UNIPATH STAFF
Lebanese security forces disrupted a major drug trafficking operation in a raid on the home of a drug lord with operations in the district of Matn, Mount Lebanon governorate, and the district of Keserwan, Keserwan-Jbeil governorate.
A search of the drug trafficker’s house uncovered stacks of money, packaging material and large amounts of imported cocaine.
Lebanese security forces have a long history of hunting down drug dealers and illicit crop farmers. During the instability and turmoil resulting from the civil war in Lebanon from 1975 to 1990, militias often used drug sales to increase power and influence.
In those years of turmoil, Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley produced annually up to 1,000 tons of hashish and 50 tons of opium to make heroin.
Despite Lebanese successes in suppressing the illegal trade in the years after the country’s civil war, the outbreak of war in Syria in 2011 stimulated production of narcotics again. Criminals established operations on an industrial scale in the Lebanese regions bordering Syria. Fertile soil and favorable climate made the Bekaa Valley ideal for cannabis cultivation.
Lebanese security forces have struck back. The most noteworthy drug seizure was the discovery in 2020 of 25 tons of hashish en route to the Port of Beirut for shipment to Africa.
In October 2018, security forces killed Ali Zaid Ismail, a notorious drug lord, along with seven others who had exchanged fire with a detachment from the Lebanese army in the town of Hamoudia in northeastern Lebanon.
Sources: Al Arabiya, Al Jazeera