Outgoing Interior and Municipalities Minister Bassam Mawlawi asked the General Directorate of the Internal Security Forces (ISF) to take the necessary legal measures to prevent the expansion of informal settlements of Syrian refugees and the construction of new ones, within a radius of 200 meters from the course of the Litani River in the Baalbeck-Hermel and the Bekaa districts.

The initiative, carried out on the recommendation of the Litani River Authority, aims to mitigate environmental degradation, according to the written document on the subject that we were able to consult. “The transmission document,” dated November 21, 2024, bears the signature of the Interior Minister.

Against a backdrop of escalating armed conflict between Hezbollah and Israel over the past two months, after a year of cross-border exchanges, more than 540,000 people have fled Lebanon for Syria, reported the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on Nov. 19, 2024. Of these, 63 percent were Syrians and 37 percent were Lebanese. In addition, 886,000 Lebanese and Syrians have been displaced within Lebanon, according to figures from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the UNHCR.

“The aim of such a measure is to prevent new refugees from settling on the banks of the Litani, further polluting the river, in a context of major population displacements and mass departures of Syrian refugees in Syria,” Sami Alawieh, Director of the Litani Office, explained to L'Orient-Le Jour. “When they left, some Syrian families wanted to give up their tents near the river to other refugees. But we reacted quickly, with the help of the Interior Minister and the Internal Security Forces, to prevent any deterioration in the Litani's environmental situation,” he added.