Beirut

Founded by Phoenicians and shaped by Ottoman rule, the French mandate and a fifteen-year civil war, Beirut has 2.4 million people in its metropolitan area. The 2020 port explosion killed over 200 people and destroyed much of the commercial waterfront, with the World Bank estimating damage at $3.8-4.6 billion; Lebanon's financial collapse, which began in 2019, wiped out middle-class savings and drove emigration at a scale not seen since the civil war era.

For decades the rest of the city functioned on an informal understanding that conflict was contained to Dahiyeh, Hezbollah's southern suburb; the 2026 war ended that understanding, with Israeli strikes reaching the Ramada hotel, the Aisha Bakkar neighbourhood and the Ramlet al-Baida seafront from March 2026 Onward.

Beirut is the seat of the Lebanese Republic under Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, whose government cannot control the armed actors on Lebanese soil but has sought to reassert state sovereignty through diplomatic and legal channels rather than force.