The amount of debris resulting from the 2024 war in Lebanon is estimated at millions of tons, with official figures indicating around 22 million tons across various affected areas, including between 2 and 3.9 million tons in Beirut’s southern suburb alone, according to a report issued by the National Council for Scientific Research (CNRS) and published on December 23, 2024, less than a month after the ceasefire.

This does not include the remnants of the latest war. These figures are part of a broader context of challenges linked to reconstruction, with the debris issue emerging as one of the most complex environmental and logistical files. So what is actually happening on the ground, and who is managing and overseeing the debris file?

According to Haitham Bazzi, the regional director of Public Works in the south, “The decision on how to handle the debris is made by the Cabinet, which assigns different executive bodies depending on the regions. In 2024, the Southern Council was tasked with debris removal in southern Lebanon, while the Higher Relief Commission managed the file in Beirut, the Bekaa, and the southern suburb. The role of the Ministry of Public Works is limited to opening roads and removing obstacles, without legal authority to remove debris.”

Bazzi explains to “Annahar” that the debris removal process is subject to precise legal procedures, requiring approval from the property owners themselves through forms signed by all building owners, in addition to the signatures of the mayor and the Southern Council engineer, as the law prohibits debris removal without the consent of the property owners.

In February 2025, the government created a list of 42 temporary sites designated to receive the debris, as part of efforts to organize its collection and preliminary processing.

The project consists of four main components, including immediate response through the financing of urgent measures to ensure recovery readiness, among them safe and organized debris management within an approach aimed at reintegrating about 70% of the debris into the circular economy through reuse or recycling, while isolating 30% as inert materials.

Despite the existing regulatory framework, the data shows that recycling has not been effectively implemented. According to Haitham Bazzi, “In some cases, agreements are made with the Ministry of Environment to transport the debris to designated sites, granting contractors the right to extract and sell the iron. A price is set per cubic meter, while the iron is left to the contractors.”

In this context, the head of the Federation of Municipalities of the Southern Suburb, Engineer Mohammad Dergham, explains that the Lebanese government, under Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Minister of Environment Nasser Yassin, decided in 2024 to expand Costa Brava and establish a third cell, noting that constructing the project’s water barrier required around one and a half million cubic meters of debris.

He states, “An environmental impact study was conducted on the debris from the destroyed buildings, which was sorted on property number 338 belonging to the Mreijeh Municipality under the supervision of engineering consultants, before undergoing the necessary tests. Subsequently, the design consultant from the engineering firm approved the use of these materials for ground filling at Costa Brava, not in the sea, as they are suitable for such works.”

However, past experiences, particularly following the July 2006 war, have shown that the random dumping of debris in landfills such as Naameh and Costa Brava led to long term environmental repercussions, without the adoption of an integrated treatment system. This raises concerns among citizens and experts that what missiles and airstrikes failed to destroy may be silently destroyed through pollution and disease, and that those who survived the war may ultimately fall victim to cancer.

Despite the numerous plans and projects, as well as the presence of international funding this time, the management of this file has yet to demonstrate full transparency or an effective monitoring system, while practices on the ground remain caught between burial and procrastination. This raises the question of how the Ministry of Environment intends to implement the LEAP project while debris from the 2024 war is still being buried or sold.