Jounieh جونيه | |
|---|---|
City | |
 Jounieh Bay | |
  Jounieh Location in Lebanon | |
| Coordinates:33°58′11″N35°36′56″E / 33.96972°N 35.61556°E /33.96972; 35.61556 | |
| Country |  Lebanon |
| Governorate | Keserwan-Jbeil |
| District | Keserwan |
| Population | |
• Estimate | 100,000 |
| Time zone | UTC+2 |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC+3 |
| Website | www |
Jounieh (Arabic:جونيه, orJuniya,جونية) is a coastal city inKeserwan District, about 16 km (10 mi) north ofBeirut,Lebanon. Since 2017, it has been the capital ofKeserwan-Jbeil Governorate.[1][2] Jounieh is known for its seaside resorts and bustling nightlife, as well as its old stonesouk, ferry port, paragliding site andgondola lift (letéléphérique), which takes passengers up the mountain to the shrine ofOur Lady of Lebanon inHarissa.[3]
Above Jounieh, and on the way toHarissa, a small hill namedBkerké (Arabic:بكركي, orBkerki), overlooking the Jounieh bay, is the seat of thePatriarch of theMaronite Catholic Church of Lebanon. Residents of Jounieh and the surrounding towns are overwhelminglyMaronite Catholics.[4]Maameltein is a district ofGhazir village.
The history of Jounieh goes back to the time of thePhoenicians.[5] The town was an important trading center along the Lebanon coastline. In those days the port was an important one during winter, as it served as a safe spot for ships sailing south toByblos. This gave the place the name of the name of "Palaebyblus" that means 'Before Byblos”. In his geographic description theGreek historianStrabo mentions this town.[5]
The reason few remains can be seen today is due to the fact that during theRoman andByzantine period, many buildings and structures were built over the Phoenicians buildings and some are still visible today.[5]
The medieval Muslim historianal-Idrisi (d. 1165) notes that Jounieh was a sea fortress whose inhabitants wereJacobite Christians.[6] The Syrian geographerYaqut al-Hamawi (d. 1226) called it a dependency ofTripoli.[7]
In the sixth part ofThe Introduction to Jounieh in the Mid Nineteenth Century, ProfessorButrus Al-Boustani said: “Jounieh is a place on theKeserwan coast which has warehouses, stores, and a dye house. Ships and boats bring supplies and itsgrain trade is very popular. Thus a district of the following villages: Sarba, Ghadir, and Harat Sakhr was named for it. Its total population is 2,500. Jounieh itself is not a residential area but mainly a commercial district whose workers come from neighboring towns.”[8]
Jounieh was connected with neighboring areas by roads built for carriages. So it was connected withBkerké and beyond it during the rule of Dawud Basha, the ruler ofMount Lebanon. It was connected to Ghazir between 1867 and 1868 despite the objection of Ghazir's residents. Another road connected Jounieh to the Beirut Bridge during the rule of Rustum Basha. To the north it was connected by a carriage's road untilBatroun during the rule of Wasa Basha (1883–1892). In 1892, Jounieh was connected toBeirut via a railroad that had stations between the two locations, three of which in Jounieh and its environs: Sarba, Jounieh, and Mu’amilitain at the end of the line, which facilitated the transportation of goods and passengers from and to the Governorate of Beirut. In 1876, the number of shops exceeded 300, five silk factories, three rest houses, a mill, three juice factories, an artificial ice factory, a bank known by its owner's name "Bank Baghos", and a group of small sailboat construction sites.
In 1906, according to theGuide to Lebanon by Ibrahim Beik Al-Soud, the population of Jounieh was 2,400, and it had a silk factory owned by the Nasras, a silkworms choker owned by Moussa de Franj, a silk factory owned by the heirs of Rizkallah and Abdul Ahad Khadra which had 190 wheels and produced 10,000 cocoons, 330 domestic animals, and owned 80 carriages.According to the records of the Keserwan Governorate, the town of Ghadir, in 1914, had 433 corporations and its population was 1,263. The town of Sarba had 213 commercial institutions and its population was 1,714. In Harat Sakhr, there were 165 corporations and its population was 808. In Sahil ‘Alma, there were 21 corporations its population reached 187. Jounieh had seen noticeable prosperity after France and theMaronite Patriarchy supported the opening a port for commercial ships which became (with the Al-Nabi Younes Port on theChouf Coast) the official port ofMount Lebanon.[3]
In 1913 and during the Mandate era, Jounieh suffered economic decline and recession as the French administration moved part of Jounieh’s administrative role to the Capital,Beirut. Also Jounieh came out of theFirst World War weakened by famine and economic stagnation. So several of its inhabitants were forced to move to the capital or to immigrate, and Jounieh lost most of its expertise. Its social and population development stopped, and its economic development weakened. The 1932 statistics showed 1,286 housed in Jounieh: 371 in Sarba, 434 in Ghadir, 350 houses in Harat Sakhr, and 131 in Sahil ‘Alma. This affected the building industry and records in the town hall showed very limited number of permits given from 1922-1940. The only active sectors in that period were schools, small crafts, and planting of citrus trees, sugar cane, and vegetables. This situation stayed the same until the rule of PresidentFuad Chehab who outfitted the city with all that it needed to become modern. Jounieh then awakened from its slumber with projects for roads, lighting, modern planning, a stadium, a tourist port, a government house, and infrastructure. The talk became of “Monte Carlo of the East” and Jounieh stood out as a bride of the Lebanese coast. In 1959, it started to attract banks, the first which were the Lebanese Commerce Bank and the Lebanese Federal Bank. By 1975 the number of banks reached six and today there are 38 banks in addition to the Lebanese Central Bank which was established in 1879.
