4 endings for one black economy

Source: Nida Al Watan

Since the President of the Republic, Joseph Aoun, outlined in his inaugural address at the beginning of 2025 a roadmap for building a “state under the rule of law, with no mafias or security enclaves, no smuggling, money laundering, or drug trafficking,” it became clear that dismantling drug networks and their strongholds during his term would not be addressed as an isolated domestic security issue. Rather, it would be treated as part of a broader political choice, internally and externally, through which Lebanon seeks to reposition itself at a time of extreme regional and international sensitivity.

Accordingly, it was not surprising in the first year of the new mandate to witness the firmness shown by the military forces toward “protected” gangs. This approach formed part of a “national strategy” placed under the scrutiny of the entire world, with its ceiling defined by monopolizing the bearing of arms, investing in the army to control borders, preventing smuggling, combating terrorism, implementing international resolutions, and dismantling the system of the “illegal” economy. This economy had emerged from the convergence of international sanctions imposed on Syria with the expansion of the cash economy in Lebanon following the collapse of its national currency, using the intertwined Lebanese-Syrian borders as its corridor; especially during the war waged by Hezbollah in support of the former Bashar al-Assad regime.

The political decision first

The President of the Republic, as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and President of the Supreme Defense Council, understands the importance of political cover in supporting the military in one of its most difficult internal missions. Prior to assuming his new responsibilities, the military institution under his command had engaged in direct confrontations with drug trafficking and smuggling gangs, paying a heavy price in martyrs. However, during that phase, the balance of power remained tilted in favor of the networks, which drew their political and security cover from the influence of dominant forces in their areas—turning them into security islands beyond even the authority of the state.

Shifting local and regional power balances

The “superstar” persona of drug trafficker Nouh Zaiter in Baalbek-Hermel encapsulates the nature of the protection long afforded to drug gangs from the withdrawal of the Syrian army from Lebanon until the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime. The most notorious and controversial fugitive became a striking example of brazen impunity: appearing in the media, moving in armed convoys, attending official and unofficial events, and openly carrying weapons as a “fighter against takfiris.”

Zaiter benefited from Hezbollah’s narrative justifying its embrace of tribal environments in the Bekaa as reservoirs of military and security support. Like other drug traffickers, however, he turned this “tribal” patronage into a political and security umbrella that allowed him to conduct his “illegal” activities with complete ease.

Zaiter’s immunity did not appear threatened even after his name was placed on U.S. sanctions lists in 2023. Yet the fracture that struck Hezbollah following the loss of its Syrian ally, and the decline of its political arm’s influence after its fall as a resistance force against Israel in 2024, eroded the aura of inviolability surrounding environments once beyond the state’s reach. Nouh Zaiter, like other drug traffickers, was left without a ceiling or protection. This perhaps explains why he surrendered in what was described as a theatrical manner, in a scene that exposed years of previous impunity.

The state sends its messages with “Abu Salla”

Throughout 2025, the arrest of major drug traffickers accelerated at an unprecedented pace, accompanied by wide-ranging raids and the use of tools and methods previously unfamiliar. In tracking down fugitives, the military command carried out high-quality operations and did not hesitate to target them even using drones and helicopters. The first result of this firmness was the killing of Ali Mounzer Zaiter, known as “Abu Salla.”

Zaiter earned his nickname from his initial method of distributing drugs via a basket lowered from his balcony to deliver orders and collect payment, before his activity later expanded into broader networks.

According to journalistic information, he constituted a significant link in the intertwined drug trade system between Lebanese and Syrian territory. His name was associated with cross-border smuggling operations and networks extending from the Bekaa to the coast and onward to the Gulf.

According to a statement by the Directorate of Guidance, “Abu Salla” was wanted under more than one thousand arrest warrants, including crimes involving the killing of soldiers, kidnapping, and firing on army patrols. His killing in August 2025 thus sent a message to fugitives that the era of implicit settlements had ended, and that the ceiling of confrontation was nothing less than dismantling the combat infrastructure of drug traffickers; even at the cost of open confrontation. This reshuffled the cards within the environment hosting drug trafficking and smuggling networks, particularly in the Baalbek-Hermel region.

Adding to the disarray of drug gangs in the area was their loss of safe havens on the Syrian side of the border following the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime and the fading influence of the Fourth Division, the border partner in drug deals moving between the two sides.

