Lebanon Response Plan 2024 - Chapeau Document
Foreword co-signed by his Excellency the Prime Minister of the Government of Lebanon, Najib Mikati, and the UN Resident Coordinator/Humanitarian Coordinator Imran Riza. Updated in October 2024.
This year represents an extremely precarious moment in Lebanon’s history, with crisis upon crisis affecting the country’s social, economic, and environmental stability. The escalation in hostilities at Lebanon’s southern border and around the country, precipitating significant internal displacement, has placed a further strain on Lebanon’s health, education, water, energy and social protection systems, created protection challenges and destroyed livelihoods. Amidst the multiple, protracted crises facing Lebanon, challenges continue to deepen for vulnerable populations. Local authorities at the frontline of responding, are also under immense pressure.
The Lebanon Response Plan 2024-25 (LRP) is an integrated humanitarian and stabilization response plan co-led by the Government of Lebanon and the United Nations, supported by international and national partners. The plan sets out to respond to challenges in a holistic manner through providing immediate assistance to and ensuring protection of vulnerable populations; supporting service provision through national systems; and supporting Lebanon’s economic, social and environmental stability. Based on the needs identified by affected communities, the Government and its partners, the LRP presents a prioritized and evidence-based appeal of $2.72bn in 2024 to fund partners’ coordinated interventions across ten sectors.
Since the Lebanon Response Plan for 2024 was drafted, Lebanon is now facing the largest escalation of conflict since the 2006 War, with 1,030 people killed between 16 and 27 September 2024 alone, including 87 children and 156 women, according to the Ministry of Public Health. Israeli airstrikes have hit towns across all governorates of Lebanon, leading to mass casualties, internal displacement and rising needs across the country.
In addition to the LRP funding appeal, a humanitarian Flash Appeal has been issued by the UN for $425 million to support immediate life-saving assistance in response to needs arising from the conflict, as part of the overall Government-led response. It remains essential that alongside the emergency response, LRP stabilization interventions to bolster Lebanese institutions and public services continue to be prioritized, including to respond to the ongoing needs of internally displaced people.
Responding to the imperative to work in as efficient and coordinated way as possible, including through humanitarian–peace–development nexus approach amid the multiple drivers of crisis in Lebanon, the LRP brings together efforts under the previous Lebanon Crisis Response Plan (which targeted displaced Syrians, vulnerable Lebanese, Palestinian Refugees from Syria (PRS) and Palestine Refugees in Lebanon (PRL), 2015- 2023) and the Emergency Response Plan (which targeted vulnerable Lebanese, PRL and migrants, 2021- 2023).
The LRP recognizes that the needs of Lebanon’s institutions and people have substantially increased and changed in recent years amid the unprecedented financial, economic and public health crises, exacerbated now by the ongoing conflict, as well as the continued impact of the Syria crisis on Lebanon. Alongside displaced populations and migrants residing in Lebanon also deeply affected by the compounded crises, for many Lebanese, access to assistance and services is an essential life-line. Working to bolster vital national systems and ensure support to those who need it most is our common endeavor. It is important to note that the economic crisis has had a disproportionate impact on certain groups including children and youth, older people and people living with disabilities, within which women and adolescent girls are highly affected.
In line with commitments made at successive Brussels Conferences on Supporting the Future of Syria and the Region, the Lebanon Response Plan also recognizes the duty of the international community to support Lebanon given its role as host country. Lebanon continues to host the most internationally displaced people per capita and per square kilometer in the world. More than twelve years since the start of the crisis in Syria, the impact on Lebanon’s social, environmental and economic stability remains significant.
The donor community has provided steadfast support through more than $12 billion of humanitarian and stabilization funding to Lebanon since 2015. It is imperative that this support is maintained, in the absence of immediate solutions and given the unprecedented further strain that people across Lebanon are now facing in light of the escalation in conflict. Through the LRP, in turn, the Government of Lebanon and its partners commit to ensuring efficiency, accountability, and transparency.
The temporary nature of the LRP serves to reinforce the essential collaborative action that is of course required outside of the confines of a humanitarian and stabilization response plan to secure lasting solutions for a better future for people across the country. This includes action to manage multifaceted, internal and regional displacement crises, including through enhanced border security, and addressing persistent barriers to return in safety and dignity; to advocate for and support the country’s reform agenda; and to address pre-existing structural development constraints and support Lebanon’s sustainable development trajectory, among other common objectives shared by the Government of Lebanon and the international community.