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The area also witnessed an increase in the price of land from an average of seven to nine Lebanese pounds per square meter between 1950 and 1960 to an average of 25 to 35 Lebanese pounds in 1965.
The construction sector developed slowly starting from Sarba to Harat Sakhr, and finally the coast of ‘Alma. The buildings also started expanding around the city as the agricultural sector contracted and became confined to the coasts ofKaslik and some orchards in Ghadir, Harat Sakhr and the coast of ‘Alma. In the beginning of the seventies, Jounieh was transformed to a major and complete tourist center with the tourist network around it and on its edges including:Casino du Liban, the cable cars, the Harisa Church, the caverns inJeita, restaurants, hotels, nightclubs, and the port.
With the war of 1975, and the division ofBeirut into East and West parts and the escalation of the violence, many people fled to safe areas and were organizing their lives in accordance with the new realities.
From 1980 to 1990, Jounieh witnessed a massive migration as a large number of the Beirut traders moved to its markets. Buildings took over its green spaces, and the tourist complexes took over its shores. So its features changed randomly though it benefited from the use of the tourist port for commerce.
During the Civil War the ferry making the 120 mile journey from Jounieh toLarnaca was the only way to travel in and out of Lebanon for those living in the areas controlled by Christian militias. Over the fourteen years from 1975 an estimated 990,000 Lebanese left the country, up to 40% of the population.[9]During the 1989 fighting betweenGeneral Aoun and theLebanese Forces 10,000 civilians from Beirut arrived in Cyprus over a six-week period.[10] On 24 February 1990 the ferry was attacked by an unidentified naval patrol boat. One passenger was killed and seventeen wounded.[11][12] In 1997 acatamaran was operating between Larnaca and Jounieh. A return ticket for the four-hour journey cost US$100. At the time the average monthly income in Lebanon was US$132.[13]
On 18 June 1991 six people were killed and 30 wounded after an explosion at aLebanese Forces ammunition dump.[14]
On 7 May 2005, a car bomb exploded between the Christian Sawt al Mahabaradio station and the Mar YuhannaChurch in Jounieh. The radio station was destroyed and the church suffered major damage. Twenty-two people were wounded.[15]
Today, close to 100,000 people reside in Jounieh. Those who live in its suburbs exceed that number. By the middle of the century, it is predicted that Jounieh will become a suburb of Beirut in a coastal line that forms one city that expands the length of the coastal road at a time when the inhabitants of Lebanon will reach six million plus around the year 2025. The population of Jounieh is majorityMaronite.[16]
In 2014,Christians made up 97.71% of registered voters in Jounieh. 71.19% of the voters wereMaronite Catholics, 8.82% wereGreek Catholics, 6.03% wereArmenian Orthodox and 5.40% wereGreek Orthodox.[18]
Jounieh istwinned with:
Monaco
Gustavia, Saint Barthelemy, France
Rio de Janeiro, BrazilJounieh has ahot-summer Mediterranean climate (Köppen climate classificationCsa). In winter there is much more rainfall than in summer. The average annual temperature in Jounieh is 20.9 °C (69.6 °F). About 873 mm (34.37 in) of precipitation falls annually.
| Climate data for Jounieh | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Mean daily maximum °C (°F) | 14.6 (58.3) | 15.6 (60.1) | 18.1 (64.6) | 21.1 (70.0) | 24.9 (76.8) | 28.0 (82.4) | 30.2 (86.4) | 30.4 (86.7) | 28.8 (83.8) | 25.9 (78.6) | 21.3 (70.3) | 16.8 (62.2) | 23.0 (73.4) |
| Daily mean °C (°F) | 10.9 (51.6) | 11.8 (53.2) | 14.2 (57.6) | 17.2 (63.0) | 21.0 (69.8) | 24.1 (75.4) | 26.1 (79.0) | 26.3 (79.3) | 24.7 (76.5) | 21.8 (71.2) | 17.0 (62.6) | 12.9 (55.2) | 19.0 (66.2) |
| Mean daily minimum °C (°F) | 7.3 (45.1) | 7.9 (46.2) | 9.8 (49.6) | 12.4 (54.3) | 16.1 (61.0) | 19.4 (66.9) | 21.6 (70.9) | 22.1 (71.8) | 20.6 (69.1) | 17.7 (63.9) | 13.0 (55.4) | 9.3 (48.7) | 14.8 (58.6) |
| Averageprecipitation mm (inches) | 147 (5.8) | 143 (5.6) | 106 (4.2) | 48 (1.9) | 19 (0.7) | 3 (0.1) | 1 (0.0) | 1 (0.0) | 8 (0.3) | 33 (1.3) | 80 (3.1) | 137 (5.4) | 726 (28.4) |
| Average rainy days | 10 | 8 | 7 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 6 | 8 | 52 |
| Source:[19] | |||||||||||||
Paragliding site in Ghosta, three minutes from Harissa. Since 1992, paragliding above Jounieh is considered one of the best outdoor activities in Lebanon.[20]
Every summer, Jounieh International Festival hosts national and international icons, likeMika,Jessie J,Imagine Dragons,Jason Derulo and many others.[21]
Casino du Liban offers gaming and shows and is located in the northern part of Jounieh, it is also the biggest one in the Middle East.
Lebanese Heritage Museum displays items related to the culture and history of Lebanon.[22]
Thetéléphérique is agondola lift that operates between Jounieh andHarissa. It offers the passengers beautiful panoramic views of the bay of Jounieh and the coast all the way toBeirut.[23](SeeTéléphérique de Jounieh page)
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| National | |
