Nohad Machnouk (or Machnouq, ; born 1955) is a Lebanese politician who was the Lebanese Minister of Interior and Municipalities and a Member of

Parliament In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

representing

Beirut Beirut ( ; ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, just under half of Lebanon's population, which makes it the List of largest cities in the Levant region by populatio ...

’s second district. He is a member of the “ Future Bloc” coalition and serves on the Human Rights and Foreign Affairs parliamentary committees. He also serves on the ministerial committee charged with responding to the Syrian refugee crisis.

Early life

Machnouk was born in

Lebanon Lebanon, officially the Republic of Lebanon, is a country in the Levant region of West Asia. Situated at the crossroads of the Mediterranean Basin and the Arabian Peninsula, it is bordered by Syria to the north and east, Israel to the south ...

, in 1955, to a

Sunni Muslim Sunni Islam is the largest branch of Islam and the largest religious denomination in the world. It holds that Muhammad did not appoint any successor and that his closest companion Abu Bakr () rightfully succeeded him as the caliph of the Musli ...

family that traces its roots to

Hama Hama ( ', ) is a city on the banks of the Orontes River in west-central Syria. It is located north of Damascus and north of Homs. It is the provincial capital of the Hama Governorate. With a population of 996,000 (2023 census), Hama is one o ...

, Syria. After starting his career as a journalist, El Machnouk was hired by Lebanese weekly magazine '' Annahar'' and wrote extensively on regional issues.

Political career

In 1983, he assumed his first political role as co-founder of ''Al Liqa’ al-Islami'' ("The Islamic Meeting"), a political gathering of prominent politicians and civil society leaders that called for an end to Syrian dominance of Lebanon and a halt to civil conflict. In 1992, he was appointed senior political advisor to Prime Minister

Rafic Hariri Rafic Bahaa El Deen al-Hariri (; 1 November 1944 – 14 February 2005) was a Lebanese businessman and politician who served as Prime Minister of Lebanon, prime minister of Lebanon from 1992 to 1998 and again from 2000 to 2004. Hariri headed fi ...

. He served in this position until 1998, when he was forced into exile by the Syrian intelligence apparatus for his efforts to reduce Syrian tutelage of the country. Upon the withdrawal of Syrian troops in 2005, he resumed his journalistic career as a weekly columnist for Lebanese daily '' Assafir'', before running for parliament in 2009. In 2014, he was named Minister of Interior and Municipalities in

Tammam Salam Tammam Saeb Salam (, ; born 13 May 1945) is a Lebanese politician who was the Prime Minister of Lebanon from February 2014 until December 2016. He also served as the acting President of Lebanon from May 2014 until October 2016 in his capacity as ...

’s national unity government. As minister, he devised and implemented a comprehensive security strategy to gradually impose state sovereignty on all the Lebanese territory. This put an end to the rounds of sectarian infighting that had taken place in

North Lebanon North Lebanon () is the northern region of Lebanon comprising the North Governorate and Akkar Governorate. On 16 July 2003, the two entities were divided from the same province by former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The division was known as Law ...

for a decade and helped dismantle the criminal networks that served as support infrastructures for terrorist groups operating in the northeast of the country. In December 2016, Nohad El Machnouk was appointed Minister of Interior and Municipalities.

Beirut protests

On 22 August 2015, protesters took to the streets of Beirut demanding a resolution to the trash crisis, the protests led to a clash with the riot police who fired tear gas and water cannons at the protesters and shot rubber bullets directly at them and real bullets in the air. Hundreds of people were wounded in the events and the public demanded the prosecution of the responsible forces and the resignation of Machnouk. Machnouk was abroad at the time of the protests. However, upon his return he defended officers involved in controlling the protests and rejected calls for his resignation, describing the aftermath of the protests as vandalism by rioters who had taken advantage of the chaos. At the same time, Machnouk was criticized as a video clip was widely shared online and on Lebanese television, that appeared to show him dancing at a bar on the Greek island of Mykonos as the crisis escalated in Beirut.

External links

Official website

The Washington Institute

The Daily Star

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Machnouk, Nohad Living people Members of the Parliament of Lebanon 1955 births Politicians from Beirut Interior ministers of Lebanon Future Movement politicians Lebanese Sunni politicians Lebanese people of Syrian descent