Lebanon

Policy Watch

The website of the Directorate General of Urban Planning: An Incomplete Step Toward Transparency

On January 31, the website of the Directorate General of Urban Planning was launched, with the aim of enhancing transparency and facilitating access to information. While this is seen as a long-awaited move toward transparency and accountability, it is considered incomplete and does not absolve the Directorate of its core responsibilities.

Statement

A Call to Protect Cultural Properties following the Israeli Aggressions on Lebanon

Following the Israeli aggression against Lebanon, which killed thousands of civilians and targeted a large number of villages and towns in the southern and Bekaa regions, in addition to the southern suburbs of …

Article

A Ministry of Development, Planning and Housing: What We Need at This Stage

In the context of the ongoing debate around the need for a Ministry of Planning, this article provides an overview of the Ministry’s history, stressing the importance of establishing such a ministry, to produce a comprehensive vision of the political economic plan for the State and regions, especially at the level of land regulation.

Interactive Map

Distribution of Sunni, Orthodox, and Maronite Endowment Lands (Waqf) in Mount Lebanon and Beirut

The map and article is not yet translated, refer to the Arabic version here.

Law Commentary

Enacting a law to extend rental contract deadlines: An insufficient measure to safeguard the right to housing

The Lebanese government’s new law suspends legal, judicial, and contractual deadlines to protect citizens’ rights during the Israeli aggression. However, concerns persist about its long-term effectiveness, especially regarding housing security and old rental tenants.

Study

Squatting Vacant Buildings: A Report on the Illegality of Evictions During the War

During the Israeli war on Lebanon, the use of vacant buildings proliferated as a prominent way to access housing due to the lack of alternatives. In an attempt to understand these practices, this report documents the legal and political tools used for evictions and eviction threats in 3 case studies in Beirut, highlighting their illegitimacy. It also calls for challenging the criminalization of squatting, particularly during war, and emphasizes the role of these practices in restoring the social value of vacant buildings.

Law Commentary

 The Reconstruction Draft Law repeats the Mistakes of the past:

Reviving destroyed villages can’t happen only through buildings

After a ceasefire was implemented in Lebanon on November 27, the Lebanese government held a special session on December 7 in the southern city of Tyre and approved a draft law for rebuilding homes destroyed by Israeli attacks, as they were before. Regardless of its immediate issues in terms of content, it appears that the proposed law does not address the previous or emerging challenges we are facing and risks repeating the mistakes of past failed reconstruction experiences.

Field Watch

 In Bir Hassan, Eviction After Displacement, Under the Pressure of Real Estate Development, and the Pretext of Protecting the Safety of Residents

After a long history of threatening families displaced by the Lebanese Civil War with eviction from a residential building in Bir Hassan under the pretext of being “illegal occupants,” and following failed negotiations, …

Narrative

Under the Bombs: who supervises the work of NGOs working with the refugees?

Amid airstrikes in southern Lebanon, Walid and his family fled Nabatieh and entered a cycle of displacement. His story sheds light on systemic failures in addressing refugee needs by both the government and refugee aid organizations in time of war.

Report

When the Emergency Plan Fails in Practice: A Critical Reading of Crisis Management

This report, produced after the ceasefire was announced, offers an evaluation and critique to the national emergency plan, highlighting its content flaws and execution failures based on field observations and the experiences of those impacted by the Israeli war.

Investigation

How Sound Builds New Walls: Warscapes and the Safe City Map

The damage of the war was not limited to the residents of the targeted areas; its brutality extended to most of the Lebanese territories. The echoes of these attacks reached areas far from the bombing, as a result of the violation of the Lebanese skies by hostile Israeli warplanes and drones. This text is an attempt to explore sound as a war tool, used by the Israeli killing machine to support its war against us.

Law Commentary

Solutions to Adapt to the Conditions of War: A Temporary Fix that Conceals the Necessity of Reforming Property and Construction Laws.

A Joint Commentary by Public Works Studio and Legal Agenda

The proposed draft law, submitted on November 19, 2024, suggests extending the validity of Law 294/2022 for five more years and applying some modifications to certain clauses. The law is proposed with the …