LETTER FROM BEIRUT
As it celebrates its 100 years of existence this year, L'Orient-Le Jour (L'OLJ) is establishing itself as a singular voice in the Lebanese and Arab media landscape. As it shakes off its image as the gazette of the "aunts of Achrafieh," a symbol of the French-speaking Christian bourgeoisie in East Beirut, and supported by a resolutely young editorial team, the French-language daily has succeeded in the transformation it began a decade ago, despite the turmoil in the Land of the Cedars.
Born in 1971 from the merger of L'Orient, founded in 1924 by Lebanese intellectual Georges Naccache, and its competitor Le Jour, founded in 1934 by Michel Chiha, the editor of the Lebanese Constitution, the daily now employs around 60 journalists, more than half of whom are under 35. They cover and decipher the news on a continuous basis in its print format and on the website of the media outlet, as well as on that of its English-language offshoot, L'Orient Today.
Its freedom of expression and editorial quality earned it the Grand Prix de la Francophonie from the Académie Française in 2021. Journalist Caroline Hayek, meanwhile, was awarded the Albert Londres Prize for her coverage of the explosion at the port of Beirut in August 2020. This major success was matched by record audience – 1.4 million visitors per month to the site, double the usual figure – with coverage of the war in Gaza and its repercussions in Lebanon.
Dealing with taboo subjects
"We were one of the few Arab media outlets to say that the attack on October 7 [2023] was a massacre that nothing can justify, and to draw attention to the fact that the Israeli response would be a massacre that October 7 cannot justify," said Anthony Samrani, editor-in-chief of L'Orient-Le Jour. For the 30-year-old, who joined L'OLJ in the international department in 2014, the ambition is "to become a benchmark newspaper in Lebanon and a singular voice in the Arab world. Our slogan is a plural, free and sovereign Lebanon."
L'OLJ has embraced the struggles of Lebanese civil society, from the garbage crisis in 2015 to the thawra ("revolution") of 2019. "We wanted to bring about change, with a younger team, more committed to the field, and with more involved shareholders too," said Nayla de Freige, the newspaper's president, whose paternal family, the Pharaons, are among the minority shareholders alongside the Eddé and Helou families, the majority shareholders.
"L'OLJ is not aligned with any regional axis, nor is it dependent on foreign funding. It is free of any financial pressure from the Lebanese business community. It takes a fierce line against Hezbollah, but also against elite corruption and nepotism," said French-Lebanese political scientist Karim Bitar, a regular reader and occasional contributor. In his eyes, L'Orient-Le Jour has remained true to the philosophy of its founders: French-speaking, open to the world and liberal. "It's one of the few media outlets that covers marginalized subjects and refuses to gag freedom of expression," he said. Topics that are still taboo in Lebanon, such as homosexuality, domestic violence, suicide and abortion, regularly appear in its columns.
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