The Right to Water in Lebanon: Inequality, Ecological and Austerity Crises - Roland Riachi
This research is a part of the Arab Watch Report 2025 on the right to Water and Climate Change.
The Right to Water in Lebanon: Inequality, Ecological and Austerity Crises - Roland Riachi
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Lebanon experienced one of its driest winters on record in 2025; rainfall levels dropped by more than 50% compared to previous years. Despite the existence of a national early warning system platform (NEWSP), no drought control or mitigation measures were triggered, highlighting the persistent gap between institutional frameworks, donor funding, and actions. Already in 2022, UNICEF (2022) found that per capita water supplies from Lebanon’s public water authority were alarmingly “falling short of the 35 liters a day considered to be the minimum acceptable quantity" (UNICEF, 2022).
Lebanon faces a severe and multifaceted water crisis driven by an interplay of climate change, resource depletion, pollution, systemic mismanagement, entrenched power dynamics, impacts of economic crisis, and war. While exacerbated by the monetary system collapse in October 2019, the sector’s situation has deeper historical roots from Ottoman and French mandate laws and foundational institutions, Cold War politics, and more contemporary neoliberal reforms driven by international donors. They were all structured around the country's confessional political system. Despite substantial foreign aid and investment in large-scale infrastructure projects over the last three decades, the situation has worsened, highlighting a fundamental disconnect between policies, development indebtedness, and challenging realities.
Under dire financial conditions since the 2019 economic collapse, the sector has been struggling to pay operational costs, lacking fuel to run pumping stations, and with no chlorine or spare parts to maintain a functioning network. As a consequence of this failure, most households are increasingly relying on costly, often unsafe informal water sources since the crisis began. The uncontrolled pumping from wells, along with hazardous illegal pollutant dumping, has led to a resurgence of diseases like cholera over the last few years, which were thought to be under control.
Compounding this structural crisis, between October 2023 and November 2024, repeated Israeli strikes on Lebanon’s civilian water infrastructure, including pumping stations, pipelines, reservoirs, and sewage systems, caused widespread destruction concentrated in the South and Nabatieh governorates. An estimated 26 publicly operated water pumping facilities and 28 water pipeline networks were damaged (Action Against Hunger, 2025). Farmers lost irrigation networks such as the Litani–Qasmieh project, which once watered 6,000 hectares of crops, undermining food security and livelihoods. By March 2025, the World Bank estimated that 64% of community reservoirs, 58% of pumping stations, and nearly a quarter of treatment plants had been destroyed or damaged in the area (World Bank, 2025). The bombardment is estimated to have caused losses of USD 171 million in the water sector.
Lebanon’s water sector has undergone significant structural transformations over the past decades, largely influenced by globalized policy paradigms driven by international donors. The fragmentation within institutional frameworks and entrenched confessional zuama, coupled with ineffective donor-driven policies lacking contextual relevance, impedes the effective provision of the service. The intensive utilization of aquifers for an export-led agricultural model exacerbates this precarious situation. Addressing the right to water in Lebanon needs to delve into those socio-political and ecological factors that have historically shaped and are still shaping access, use, and abuse of this essential resource. As we examine the evolution of water use and distribution, institutions, and water legal frameworks, it becomes evident that a radical change is utmost needed.
The first section of the chapter examines Lebanon’s most pressing water challenges, including climate change, resource depletion, and pollution, to highlight the environmental and systemic pressures. The second section explores water production, distribution, and consumption, revealing deep inequalities shaped by mismanagement, infrastructure deficiencies, and socio-economic disparities. Moving forward, the third section critically engages with legal pluralism and governance failures under austerity. Finally, the fourth section considers alternative approaches to securing an unconditional and universal right to water in Lebanon.
