Lebanese Civil War, civil conflict (1975–90) in Lebanon emanating from the deterioration of the Lebanese state and the coalescence of militias that provided security where the state could not. These militias formed largely along communal lines: the Lebanese Front (LF), led by the Phalangists (or Phalange), represented Maronite Christian clans whose leaders had dominated the traditional elite class of the country’s sociopolitical fabric; the Lebanese National Movement (LNM), a coalition of secular leftists and Sunni Muslims sympathetic to Arab nationalism; the Amal (“Hope,” also an acronym for Afwāj al-Muqāwamah al-Lubnāniyyah [Lebanese Resistance Detachments]) movement, comprising Shiʿi populists; and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which represented Lebanon’s large Palestinian refugee population. Other participants in the war included Syria, Israel, and splintered contingents of the Lebanese Army.
