Lebanon: the rights of the LGBT+ community increasingly threatened

Activists display an LGBT+ community flag in Beirut on June 27, 2020. AP - Hassan Ammar

Text by: RFI Follow

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A demonstration scheduled for Sunday outside the headquarters of the Interior Ministry in Beirut to protest against a decision to ban all pro-LGBTQ+ activity has been postponed, according to its organizers.

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With our correspondent in Beirut,

The postponement of this event comes in a context of increasing threats against the LGBT + community with the approach of the "Pride Day" celebrated in June in the world.

A video circulating on social media showed a group of men calling themselves "God's soldiers" issuing threats while vandalizing a huge rainbow flag in the Christian neighborhood of Ashrafie, Beirut.

The day before, the Minister of the Interior ordered the security forces

under pressure from Dar al-Fatwa, the highest Sunni religious body in Lebanon. .

Homosexuality remains penalized by law

These developments illustrate a toughening of measures against the LGBT+ community in a country hit hard by an economic and social crisis, and where homosexuality remains penalized by law.

The first "pride day" was celebrated in 2017 in relative discretion.

Pro-LGBT lectures and debates had been tolerated but there had been no march.

The Gay Pride of 2018 and 2019 had been canceled after the intervention of the public authorities under pressure from the Christian and Muslim religious authorities.

Since then, public pro-LGBT demonstrations have almost disappeared and members of the community have been subjected to social and religious pressure.

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• Lebanon

• LGBT+