When Nouh avoided the fate of Abu Salla and Hassouna

The army reinstated this equation of open confrontation in October of the same year, when one of its units clashed in the Charawneh neighborhood of Baalbek with a gang led by Hussein Jaafar, known as “Hassouna.” Hassouna met the same fate as Abu Salla, even though the military forces suffered losses, with the martyrdom of soldiers Bilal al-Baradaei and Ali Haidar.

At that point, Nouh Zaiter’s card began to fall definitively. He understood the message through the wide-scale raids on his and his family’s homes, prior to the ambush that led to his arrest.

Accounts differed regarding how Zaiter was apprehended. The army and its sources spoke of a security plan involving months of surveillance and pressure. Journalistic analyses, meanwhile, considered his arrest a legal exit that opened the door to an in-person trial overturning previous in absentia sentences, or a prelude to a general amnesty through which heavy security files would be reorganized; even if Nouh’s benefit from such an amnesty was deemed highly unlikely. His arrest, however, was undoubtedly a direct result of the security shift in confronting drug dens imposed by regional and international circumstances, even if it spared Nouh a fate similar to that of Abu Salla and Hassouna.

In Shatila: when the “suspicious man” came out to say “take me”

Drug dens in the Bekaa were not the only targets of military forces. One of the most significant expansions of operations in 2025 took place around the Shatila Palestinian refugee camp, where drug rooms were exposed following the killing of young Elio Abu Hanna.

After the brutal crime against the young man who had lost his way into the camp, the “suspicious man came out to say ‘take me’.” The aftermath revealed the spread of drug trafficking within one of the most fragile environments, exploiting poverty, urban density, and the absence of the state. The exposure of the “Shatila drug hangar” revealed a model of distribution centers fortified with weapons and fighters, from which drugs were dispatched to Beirut, the southern suburbs, and Mount Lebanon.

The significance of demolishing the hangar and arresting its manager, Hassan Naeimi (known as “Hassan Jarrafa,” sentenced to life imprisonment) after surveillance, tracking, and coordination with camp security, lay in breaking yet another link in the drug trade chain, regardless of the camps’ security sensitivities. These camps had long enjoyed a form of self-security and continue to raise many suspicions about serving as safe havens for fugitives from all regions of Lebanon.

A year of record seizures as well

Since the beginning of 2025, Lebanon has appeared to face a rare opportunity to cleanse its record of the reputation of being a “Captagon state.” This came amid clear Gulf and U.S. pressure and unprecedented intelligence cooperation, which, according to journalistic information, led to record seizures that, in just nine months, exceeded the total seized over five years. At the same time, with the implementation of the cannabis cultivation regulation law, the state proposed an alternative path aimed at legalizing cultivation for industrial and medical uses; a path that, if pursued through legal channels, could transform the “green gold of the Bekaa” from a black economy into a regulated activity.

Lebanon facing a test of Arab and international trust

The battle, however, does not appear to have been decided yet. Networks that grew like a spider’s web in impoverished areas (benefiting from economic, security, and even political collapse) cannot be dismantled by security measures alone. This explains concerns that campaigns against drug traffickers may remain merely a temporary response to external pressure, lacking sustainable conditions to restore Arab and Western trust in Lebanon.

Since 2021, this file has been one of the most prominent factors shaping Lebanon’s relations with Gulf states, particularly Saudi Arabia, following the ban on Lebanese imports over Captagon shipments. Despite initial signs of repairing this relationship in 2025, Arab (especially Gulf) states have been clear throughout that any economic or trade normalization with Lebanon is contingent upon tangible, not cosmetic, measures. This makes firmness in halting drug traffickers’ activities one of the conditions for reintegrating Lebanon into the “acceptable regional system.”

The test may not be easy, especially since concerned states are not only monitoring the number of detainees, but also their judicial fate and the continuity of procedures. A state that pledged to export abroad only “the best,” as stated in the President’s inaugural address, cannot afford once again the cost of exporting chaos under new names.

So will Lebanon, at the level of its legitimate authority, pursue a clear strategy to eliminate the “black economy” in 2026? Or will the notable steps taken in 2025 prove to be merely a way of buying time to gain the trust of the world, like previous attempts that failed on more than one front?