Amnesty International (Autor): „The State of the World's Human Rights; Lebanon 2025“, Dokument #2139340

Background

Lebanon ended more than two years of political deadlock with the election on 9 January of a president – Lebanese Armed Forces commander Joseph Aoun – and the formation of a government. On 13 January, parliament named Nawaf Salam as prime minister.

Despite a ceasefire agreement reached in November 2024, the Israeli military continued to conduct almost daily air strikes in southern Lebanon and the Bekaa region – and occasionally in other locations, including the capital, Beirut – targeting what they described as Hezbollah military locations and personnel.

On 18 February, Israel announced it would maintain a military presence in and temporarily control five “strategic” vantage points in southern Lebanon. On 27 February the Israeli defence minister said that Israeli forces were “staying indefinitely” in a buffer zone on the Israel-Lebanon border. In August, Israel’s prime minister linked Israel’s “phased reduction” of troops on Lebanese territories to the disarmament of Hezbollah.

As of 1 October, according to the OHCHR, the UN human rights office, Israeli military operations had killed 103 civilians in Lebanon since the ceasefire went into effect, and 80,000 people remained displaced.

Violations of international humanitarian law

The Israeli military’s air strikes on Lebanon caused extensive destruction and damage to civilian structures and agricultural land in southern Lebanon in violation of international humanitarian law.¹

Between 1 October 2024 and 26 January 2025, more than 10,000 structures were heavily damaged or completely destroyed, including homes, mosques, cemeteries, roads, parks and football pitches. In three municipalities, more than 70% of all structures were destroyed. Most of the destruction occurred outside active combat, and in the apparent absence of imperative military necessity as required under international humanitarian law. The destruction continued while a ceasefire agreement was in effect.

In October, after a visit to Lebanon, the UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial executions found that Israel’s attacks on first responders, hospital personnel and journalists raised serious concerns under international humanitarian law. He told journalists that the 13 October 2023 attack that killed Reuters photojournalist Issam Abdallah and wounded six other journalists appeared to be a war crime. He called on Lebanon to accept the jurisdiction of the ICC and to open domestic criminal investigations into potentially unlawful deaths.

Freedom of expression

A draft media law submitted to the parliamentary Justice and Administration Committee in May included positive advancements for freedom of expression, notably abolishing pretrial detention and prison sentences for speech-related offences and repealing criminal defamation and insult provisions from the Penal Code and military judiciary law. However, a number of proposed amendments under discussion risked undermining the right to freedom of expression, including reintroducing pretrial detention for “infringing on individuals’ dignity or private lives” and imposing blanket bans on media outlets publishing information about complainants during ongoing legal proceedings.

The Lebanese authorities continued to summon activists and journalists on criminal defamation and other vague charges in violation of the right to freedom of expression. More than 15 individuals were summoned, mostly following complaints by high-profile, influential political and finance figures.

On 15 February, judicial authorities summoned staff from independent outlets Daraj Media and Megaphone News after they published reports critical of candidates for the Central Bank governorship and of the government’s financial decisions. The complaint, filed by three lawyers in a private capacity, accused the outlets of “undermining the state’s financial standing” and “weakening national sentiment”.² In November the Court of Cassation’s public prosecutor summoned Megaphone News’s editor-in-chief and its director following a complaint filed on behalf of the former Cybercrimes Bureau chief.

In January the Lebanese government extradited Egyptian-Turkish poet Abdul Rahman Al-Qaradawi to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), based on a warrant issued by the Arab Interior Ministers Council, despite concerns from human rights organizations that extradition could put him at risk of serious human rights violations.³ During a visit to Syria in December 2024, Abdul Rahman Al-Qaradawi had filmed himself inside Damascus’s Umayyad Mosque criticizing the authorities of the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. On 28 December 2024 he was arrested by Lebanese General Security. Upon arrival in the UAE, he was forcibly disappeared. His whereabouts remained undisclosed at the end of the year (see United Arab Emirates entry).

Torture and other ill-treatment

Since the passing of the anti-torture law (law number 65/2017) in 2017, Amnesty International has documented dozens of complaints brought under the law that were not effectively investigated and never reached trial.

The State Shura Council, Lebanon’s highest administrative court, ordered the government to pay actor Ziad Itani reparations of LBP 480 million (approximately USD 5,360) for the authorities’ failure to prohibit, prevent and adequately investigate his allegations of torture and other ill-treatment. The council’s decision, issued on 5 December 2024 and made public on 10 March 2025, acknowledged the state’s failure to prohibit acts of torture, protect the presumption of innocence, and conduct the necessary investigations and prosecutions to ensure that perpetrators of torture and other ill-treatment are held accountable. By the end of the year, Ziad Itani had not received the court-ordered reparation.

