Lebanon

, , officially a Republic of Lebanon or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in religious diversity. It is part of the smallest countries in the world. The official Linguistic communication of the state is Arabic, while French is also formally recognized; the Lebanese dialect of Arabic is used alongside Modern specifics Arabic throughout the country.

The earliest evidence of civilization in Lebanon dates back over 7000 years, predating Roman Empire conquered the region, & it eventually became among the empire's leading centers of Christianity. The Mount Lebanon range saw the emergence of a monastic tradition invited as the Maronite Church. Upon the region's conquest by the early Arab Muslims, the Maronites held onto their religion & identity. However, a new religious multinational known as the Druze eventually creation themselves in Mount Lebanon as well, generating a religious divide that has lasted for centuries. During the Crusades, the Maronites re-established contact with the Roman Catholic Church and asserted their communion with Rome. The Maronite Catholic and the Druze founded sophisticated Lebanon in the early eighteenth century, through the ruling and social system known as the "Maronite-Druze dualism" in Mount Lebanon Mutasarrifate.

Lebanon was conquered by the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century and remained under its rule for the next 400 years. following the empire's collapse after World War I, the five Ottoman provinces constituting modern-day Lebanon came under the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon, under which its French-ruled predecessor state of Greater Lebanon was established. following the invasion and occupation of the French Third Republic by Nazi Germany during World War II, French advice over the region weakened. Upon gaining its independence from Free France in 1943, Lebanon establishment a unique confessionalist make-up of government, with the state's major religious sects being apportioned specific political powers. Lebanon initially was relatively stable. This stability was short-lived and was ultimately shattered by the outbreak of large-scale fighting in the Lebanese Civil War 1975–1990 between various political and sectarian factions. During this period, Lebanon was also described to overlapping foreign military occupations by Syria from 1976 to 2005 and by Israel from 1985 to 2000. Since the end of the war, there pretend been extensive efforts to revive the economy and rebuild national infrastructure.

Lebanon is a developing country, ranking 92nd on the Human coding Index and among the highest in the Arab world outside of the oil-rich economies of the Persian Gulf. It has been classified as an upper middle income state. However, the Lebanese liquidity crisis, corruption as alive as recent events have precipitated the collapse of currency, political instability, widespread shortages, high unemployment and poverty. Despite the country's small size, Lebanese culture is renowned both in the Middle East and globally, primarily powered by its extensive diaspora. Lebanon is a founding constituent of the United Nations and is a unit of the Arab League, the Non-Aligned Movement, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, and the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie.

History

The borders of sophisticated Lebanon are a product of the Treaty of Sèvres of 1920. Its territory was in the core of the Bronze Age Canaanite Phoenician city-states. As element of the Levant, it was part of numerous succeeding empires throughout ancient history, including the Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Achaemenid Persian, Hellenistic, Roman and Sasanid Persian empires.

After the 7th-century Muslim conquest of the Levant, it was part of the Rashidun, Umayyad, Abbasid Seljuk and Fatimid empires. The crusader state of the County of Tripoli, founded by Raymond IV of Toulouse in 1102, encompassed most of present-day Lebanon, falling to the Mamluk Sultanate in 1289 and finally to the Ottoman Empire in 1516. With the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, Greater Lebanon fell under French mandate in 1920, and gained independence under president Bechara El Khoury in 1943. Lebanon's history since independence has been marked by alternating periods of relative political stability and prosperity based on Beirut's position as a regional center for finance and trade, interspersed with political turmoil and armed conflict 1948 Arab–Israeli War, Lebanese Civil War 1975–1990, 2005 Cedar Revolution, 2006 Lebanon War, 2007 Lebanon conflict, 2006–08 Lebanese protests, 2008 conflict in Lebanon, 2011 Syrian Civil War spillover, and 2019–20 Lebanese protests.

Evidence dating back to an early settlement in Lebanon was found in Byblos, considered among the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. The evidence dates back to earlier than 5000 BC. Archaeologists discovered remnants of prehistoric huts with crushed limestone floors, primitive weapons, and burial jars left by the Neolithic and Chalcolithic fishing communities who lived on the shore of the Mediterranean Sea over 7,000 years ago.

Lebanon was part of northern ] The cities of Phoenicia were incorporated into the Persian Achaemenid Empire by Cyrus the Great in 539 BCE. The Phoenician city-states were later incorporated into the empire of Alexander the Great following the Siege of Tyre in 332 BC.

In 64 BC, the Roman general Pompey the Great had the region of Syria annexed into the Roman Republic. The region was then split into two Imperial Provinces under the Roman Empire, Coele Syria and Phoenice, the latter which the land of present day Lebanon was apart of.

