Did the Syrian regime practice ethnic cleansing in occupied Lebanon?
Yes. In one of the most terrifying scenes of the modern history: the Syrian regime worked on changing the ethnic and religious demography of Lebanon by replacing its people. Since 1990, Syrian occupation of Lebanon has forced more than 35% of the Lebanese to leave their country. Meanwhile the Syrian-appointed government in Lebanon naturalized around half a million Syrians and Palestinians that is equal to 20% of the Lebanon population. This was an answer to the Lebanese popular refusal to legitimize the Syrian occupation of Lebanon; 90% of the Lebanese eligible to vote boycotted a Syrian-arranged parliamentary elections that resulted in a puppet parliament in 1992. The Syrian regime hence started inserting ‘new’ Lebanese. Syrian troops in Lebanon protected around 1.5 million Syrian illegal workers (that is about half the population of Lebanon), which forces Lebanese to abandon their country. This mass displacement project was accompanied with regular persecution, arresting, kidnapping,