Right to truth, justice and reparation

Five years after the Beirut Port explosion, which killed at least 236 people and injured more than 7,000, authorities had yet to deliver truth and justice for the victims and their families.

In February, after a two-year suspension, Judge Tarek Bitar resumed the investigation by summoning additional employees and officials implicated in the explosion. In March, prosecutor Jamal Hajjar overturned the measures imposed by his predecessor that had effectively frozen the investigation. Some of those summoned – including former prime minister Hassan Diab, Major General Abbas Ibrahim and Major General Tony Saliba – complied with the summons and appeared for questioning. However, other officials including two MPs – Ali Hassan Khalil and Ghazi Zaaiter – and the former prosecutor continued to obstruct the investigation by refusing to submit to questioning.

The government failed to pursue accountability for violations of international humanitarian law committed during the conflict with Israel by refraining from providing the ICC jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute crimes within the Rome Statute committed on Lebanese territory and ensure victims’ right to remedy.

Amnesty International documented repeated international humanitarian law violations committed by the Israeli military in Lebanon between 2023 and 2025, including strikes on healthcare facilities and vehicles in Beirut and in southern Lebanon.⁴ Amnesty International also documented multiple air strikes that killed civilians, including children, and destroyed civilian properties.

Right to social security

Despite limited reforms, Lebanon remained far from having a universal social protection system. Following the 2019 economic crisis, many families with children, older people and those unable to work still lacked access to affordable health insurance and basic income security.

In June the National Social Security Fund announced a series of changes to its end-of-service and family allowances, including higher employer contributions and increased benefits for employees, including increased family allowances. These changes were implemented from 1 July.

While a major step forward when adopted in 2024, the National Social Protection Strategy remained underfunded and under-implemented, and continued to exclude non-Lebanese communities, including migrants and refugees.

Women’s and girls’ rights

Women’s rights groups continued to advocate for a unified personal status law and rights including equal custody of children, full protection from domestic violence, and the ability of women to pass on their nationality to their children and foreign spouses. Under Lebanon’s nationality law, citizenship continued to be primarily passed down through the father.

On 2 September, MP Cynthia Zarazir submitted a proposal to parliament to amend Article 1 of the Lebanese Nationality Law to grant Lebanese nationality to children of Lebanese women. She announced the draft on 16 October, as part of the “My Nationality is a Right for Me and My Family” campaign, founded in 1999 by a group of affected rights holders.

Refugees’ and migrants’ rights

Lebanon continued to host a large number of refugees, including Syrians and Palestinians. While thousands of Syrians returned home after the ousting of former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in December 2024, as of 30 September, 636,051 Syrian refugees remained registered with UNHCR in Lebanon, according to the UN refugee agency. The government estimated that 1 million Syrian refugees remained in Lebanon and an additional 120,000 Syrian refugees had arrived after December 2024, escaping deadly tensions and violence in Syria’s coastal and southern regions (see Syria entry).

UNHCR said that, due to budget cuts, it had closed its reception centres in the cities of Tripoli, Akkar and Tyre, and the Bekaa area. By the end of September, only 25% of UNHCR’s required funding for programmes in Lebanon had been received. UNHCR had phased out all education and primary healthcare support by July, and by 1 December it ended secondary healthcare support, including hospitalization, maternity care and emergency admissions, leaving 85,000 refugees (40,000 formerly receiving primary care and 45,000 secondary care) without these services.

Right to a healthy environment

In August, UNICEF’s Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Programme in Lebanon reported that the country experienced its most severe drought in recent years, with the winter of 2024-5 bringing less than 50% of the average seasonal rainfall and minimal snow cover. This sharply reduced surface and groundwater availability, affecting rivers, reservoirs, springs and wells. A study by the Litani River National Authority, which manages Lebanon’s largest reservoir, found that climate change had contributed to the drought.

On 30 September the Ministry of the Environment submitted its third NDC, committing Lebanon to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 22% unconditionally, and 33% conditional on international support, based on a 2035 business-as-usual scenario. It also committed Lebanon to increase renewable energy generation to meet 25% of its electricity demand unconditionally, and 30% conditionally, also by 2035. This represented a small increase in Lebanon’s mitigation targets compared to its first NDC in 2020.