The 2026 elections: Why your registration and vote matter more than ever

Lebanon stands today at an exceptionally perilous crossroads. The margin for maneuvering, and the luxury of wasting time, has disappeared entirely. Amid political deadlock and deepening crises, the 2026 parliamentary elections emerge as the single most critical juncture through which the Lebanese still possess the ability to effect real change, away from the politics of accommodation and compromise that the ruling establishment employs in its dealings with Hezbollah.

At the same time, forces opposed to any structural transformation, chief among them Speaker Nabih Berri, Hezbollah, and the Free Patriotic Movement, are working to keep Lebanon outside the new regional trajectory built on stability, investment, and major cross-border economic integration projects. One of their most visible efforts today is the attempt to obstruct the participation of Lebanese expatriates in the upcoming elections by sowing confusion over the voting mechanism, particularly whether expatriate ballots will count toward six dedicated seats or toward the full 128-member parliament. The objective is clear: discourage expatriates from registering and voting.

This struggle reflects a broader clash between those seeking to push Lebanon toward regional progress and those determined to keep it trapped in paralysis and decline. The stakes will only grow as the 2026 elections approach, given that the next parliament will play a decisive role in shaping the policies, legislation, and agreements that will define the country’s future for decades.

For this reason, calls are intensifying for Lebanese expatriates to register and participate massively in the elections, especially from political forces aiming to dismantle the entrenched system built on the alliance between corruption and armed dominance, and to end the longstanding policy of coexistence with weapons outside state authority.

The irony is striking: the very political establishment that drove so many Lebanese to emigrate now faces those same expatriates as a potential engine of change. By registering and voting, they can join residents in “displacing” the system of corruption and armed control from positions of power and liberating national decision-making and state institutions from its grip.

Lebanon’s stability and peace require a new parliament, this is why you must register.

Placing all arms under the exclusive authority of the state requires an independent political will, this is why you must register.

Rebuilding Lebanon’s relations with Arab countries and the international community requires trustworthy political leaders, this is why you must register.

Restoring confidence and attracting tourism and global investment demand a state of institutions and law, not patronage and coercion, this is why you must register.

And your eventual return to Lebanon, to work, to live, to be close to your families, requires an economic revival grounded in transparency, accountability, and the rule of law. This, too, is why you must register and vote in large numbers to help bring down the entrenched system of corruption and arms that still dominates state decision-making and permeates its institutions.

Dismantling this destructive legacy is not the task of one group alone; it is a shared responsibility of both residents and expatriates. Registration and broad electoral participation are individual rights, yet they are also a national necessity. One day, when our children ask what we did for their future, we must be able to say: “Lebanese citizens, at home and abroad, united in the 2026 elections to defeat the mafia-militia system and reclaim their state.”