Litani

Litani, river, Lebanon, about 145 km (90 mi) long. It rises in the central part of the country, west of Baalbek, and flows south between the Lebanon Mountains and the Anti-Lebanon Mountains, through the fertile Bekaa Valley (al-Biqa). It turns sharply south-west, cutting a deep gorge through the Lebanon Mountains, and empties into the Mediterranean Sea north of Şūr. A dam and irrigation project on the lower Litani produces hydroelectric power and supplies water to the dry, southern portion of the Bekaa Valley, where farming and grazing are important. The project also irrigates Lebanon’s coastal plain by way of a mountain tunnel. Sporadic warfare between the Israelis and Palestinian Arabs occurred in the region of the Litani River in the 1970s and early 1980s.