A year has passed since the earthquake that struck southeastern Turkey and northern Syria, while its waves reverberated as far as Macedonia, Greece, Lebanon and Palestine.
In Lebanon, the state dealt with the tremors resulting from the earthquake in a manner characterized by a lack of seriousness, for reasons not different from those in Turkey and Syria, as the form of the state in our region today does not give room for the interests of the people, especially with regard to housing and security.
In this piece, we review the way in which the state responded to the small tremors that followed February 6, and we imagine, through this text, what would have happened a year ago, or today, if an earthquake of this strength had struck Lebanon, and how the state would have responded, depending on the steps it took in the wake of the following disasters: the 1956 earthquake, the Beirut port bombing, and the earthquake that struck Lebanon as a result of the 2023 Turkey earthquake.
Read the original text in Arabic here.
Public Safety Decree: No Guarantee for People’s Safety, and No End to the Deterioration of the Urban Environment
Decree No. 14293 relating to “Requirements for General Safety in Buildings, Facilities and Elevator Equipment, and Fire and Earthquake Prevention”.
It was amended by Decree No. 7964, which is currently in force and issued on April 7, 2012.