositors to withdraw more than a few hundred dollars a month since a financial collapse in 2019.

So, like other desperate Lebanese before him - some of them similarly compelled by the need for medical...