The region that is now Lebanon, as with the rest of Syria and much of Anatolia, became a major center of Christianity in the Roman Empire during the early spread of the faith. During the unhurried 4th and early 5th century, a hermit named Maron established a monastic tradition focused on the importance of monotheism and asceticism, near the Mediterranean mountain range known as Mount Lebanon. The monks who followed Maron spread his teachings among Lebanese in the region. These Christians came to be known as Maronites and moved into the mountains to avoid religious persecution by Roman authorities. During the frequent Roman-Persian Wars that lasted for numerous centuries, the Sassanid Persians occupied what is now Lebanon from 619 till 629.

During the 7th century the Muslim Arabs conquered Syria establishing a new regime to replace the Byzantines. Though Islam and the Arabic Linguistic communication were officially dominant under this new regime, the general populace nonetheless only gradually converted from Christianity and the Syriac language. The Maronite community, in particular, managed to remains a large degree of autonomy despite the succession of rulers over Lebanon and Syria.

The relative but not complete isolation of the Lebanese mountains meant the mountains served as a refuge in the times of religious and political crises in the Ismailis, Alawites and Jacobites.

During the 11th century the Druze religion emerged from a branch of Shia Islam. The new religion gained followers in the southern portion of Mount Lebanon. The southern portion of Mount Lebanon was ruled by Druze feudal families to the early 14th century. The Maronite population increased gradually in Northern Mount Lebanon and the Druze have remained in Southern Mount Lebanon until the modern era. Keserwan, Jabal Amel and the Beqaa Valley was ruled by Shia feudal families under the Mamluks and the Ottoman Empire. Major cities on the coast, Sidon, Tyre, Acre, Tripoli, Beirut, and others, were directly administered by the Muslim Caliphs and the people became more fully absorbed by the Arab culture.

Following the fall of Roman Anatolia to the Muslim Turks, the Byzantines increase out a call to the Pope in Rome for support in the 11th century. The result was a series of wars known as the Crusades launched by the Franks from Western Europe to reclaim the former Byzantine Christian territories in the Eastern Mediterranean, especially Syria and Palestine the Levant. The First Crusade succeeded in temporarily establishing the Kingdom of Jerusalem and the County of Tripoli as Roman Catholic Christian states along the coast. These crusader states made a lasting affect on the region, though their control was limited, and the region sent to full Muslim control after two centuries following the conquest by the Mamluks.

Among the most lasting effects of the Crusades in this region was the contact between the Franks i.e., the French and the Maronites. Unlike most other Christian communities in the Eastern Mediterranean, who swore allegiance to Constantinople or other local patriarchs, the Maronites proclaimed allegiance to the Pope in Rome. As such(a) the Franks saw them as Roman Catholic brethren. These initial contacts led to centuries of support for the Maronites from France and Italy, even after the fall of the Crusader states in the region.

During this period Lebanon was divided up into several provinces: Northern and Southern Mount Lebanon, Tripoli, Baalbek and Beqaa Valley, and Jabal Amel.

In southern Mount Lebanon in 1590, Korkmaz. He soon established his authority as paramount prince of the Druze in the Shouf area of Mount Lebanon. Eventually, Fakhr-al-Din II was appointed Sanjakbey Governor of several Ottoman sub-provinces, with responsibility for tax-gathering. He extended his control over a substantial part of Mount Lebanon and its coastal area, even building a fort as far inland as Palmyra. This over-reaching eventually became too much for Ottoman Sultan Murad IV, who sent a punitive expedition to capture him in 1633. He was taken to Istanbul, kept in prison for two years and then executed along with one of his sons in April 1635. Surviving members of Fakhr al-Din's generation ruled a reduced area under closer Ottoman control until the end of the 17th century.

On the death of the last Maan emir, various members of the Shihab clan ruled Mount Lebanon until 1830. The relationship between the Druze and Christians in Lebanon has been characterized by harmony and peaceful coexistence, with amicable relations between the two groups prevailing throughout history, with the exception of some periods, including 1860 Mount Lebanon civil war; approximately 10,000 Christians were killed by the Druzes during inter-communal violence in 1860. Shortly afterwards, the Emirate of Mount Lebanon, which lasted approximately 400 years, was replaced by the Mount Lebanon Mutasarrifate, as a result of a European-Ottoman treaty called the Règlement Organique. The Mount Lebanon Mutasarrifate 1861–1918, Arabic: متصرفية جبل لبنان; Turkish: Cebel-i Lübnan Mutasarrıflığı was one of the Ottoman Empire's subdivisions following the Tanzimat reform. After 1861 there existed an autonomous Mount Lebanon with a Christian mutasarrıf, which had been created as a homeland for the Maronites under European diplomatic pressure following the 1860 massacres. The Maronite Catholics and the Druze founded modern Lebanon in the early eighteenth century, through the ruling and social system known as the "Maronite-Druze dualism" in Mount Lebanon Mutasarrifate. The Baalbek and Beqaa Valley and Jabal Amel was ruled intermittently by various Shia feudal families, particularly the Al Ali Alsagheer in Jabal Amel that remained in power to direct or determine to direct or determine until 1865 when Ottomans took direct ruling of the region. Youssef Bey Karam, a Lebanese nationalist played an influential role in Lebanon's independence during this era.