Exclusive – Lebanese Govt. Failures Transform Litani River into Polluted Dump

Pollution in the Litani River. (NNA)
Pollution in the Litani River. (NNA)
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Exclusive – Lebanese Govt. Failures Transform Litani River into Polluted Dump

Pollution in the Litani River. (NNA)
Pollution in the Litani River. (NNA)

Lebanon’s Litani River Authority sent dozens of legal warnings to factories and municipalities over their dumping of waste and sewage in the county’s longest river. A video posted by the Authority and circulated on social media showed how the river was being transformed into a polluted dump.

Failure to address this problem can be blamed on successive government negligence and waste of water resources. The situation has deteriorated to such an extent that farmers are no longer using the river for their irrigation.

Pleas sent to the government since 2016 have failed in saving the river.

The 170-km long Litani crosses through 20 percent of Lebanese territory. It starts from the eastern Bekaa region and ends in the Mediterranean in the South. In addition to the waste being dumped into it, its banks have also been polluted by trash and dotted by construction violations. Furthermore, the over-use of its water for irrigation has led to a drop in its levels.

Lebanon approved in April a law to protect the Litani waters, but the violations have persisted, as have the warnings. Speaker Nabih Berri even highlighted the issue during his weekly meeting with lawmakers on Wednesday. He stressed the need to implement the water law and persecute the violators.

The parliamentary public works, transportation, energy and water committee is set to convene later this week to take the necessary decisions over the Litani.

Head of the Litani River Authority Sami Alawieh told Asharq Al-Awsat that telephone calls have not ceased from the sides who have been received complaints over their violations.

The files have since been sent to the judiciary “and it alone resolves this issue,” he stressed.

He vowed to continue his mission “until the end” to ensure that the wrongs against the people have been righted.

“The only salvation lies in implementing the Lebanese laws,” Alawieh said.

Power plants under threat

Four hydroelectric power plants have been constructed on the river and they are now all facing the possibility of being shut down due to the drop in water levels. Irrigation and fish farms along the river are also being threatened due to its pollution. Touristic sites along its banks have also been affected due to a drop in river levels.

Previous governments have made proposals on the need to clean up the Litani and its basin, but ultimately, the problem can only be solved by addressing the reasons that have left the environment in such a dire state.

Alawieh noted that the authorities approved a $70 million plan in 2016 to implement various projects on the Litani over a seven-year period. They include a sewage treatment plant and cleaning the lower and upper basins of the river. Indeed, he said, the Council for Development and Reconstruction has already kicked off work in these projects.

He noted, however, that studies on the sewage treatment plants were not thoroughly planned and the plants that have already started operation are not functioning properly enough to tackle the problems.

Moreover, there are delays in launching the construction of the remaining plants, he revealed.

“Even the construction of these plants have compounded the problem,” lamented Alawieh.

Proposals have been made to municipalities to take temporary measures to treat their sewage until permanent ones are found, he said.

Sewage and garbage

Alawieh remarked, however, that even these proposals were faced with hurdles, leading him to assert that the problem cannot be solved as long as the violations on the Litani remain.

“They must be ceased immediately,” he stressed.

These violations include garbage dumps that have been set up near the river basin or the river itself. Municipalities have also dumped their sewage in the river and dug arbitrary irrigation wells. Untreated industrial waste has also been dumped there.

Ministries, said Alawieh, should also be blamed for their lenient approach in addressing the problem. He singled out former Environment Minister Mohammed al-Mashnouq’s decision to simply extend deadlines to violators to resolve their transgressions.

Instead of sending warnings to factories at fault, they should have been forced to shut down their operations, he added. The Environment Ministry at the time claimed that it does not have the authority to close factories, saying that the government alone enjoyed such a power.

Legal warning have been sent by the Litani River Authority through the judiciary and great efforts have been exerted, through the cooperation of the security forces station in the Bekaa city of Zahle, to crackdown on factory violations, he told Asharq Al-Awsat.

He also urged the Environment Ministry to “rectify the decision” taken by Mashnouq.

The solution, he explained, calls for the ministries of industry, environment and energy and the Council for Development and Reconstruction to devise a time-frame for the implementation of the Litani projects in order to speed up their execution.

According to the law, the Litani River Authority does not have the power to crackdown on violations, which forced it to resort to the judiciary, Alawieh said.



