Lebanese National Pact Power-sharing arrangement established in 1943 between Lebanese Christians and Muslims whereby the president is always a Christian and the prime minister a Sunnite Muslim. The speaker of the National Assembly must be a Shl'ite Muslim. Amendments made following the Lebanese Civil War transferred many presidential powers to a cabinet divided evenly between Christians and Muslims.
Lebanon officially Lebanese Republic Country, Middle East, south¬ western Asia, on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. Area: 4,016 sq mi (10,400 sq km). Population (2005 est.); 3,577,000. Capitaclass="underline" Beirut.
The Lebanese are ethnically a mixture of Phoenician, Greek, Armenian, and Arab elements. Languages: Arabic (official),
French, English. Religions: Islam, Chris¬ tianity, Druze. Currency: Lebanese pound.
Uplands include the Lebanon Mountains in the central region and the Anti-Lebanon and Hermon ranges along the eastern border; a low coastal plain stretches along the Mediterranean. The Litani River flows southward through the fertile AI-Biqa* (Beqaa) valley region. Originally, much of the country was forested—the cedars of Lebanon were famous in antiquity— but woodlands now cover only a tiny fraction of the country. Lebanon is not agriculturally self-sufficient and must rely on food imports. Its tradi¬ tional role as the financial centre of the Middle East has been undermined since the outbreak of the Lebanese civil war (1975-76). It is a republic with one legislative house; its chief of state is the president, and the head of government is the prime minister. Much of present-day Lebanon corre¬ sponds to ancient Phoenicia, which was settled c. 3000 bc. In the 6th cen¬ tury ad, Christians fleeing Syrian persecution settled in northern Lebanon and founded the Maronite Church. Arab tribal peoples settled in southern Lebanon, and by the 11th century religious refugees from Egypt had founded the Druze faith. Part of the medieval Crusader states, Lebanon was later ruled by the Mamluk dynasty. In 1516 the Ottoman Empire seized control; the Ottomans, who first ruled by proxy, ended the local rule of the Druze Shihab princes in 1842. Deteriorating relations between religious groups resulted in the massacre of Maronites by Druze in 1860. France intervened, forcing the Ottomans to form an autonomous province for an area known as Mount Lebanon under a Christian governor. Fol¬ lowing World War I (1914-18), the whole of Lebanon was administered by the French military as part of a French mandate; the country was fully independent by 1946. After the Arab-Israeli war of 1948-49, tens of thou¬ sands of Palestinian refugees settled in southern Lebanon. In 1970 the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) moved its headquarters to Leba¬ non and began raids into northern Israel. The Christian-dominated Leba¬ nese government tried to curb them, and in response the PLO sided with Lebanon’s Muslims in their conflict with Christians, fueling the descent
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into a civil war that split the country into numerous political and religious factions. In 1976-82 Syrian and UN troops tried to maintain a cease-fire. In 1982 Israeli forces invaded in an effort to drive Palestinian forces out of southern Lebanon; Israeli troops withdrew from all but a narrow buffer zone in the south by 1985. Thereafter, guerrillas from the Lebanese Shfite militia Hezbollah clashed with Israeli troops regularly. Israeli troops com¬ pletely withdrew from Lebanon in 2000.
Lebanon Mountains Arabic Jabal Lubnan Vja-bol-.liib-'nanV ancient Libanus Mountain range, Lebanon. Running parallel to the Mediterranean Sea coast, it is about 100 mi (160 km) long. The northern section is the highest part of the range and includes the loftiest peak, Qur- nat al-Sawda 5 , at 10,131 ft (8,088 m) in elevation. On its western slopes are the remaining groves of the famous cedars of Lebanon. The snowy peaks may have given Lebanon its name in antiquity; laban is Aramaic for “white.”
Lebowa \le-'bo-w3\ Former nonindependent black state, northeastern South Africa. It was designated by the South African government as the national territory for northern Sotho people, including the Pedi, Lovedu, and Kanga-Kone. It was granted self-government in 1972 and held its first election in 1973. After the abolition of apartheid in 1994, it became part of the new Northern (now Limpopo) province.
Lebrun \l9-'brce n \, Albert (b. Aug. 29, 1871, Mercy-le-Haut, France—d. March 6, 1950, Paris) French statesman and last president (1932—40) of France’s Third Republic. Trained as a mining engineer, he served in the Chamber of Deputies (1900-20) and Senate (1920-32). He was elected president as a compromise candidate and served as a media¬ tor and symbol of unity, rarely influencing policy. In 1940 he complied with the cabinet’s decision to seek an armistice with Germany and acqui¬ esced to his replacement by the Vichy France government. He was interned by the Germans (1943-44). In 1944 he acknowledged Charles de Gaulle as head of the provisional government.
Lebrun, Elisabeth Vigee- See Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun
Lechfeld \Tek-,felt\, Battle of (955) Battle in which the German king Otto I decisively defeated an invasion by the Magyars. Fought on the Lechfeld, a plain near present-day Augsburg, Germany, it marked the last Hungarian effort to invade Germany.
lecithin Vle-so-thonV Any of a class of phospholipids (also called phosphati¬ dyl cholines) important in cell structure and metabolism. They are composed of phosphate, choline, glycerol (as the ester), and two fatty acids. Various fatty acids pairs distinguish the various lecithins. Commercial lecithin, a wetting and emulsifying agent used in animal feeds, baking products and mixes, chocolate, cosmetics and soap, insecticides, paint, and plastics, is a mixture of lecithins and other phospholipids in an edible oil.
Leclerc \b-'kler\, Jacques-Philippe orig. Philippe-Marie, vis¬ count de Hauteclocque (b. Nov. 22, 1902, Belloy-Saint-Leonard, France—d. Nov. 28, 1947, Colomb-Bechar, Alg.) French general in World War II. He was captured by the Germans in 1939, but escaped to England, where he took the pseudonym Leclerc to protect his family and joined the Free French forces of Charles de Gaulle. He achieved a number of military victories in French Equatorial Africa and North Africa, and in 1944 he commanded a French division in the Normandy Invasion. On August 25 he received the surrender of the German commander in Paris. He died in an airplane accident and was posthumously named marshal of France.
lectisternium V.lek-ta-'stor-ne-onA (from Latin lectum sternere, “to spread a couch”) Ancient Greek and Roman rite in which a meal was offered to gods and goddesses whose images were laid on a couch placed in the street. When it originated in Greece, couches were prepared for three pairs of gods: Apollo and Latona, Heracles and Diana, and Mercury and Nep¬ tune. During the feast, which lasted seven or eight days, citizens kept open house, debtors and prisoners were released, and every effort was made to banish sorrow. Other gods were later honoured with the same rite. In Chris¬ tian times, the word was used for a feast in memory of the dead.
LED See light-emitting diode
Leda \Te-do\ In Greek legend, the daughter of King Thestius of Aetolia and wife of King Tyndareus of Lacedaemon. Visited by Zeus in the form of a swan, she conceived Helen of Troy. Zeus was also sometimes said to be the father of her son Pollux, while Leda’s own husband, Tyndareus, was held to be the father of his twin, Castor (see Dioscuri). Tyndareus was also the father of Leda’s daughter Clytemnestra, who married Agamemnon.