The women who rewrote Lebanese justice

On International Women Judges Day, Lebanon has a legacy of progress to celebrate. The transformation of its judiciary tells the story of women who entered institutions that were not built for them and, through persistence, helped reshape them from within. From two pioneering appointments in 1965 to nearly half of Lebanon’s judiciary today, the rise of women on the Lebanese bench represents one of the country’s most consequential institutional transformations.

A beginning that required bravery

The story begins in 1965, during Charles Helou’s presidency, when Katina Gholam and Georgette Arbid Chidiac became the first women ever appointed as judges in Lebanon. The significance of their appointment lies in what Lebanon’s judiciary represented at the time: a fortress of masculine tradition, staffed almost entirely by men and governed by norms that treated female authority in public life as an aberration. Gholam and Chidiac did not enter a welcoming institution. They entered one that had not expected them and was not certain it wanted them.

Eight years later, in 1973, Arlette Jreissati became the first woman with formal judicial education to enter the Lebanese judiciary, strengthening the professional credibility of women’s presence on the bench.

The next turning point came in 2006, when Feryal Hussein Dalloul was appointed to the Supreme Judicial Council, the highest judicial body in the country. Approved by then–Prime Minister Fouad Siniora alongside four colleagues, Dalloul became the first woman to reach that level and the youngest appointee on the council.

The weight of numbers

Today, women account for 48 percent of Lebanon’s 543 serving judges.

This shift did not happen by accident. A quota system designed to ensure women’s sustained representation at every tier of the judicial hierarchy has provided structural support for what early pioneers achieved through sheer determination. It is a reminder that representation requires both individual courage and institutional design that inspiration alone is insufficient without mechanisms that make progress durable.

Beyond representation: The case for diverse justice

The case for women on the bench is often framed in symbolic terms that representation matters. That is true, but it is only part of the argument. The deeper point is that diverse courts produce stronger justice.

Judges are human beings who bring to the bench the experiences that shape their understanding of power, vulnerability, family, violence, work, and loss. A judiciary composed entirely of one demographic is not neutral, it is partial, blind to entire categories of human experience.

When women sit on criminal panels, rule on constitutional questions, interpret commercial contracts, or adjudicate land disputes, they bring perspectives that legal training alone cannot provide. They ask different questions. They notice different silences.

The work that remains

Lebanon’s progress deserves to be recognized and celebrated as evidence that change is possible even within institutions designed to resist it.

But celebration must not become complacency.

The women who transformed Lebanese justice did not wait for permission. They entered courtrooms that doubted them and proved ruling by ruling, year by year that the doubt was never warranted.