William Noun, who lost his brother in the Beirut Port explosions, speaks during a demonstration by the victims' relatives in front of the Beirut Justice Palace on Jan. 8, 2026. (Credit: Mohammad Yassin/L’Orient-Le Jour)
The investigating judge in the case of the Beirut Port double explosion, Tarek Bitar, did not abuse his power during his investigation, as former public prosecutor Ghassan Oueidat had accused him of doing.
This was the decision issued on Thursday by Habib Rizkallah, an ad hoc-appointed investigating judge, ruling on the abuse-of-power complaint filed in January 2023 by the former chief public prosecutor at the Court of Cassation.
The ruling came shortly after a sit-in by relatives of the victims of the Aug. 4, 2020, tragedy, who had threatened to escalate pressure on Rizkallah to hand down his decision.
This decision was highly anticipated, as it would finally provide Bitar with a clear path to issue his long-awaited indictment.
Oueidat had accused Bitar of "assuming the quality of investigating judge and abuse of authority" after the latter decided to resume his probe into the case in January 2023, despite numerous complaints filed against him by political and security officials implicated in the double explosion — particularly due to the storage of thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate in a warehouse at the port without any safety measures.
In his decision, Rizkallah ended the proceedings against Bitar in this case, on the grounds that Oueidat had recused himself, as public prosecutor at the Court of Cassation, from any intervention in this file, especially due to his family ties with former minister Ghazi Zeaiter, who is also the focus of the investigation.
According to the ruling, Oueidat therefore lacked the required legal standing to initiate proceedings against the investigating judge.
Sit-in in front of Justice Palace
According to our information, Rizkallah sent the file to Judge Jamal Hajjar, the public prosecutor at the Court of Cassation, during the last week of November 2025, for his opinion on the case.
The latter reportedly left it to Rizkallah to decide whether Bitar had abused his power, without offering an opinion. In any case, Hajjar’s opinion, which was non-binding, would not have required Rizkallah to decide one way or another.
The Court of Cassation prosecutor’s office, as well as former customs director Badri Daher and Amal Movement MP Ali Hassan Khalil — both prosecuted in this case and who joined Oueidat’s complaint — have 24 hours to file an appeal with the indictment chamber once they are notified.
The decision by Rizkallah was announced after relatives of the victims of the Beirut Port explosions protested in front of the Beirut Justice Palace to press Rizkallah to rule on the complaint.
Cécile Roukoz, the sister of Joseph Roukoz, who was killed in the tragedy, considered the time taken by the magistrate to issue his decision as "procrastination."
"This enshrines the principle of the non-independence of Judge Bitar's work," she told our on-site journalist.
William Noun, whose brother was killed on Aug. 4, 2020, in turn called on President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam to "put pressure on the judiciary" for Rizkallah to rule on the complaint against Bitar, also criticizing the time taken to decide the matter.
More than five years after the tragedy, which killed more than 220 people, injured 6,500 others, and devastated entire neighborhoods of Beirut, the investigation is still stagnating due to political interference.
This article was translated from L'Orient-Le Jour.