What to Know About the Flash Floods in Texas That Killed over 100 People

 Firefighters from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico, transport a recovered body on the flooded Guadalupe River days after a flash flood swept through the area, Monday, July 7, 2025, in Ingram, Texas. (AP)
Firefighters from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico, transport a recovered body on the flooded Guadalupe River days after a flash flood swept through the area, Monday, July 7, 2025, in Ingram, Texas. (AP)
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What to Know About the Flash Floods in Texas That Killed over 100 People

 Firefighters from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico, transport a recovered body on the flooded Guadalupe River days after a flash flood swept through the area, Monday, July 7, 2025, in Ingram, Texas. (AP)
Firefighters from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico, transport a recovered body on the flooded Guadalupe River days after a flash flood swept through the area, Monday, July 7, 2025, in Ingram, Texas. (AP)

Flash floods in Texas killed at least 100 people over the Fourth of July holiday weekend and left others still missing, including girls attending a summer camp. The devastation along the Guadalupe River, outside of San Antonio, has drawn a massive search effort as officials face questions over their preparedness and the speed of their initial actions.

Here's what to know about the deadly flooding, the colossal weather system that drove it in and around Kerr County, Texas, and ongoing efforts to identify victims.

Massive rain hit at just the wrong time, in a flood-prone place

The floods grew to their worst at the midpoint of a long holiday weekend when many people were asleep.

The Texas Hill Country in the central part of the state is naturally prone to flash flooding due to the dry dirt-packed areas where the soil lets rain skid along the surface of the landscape instead of soaking it up. Friday's flash floods started with a particularly bad storm that dropped most of its 12 inches (30 centimeters) of rain in the dark early morning hours.

After a flood watch notice midday Thursday, the National Weather Service office issued an urgent warning around 4 a.m. that raised the potential of catastrophic damage and a severe threat to human life. By at least 5:20 a.m., some in the Kerrville City area say water levels were getting alarmingly high. The massive rain flowing down hills sent rushing water into the Guadalupe River, causing it to rise 26 feet (8 meters) in just 45 minutes.

Death toll is expected to rise and the number of missing is uncertain

In Kerr County, home to youth camps in the Texas Hill Country, searchers have found the bodies of 75 people, including 27 children, Sheriff Larry Leitha said Monday morning. Fatalities in nearby counties brought the total number of deaths to 94 as of Monday afternoon.

Ten girls and a counselor were still unaccounted for at Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp along the river.

For past campers, the tragedy turned happy memories into grief.

Beyond the Camp Mystic campers unaccounted for, the number of missing from other nearby campgrounds and across the region had not been released.

Gov. Greg Abbott on Sunday had said that there were 41 people confirmed to be unaccounted for across the state and more could be missing.

Kerrville City Manager Dalton Rice said during a Monday news conference he couldn't give an estimate of the number of people still missing, only saying “it is a lot.”

Officials face scrutiny over flash flood warnings

Survivors have described the floods as a “pitch black wall of death” and said they received no emergency warnings.

Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly, who lives along the Guadalupe River, said Saturday that “nobody saw this coming.” Officials have referred to it as a “100-year-flood,” meaning that the water levels were highly unlikely based on the historical record.

And records behind those statistics don’t always account for human-caused climate change. Though it’s hard to connect specific storms to a warming planet so soon after they occur, meteorologists say that a warmer atmosphere can hold more moisture and allow severe storms to dump even more rain.

Additionally, officials have come under scrutiny about why residents and youth summer camps along the river were not alerted sooner than 4 a.m. or told to evacuate.

Rice said Monday that he did not immediately know if there had been any communication between law enforcement and the summer camps between 1 a.m. and 4 a.m. on Friday. But Rice said various factors, including spotty cell service in some of the more isolated areas of Kerr County and cell towers that might have gone out of service during the weather, could have hindered communication.

Rice said officials want to finish the search and rescue and then review possible issues with cell towers, radios and emergency alerts.

Officials noted that the public can grow weary from too many flooding alerts or forecasts that turn out to be minor.

Kerr county officials said they had presented a proposal for a more robust flood warning system, similar to a tornado warning system, but that members of the public reeled at the cost.

Monumental clearing and rebuilding effort

The flash floods have erased campgrounds and torn homes from their foundations.

"It’s going to be a long time before we’re ever able to clean it up, much less rebuild it," Kelly said Saturday after surveying the destruction from a helicopter.

Other massive flooding events have driven residents and business owners to give up, including in areas struck last year by Hurricane Helene.

President Donald Trump said he would likely visit the flood zone on Friday.

AP photographers have captured the scale of the destruction, and one of Texas' largest rescue and recovery efforts.