Lebanon Faces Industrialists Exodus Triggered by Crisis with Gulf Countries

 Vice President of the Association of Lebanese Industrialists Ziad Bekdache
Vice President of the Association of Lebanese Industrialists Ziad Bekdache
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Lebanon Faces Industrialists Exodus Triggered by Crisis with Gulf Countries

 Vice President of the Association of Lebanese Industrialists Ziad Bekdache
Vice President of the Association of Lebanese Industrialists Ziad Bekdache

Since 2019, the Lebanese government has not been able to stop the economic collapse afflicting Lebanon. On the contrary, the state has resorted to political approaches that have been putting nails in the country’s coffin in general, and the economy in particular. Because of these irresponsible approaches, Arab Gulf states have shut down their doors to the livelihoods of the Lebanese, depriving them of access to the largest import market.

The crisis with Gulf states has prompted Lebanese industrialists to flee Lebanon, where they are paying a very steep price brought about by their state's inability to assume responsibilities.

Lebanon’s government has failed to arrest drug smugglers trafficking narcotics to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Adding fuel to the fire, former Foreign Minister Charbel Wehbe insulted Arab Gulf countries and falsely accused them of financing terrorism. At the same time, Information Minister George Kordahi criticized the coalition led by Saudi Arabia against Houthi terrorist militia in Yemen.

“Many of Lebanon's industrialists have already begun to study markets in other countries such as Oman and Egypt, and even Turkey and Cyprus, in search of a place to move their factories, while some closed their factories and dismantled their machines and actually moved,” Vice President of the Association of Lebanese Industrialists Ziad Bekdache told Asharq Al-Awsat.

“We went with a delegation of industrialists to Muscat some time ago to study the market there, and some rented factories while others were studying the possibility of moving,” added Bekdache.

Bekdache moves on to explain that, about four months ago, after a smuggled shipment of Captagon exported from Lebanon to Saudi Arabia was seized, food factories that export in large quantities to Saudi Arabia and Bahrain were forced to reduce production or dismantle their machines and move to other countries.

Lebanese food factories, according to Bekdache, rely heavily on their exports to Saudi Arabia.

Exports to the kingdom account for about 60%-65% percent of total production.

Bekdache adds that the untimely comments by Wehbe and Kordahi have led to the barring of all Lebanese exports to Saudi markets. This has spurred fear among Lebanese industrialists that Kuwait, Bahrain, and the UAE will also ban Lebanese products in their countries.

“Lebanon’s industries have received a very big blow, and the alternative plan will take time,” notes Bekdache.

Stressing that Lebanese industrialists cannot afford to lose access to Gulf markets, Bakdache said “all industrialists are in a stage of brainstorming to know where they will go with their industries next.”



Netanyahu Denounces Tactical Pauses in Gaza Fighting to Get in Aid

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) attends the Knesset plenum vote on the ultra-Orthodox conscription to military service law, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, 10 June 2024. (EPA)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) attends the Knesset plenum vote on the ultra-Orthodox conscription to military service law, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, 10 June 2024. (EPA)
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Netanyahu Denounces Tactical Pauses in Gaza Fighting to Get in Aid

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) attends the Knesset plenum vote on the ultra-Orthodox conscription to military service law, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, 10 June 2024. (EPA)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) attends the Knesset plenum vote on the ultra-Orthodox conscription to military service law, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, 10 June 2024. (EPA)

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized plans announced by the military on Sunday to hold daily tactical pauses in fighting along one of the main roads into Gaza to facilitate aid delivery into the Palestinian enclave.

The military had announced the daily pauses from 0500 GMT until 1600 GMT in the area from the Kerem Shalom Crossing to the Salah al-Din Road and then northwards.

"When the prime minister heard the reports of an 11-hour humanitarian pause in the morning, he turned to his military secretary and made it clear that this was unacceptable to him," an Israeli official said.

The military clarified that normal operations would continue in Rafah, the main focus of its operation in southern Gaza, where eight soldiers were killed on Saturday.

The reaction from Netanyahu underlined political tensions over the issue of aid coming into Gaza, where international organizations have warned of a growing humanitarian crisis.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who leads one of the nationalist religious parties in Netanyahu's ruling coalition, denounced the idea of a tactical pause, saying whoever decided it was a "fool" who should lose their job.

DIVISIONS BETWEEN COALITION, ARMY

The spat was the latest in a series of clashes between members of the coalition and the military over the conduct of the war, now in its ninth month.

It came a week after centrist former general Benny Gantz quit the government, accusing Netanyahu of having no effective strategy in Gaza.

The divisions were laid bare last week in a parliamentary vote on a law on conscripting ultra-Orthodox Jews into the military, with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant voting against it in defiance of party orders, saying it was insufficient for the needs of the military.

Religious parties in the coalition have strongly opposed conscription for the ultra-Orthodox, drawing widespread anger from many Israelis, which has deepened as the war has gone on.

Lieutenant-General Herzi Halevi, the head of the military, said on Sunday there was a "definite need" to recruit more soldiers from the fast-growing ultra-Orthodox community.

RESERVISTS UNDER STRAIN

Despite growing international pressure for a ceasefire, an agreement to halt the fighting still appears distant, more than eight months since the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas fighters on Israel triggered a ground assault on the enclave by Israeli forces.

Since the attack, which killed some 1,200 Israelis and foreigners in Israeli communities, Israel's military campaign has killed more than 37,000 Palestinians, according to Palestinian health ministry figures, and destroyed much of Gaza.

Although opinion polls suggest most Israelis support the government's aim of destroying Hamas, there have been widespread protests attacking the government for not doing more to bring home around 120 hostages who are still in Gaza after being taken hostage on Oct. 7.

Meanwhile, Palestinian health officials said seven Palestinians were killed in two air strikes on two houses in Al-Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza Strip.

As fighting in Gaza has continued, a lower level conflict across the Israel-Lebanon border is now threatening to spiral into a wider war as near-daily exchanges of fire between Israeli forces and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militia have escalated.

In a further sign that fighting in Gaza could drag on, Netanyahu's government said on Sunday it was extending until Aug. 15 the period it would fund hotels and guest houses for residents evacuated from southern Israeli border towns.