Today, September 12th, the Central Bank of Lebanon (BDL) officially lifted the subsidies on fuel imports completely, after they were gradually reduced during the past weeks. This means that Lebanese will now have to pay the price of fuel cans in Lebanese pounds based on the black market exchange rate of the USD. According to economists, fuel-importing companies will now resort to buying dollars from the black market, increasing the demand for US dollars and leading to a significant increase in the exchange rate on the black market. In parallel to the Central Bank of Lebanon’s decisive decision, most of…
Author: Salman Fayad
The research and advocacy organization, Legal Agenda, published on September 7th a report about illegal emigration from the northern shores of Lebanon to the shores of Europe. The report sheds light on the terrible and unprecedented economic crisis, severely hurting those already below the poverty line, and is the driving force behind the rising illegal emigration via “death boats.” Last week, a boat carrying about 57 passengers, including many children, sailed from the Lebanese coast and got stuck in the sea without food or drinkable water. “We do not know anything about them,” says Ahmed Barghul, a relative of an…
On Friday evening, September 9, two people were killed and one was injured when a group of unknown gunmen attempted to rob a mobile shop in Lebanon’s northern city of Tripoli. The gunmen stormed the shop by force of arms, using machine guns then threw grenade that didn’t explode. The Lebanese Army immediately deployed in the area and detonated the grenade that was thrown in front of the shop. Journalist Raed Al-Khatib told Sky News Arabia that “the security situation is unstable in the city, and there is information about a similar incident that happened in the Al-Qubba area in…
The Lebanese monthly magazine Information International warns, in its latest report published today, September 5th, of a dramatic and disastrous winter as heating costs will exceed 70 million LBP per residential unit, particularly those in the mountains. The power outage in Lebanon swells the crisis of heating with less than an hour of electricity per day while the price of buying a kilowatt from the private generators exceeds 15,000 LBP. The gas jar price rockets higher than 350,000 LBP, which is ineffective for heating in harsh weather. The price of diesel that most people in Lebanon use for heating exceeds…
A common statement published on August 29 by The Legal Agenda and the LGBTQ+ NGO Helem, issued that an appeal was filed last Thursday, August 25, at the state’s Shura Council in response to the Lebanese interior ministry’s Anti LGBTQ+ Decision. The Anti-LGBTQ+ Decision was released by Interior Minister Al-Mawlawi, on June 24, 2022, banning any and all meetings or gatherings related to what he called “the phenomenon of homosexuality”, which led to the cancellation of events and meetings for LGBTQ+. According to The Legal Agenda and Helem, the appeal is based on the minister’s illegitimate decision to issue such…
The Lebanese Minister of Culture, Judge Mohammed Al-Mortada, responded to the criticism against the Iranian regime, following the failed assassination attempt of writer Salman Rushdie. He tweeted a photo of Qasem Soleimani embracing Imam Hussain with a caption that ended with a controversial statement that translates as follows: “Were it not for the ayatollahs and the jihad of their children and allies […] many women would have been captives of Satan and his helpers.” The Mortada tweet comes in parallel with intimation and terrorizing activities against notable Lebanese opponents of Hezbollah: Lebanese journalist Dima Sadek is facing death and rape…
On August 3, the Photo-Journalist Hasan Shaaban filmed residents of the town of Beit Yahoun, south of Lebanon, protesting the water shortage for several consecutive days. That night, after the protest, Shaaban was attacked by Hezbollah supporters, and then they reiterated their threat to him the very next day with a bullet stuck in his car window. He awoke yesterday to find his car, which was parked in front of his house in Beit Yahoun, with a punctured tire and a piece of paper with the note stating: “Leave the village, you bastard spy.” Hasan Shaaban filed a claim against…
The Lebanese journalist Dima Sadek is again the target of an incitement death campaign calling for her killing publicly in response to her tweet on Saturday, August 13th. The tweet included a photo of the previous Iranian commander Qassem Soleimani and Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini with the caption “The Satanic Verses.” Her tweet came as a reaction to the attempt assassination of the British author Salman Rushdie while he was giving a lecture in west New York by a Lebanese descent in the US radicalized in Lebanon. Rushdie has been threatened with death since an Iranian “fatwa” was issued against him…
The author Salman Rushdie, whose writing led to death threats from Iran in the 1980s, was stabbed in the neck and abdomen on Friday, August 12, by a man who rushed the stage as the author was about to give a lecture at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York. Rushdie, 75-year-old, suffered significant injuries. He was rushed to the hospital by helicopter and taken into surgery. View this post on Instagram A post shared by VOA Kurdi (@voakurdi) He is currently on a ventilator and, according to Author Agent Wylie in an email update on Friday evening, “The news…
Bassam al-Sheikh Hussein, the depositor who stormed a federal bank branch in Hamra on Thursday, August 11th, in a desperate attempt to withdraw money from his own account, has just declared a hunger strike following his arrest. “In a phone call with his lawyer, he threatened to hang himself unless he was released as per the agreement made with him by the authorities,” according to Aljadeed. The 42-year-old man who had a $210,000 deposit at the Federal Bank of Beirut was able to recuperate $35,000 of it after carrying a shotgun and a gas canister, threatening to kill the customers and…
