Navy Forces

Date of establishment:

The Navy forces were established in 1950 and were located in the 1^st basin of Beirut Port. In 1972, naval forces were transferred to Jounieh after taking control of the buildings of Jounieh Naval Base. In 1991, the Naval forces were located in the Beirut Naval Base.

Mission:

• Securing the sea line of communications to Lebanese ports, enforcing the law and the State authority in waters, organizing the traffic of commercial ships in and defending State interests in the economic zone as well as assisting the Lebanese commercial fleet and the fishermen and providing security.
• Defending the regional waters and the Lebanese coast from any naval military aggression.
• Fighting terrorism, illegal immigration, smuggling and trafficking of narcotics.
• Providing naval support and early warning to the Army forces and participating in joint military operations (Fire support, Logistic support, landing operations, landing of troops on the shore…).
• Providing support to security agencies (customs, internal security forces, General security…) in their naval missions.
• Assisting ministries and agencies in their duties at sea like (Fire fighting, fighting pollution, search and rescue operations.)
• Protecting natural resources and national interests along the coast and the regional waters.

Some accomplishments of the naval forces:

• 1992: Establishing naval posts in the ports of Tripoli, Saida and Tyr.
• 1997: Establishing new radar surveillance posts along the Lebanese coast.
• 2006: During the July assault, posts related to the Naval Forces along the Lebanese coast performed active early detection operations of drones belonging to the Israeli enemy that targeted some of these posts, leading to the falling of a number of martyrs and injured individuals among the army.
  Moreover, naval forces participated with major efficiency after the end of the assault in removing petrol pollution resulting from the enemy drones targeting fuel tanks in Jiyeh electricity station.
• 2007: Between the 20^th of May and the 2^nd of September 2007, the LAF fought a war against the Organization of Fath el Islam in the Nahr el Bared Camp – North where Naval Forces cordoned off the mentioned camp from the sea with the aim of preventing the supplies from reaching the terrorists and to prevent those terrorists from escaping as well as provide fire support to the land forces.
• 2007: Establishing a modern radar network along the Lebanese beach that was offered as a gift from the Federal Republic of Germany.
• 2010: After the incident of the crash of the Ethiopian airplane on 25/01/2010 facing Khalde beach, naval forces performed vast search and rescue operations at sea where they were able to retrieve numerous bodies of victims and parts of the crashed airplane.

The emblem:
The emblem is composed of a Phoenician ship with a cedar tree amidst its sail and an anchor dangling down from its axis, symbolizing the sea front of Lebanon and Phoenician civilization.