BEIRUT: A Lebanese judge who defied a decision dismissing her from an investigation into possible currency export breaches has been summoned for a meeting on Tuesday with the country’s Supreme Judicial Council.
Judge Ghada Aoun, who was referred to the Judicial Inspection Authority because of more than 20 complaints against her, can be deemed incompetent by the vote of five council members and five authority members.
Aoun had been investigating the Mecattaf money exchange company and Societe Generale Bank for allegedly withdrawing US dollars from the market and shipping the funds abroad.
She staged two raids on a currency exchange earlier this month in defiance of the decision from Public Prosecutor Judge Ghassan Oweidat to dismiss her.
In one of the raids she was accompanied by supporters of the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM), the political party led by the president’s son-in-law MP Gebran Bassil.
In the event that Aoun agrees during Tuesday’s meeting to comply with Oweidat’s decision, she will be dismissed from matters related to important financial crimes but will remain in her position as an appellate public prosecutor in Mount Lebanon.Two protests were held outside the Beirut Justice Palace on Monday.
One was by Aoun’s supporters from the FPM. The other was by supporters of Oweidat from the Future Movement, the political party led by Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri.
The rival protests turned into a clash, with people shoving and beating each other, and one person was wounded.
The army and riot police intervened to separate the protesters and end their sit-ins.
According to one judge, there was a judicial hierarchy that must be respected: “Judge Oweidat requested the dismissal of a judge who is his subordinate, so how could she not comply?”
Aoun, who has become controversial in her handling of judicial files, has become a matter of public and political debate.
Some support the judge in her conduct to expose the corruption of authority, while others consider her to be a tool for the FPM through which it chooses which issues to attack its opponents with.
The Future parliamentary bloc said that what happened with Aoun reflected “contempt for the constitutional institutions and the incitement of some judges to usurp powers” that were not theirs.
Attorney Imad Al-Saba, who is the central coordinator of the lawyers’ sector in the Future Movement, said the party rejected the politicization of the judiciary. “It is our duty to restore the judiciary’s credibility and prestige,” he added.
Systemic corruption in Lebanon has angered the public, with people taking to the streets to protest and saying that graft has devastated the country’s economy.
The former president of the Constitutional Council, Issam Sleiman, said that what Oweidat did was against the law. “We are in an unacceptable state of chaos. The judiciary is asleep, several public prosecution offices have not done anything in any of the corruption files, and no corrupt person has been arrested or held accountable. The plundering of public money will not be exposed except through a forensic audit.”
President Michel Aoun has insisted on a financial audit into the accounts of the Banque du Liban. But his opponents are demanding the audit include all state institutions, especially the Ministry of Energy, which is run by ministers affiliated with the FPM.
Defiant Lebanese judge faces crunch meeting on Tuesday
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Defiant Lebanese judge faces crunch meeting on Tuesday
- She staged two raids on a currency exchange earlier this month in defiance of the decision from Public Prosecutor Judge Ghassan Oweidat to dismiss her
Halt to MSF work will be ‘catastrophic’ for people of Gaza: MSF chief
- MSF slammed the move, which takes effect on March 1, as a “pretext” to obstruct aid
- “Ceasing MSF activities is going to be catastrophic for the people of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank,” he said
GENEVA: Israel’s ban on Doctors Without Borders’ humanitarian operation in Gaza spells deeper catastrophe for the Palestinian territory’s people, the head of the medical charity told AFP on Monday.
Israel announced on Sunday that it was terminating all the activities in Gaza and the West Bank by the organization, known by its French acronym MSF, after it failed to provide a list of its Palestinian staff.
MSF slammed the move, which takes effect on March 1, as a “pretext” to obstruct aid.
“This is a decision that was made by the Israeli government to restrict humanitarian assistance into Gaza and the West Bank at the most critical time for Palestinians,” MSF secretary-general Christopher Lockyear warned in an interview with AFP at the charity’s Geneva headquarters.
“We are at a moment where Palestinian people need more humanitarian assistance, not less,” he said. “Ceasing MSF activities is going to be catastrophic for the people of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.”
MSF has been a key provider of medical and humanitarian aid in Gaza, particularly since war broke out after Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
The charity says it currently provides at least 20 percent of hospital beds in the territory and operates around 20 health centers.
In 2025 alone, it carried out more than 800,000 medical consultations, treated more than 100,000 trauma cases and assisted more than 10,000 infant deliveries.
It also provided more than 700 million liters of water, Lockyear pointed out.
‘Impossible choice’
Israel announced in December that it planned to prevent 37 aid organizations, including MSF, from working in Gaza for failing to submit detailed information about their Palestinian employees. The move drew widespread condemnation from NGOs and the United Nations.
It had alleged that two MSF employees had links with Palestinian militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which the medical charity vehemently denies.
“If Israel has any evidence of such things, then they should share that evidence,” Lockyear said, insisting that “there’s been no proof given to us.”
He decried “an orchestrated campaign to delegitimize us,” calling on other countries to defend efforts to bring desperately-needed humanitarian aid into Gaza.
“They should be speaking to Israel, pressuring Israel to ensure that there is a reverse of any banning of humanitarian organizations.”
Lockyear said MSF, which counts around 1,100 staff inside Gaza, had been trying to engage with Israeli authorities for nearly a year over the requested lists.
But it had been left with “an impossible choice,” he said.
“We’ve been forced to choose between the safety and security of our staff and being able to reach patients.”
‘Can only get worse’
The organization said it decided not to hand over staff names “because Israeli authorities failed to provide the concrete assurances required to guarantee our staff’s safety, protect their personal data, and uphold the independence of our medical operation.”
Lockyear insisted that was a “very rational” decision, pointing out that 15 MSF staff had been killed in Gaza during the war, out of more than 500 humanitarian workers and more than 1,700 medical workers killed in the Strip.
Lockyear highlighted that without independent humanitarian organizations in Gaza, an already “catastrophic” situation “can only get worse.”
“We need to increase massively the humanitarian assistance that’s going into Gaza,” he said, “not restrict it, not block it.”
