Beer is old in the Levant: it was drunk across the ancient Near East by the Early Bronze Age, and the archaeological museum of the American University of Beirut shows small Iron Age beer jugs from the Bekaa and Sidon. Wine and arak are the traditional drinks. Lebanon was set up in 1920 as the State of Greater Lebanon under the French Mandate, became the Lebanese Republic in 1926 and has been independent since 1943. Alcohol is legal, but about half of the people do not drink it for religious reasons, so the market is small: about 29 million litres of beer a year in 2013, or 5.5 litres a head.
The first breweries date from the 1930s. The Grande Brasserie du Levant, which brewed Laziza in the Mar Mikhael quarter of Beirut, was founded by George Gellad in 1931 according to Wikipedia; Foreign Policy says only that it opened in the 1930s. Almaza, a German-style pilsner, followed in 1933, founded by the Jabre, Comaty and Angelopoulu families at Dora. In the early 1960s one of the Almaza founders gave Amstel, later part of Heineken, a 10 per cent share in return for technical supervision, and the brewery expanded and improved its beer. Laziza was among the most popular beers in the 1960s and 1970s, but its brewery stopped in 1990 after the building was damaged, leaving Almaza as the only brewery; in 2002 it held 61.5 per cent of the market and imports the rest. In 1999 Georges Khazam, a grandson of the founder, brought Laziza back with an alcohol-free version, bottled in the Netherlands by Bavaria.
In September 2002 Heineken, which had held 10 per cent of Almaza for 42 years, announced that it would add 69 per cent; Laziza was bought a year later and became a brand of non-alcoholic malt drinks, which Almaza still makes. In mid-2021, in the economic crisis, Heineken wanted to sell and the brewery, with nearly 200 jobs, was at risk of closing. Philippe Jabre, a grandson of one of the founders, bought the majority, announced on 10 January 2022; Heineken stays a minority shareholder and Almaza keeps the sale of its brands. In 2023 the brewery said it made about 160,000 hectolitres a year, down from 250,000 in 2016, and sold a quarter abroad, aiming for 40 per cent. Almaza Unfiltered, its first new product in a decade, came out in summer 2023.
Craft brewing began with 961 Beer. Mazen Hajjar, a former banker and airline executive, had the idea in 2005 with the Danish businessman Henrik Haagen and first brewed in his Beirut kitchen. They put a plant from Canada in a small factory outside the city and opened a pub in September 2007. The pub and brewery closed in 2009 (a BLOM Bank brief says 2010) and a much bigger brewery opened in 2011 at Mazraat Yachoua; by 2021 it made 300,000 cases a year for 16 countries, and Hajjar had sold his stake and moved to Australia. Kassatly Chtaura, a drinks company founded in 1974, began a brewery in July 2013 beside its plant at Chtaura in the Bekaa: built in about nine months with twelve German tanks, it put Beirut Beer, a pilsner, on sale in July 2014, and cost about 25 million dollars for 20 million litres a year. Colonel opened in 2014 at Batroun, founded by Jamil Haddad, and grew 45 per cent in 2017. Elmir, started by Noël Abinader and Chris Fadel with a 500-litre kit in 2016, launched its beers in November 2018; its sales peaked in September 2019 and fell with the crisis, and since 2025 it has brewed in Mar Mikhael, with tours and tastings.
In 2026 BeerAdvocate lists six breweries and brands in Lebanon: 961 Beer, Almaza, Chirag (Al Arz), Colonel, Elmir and Kassatly Chtaura. The old Laziza brewery stood empty in 2017, when a residential project was planned for the site.
