Canada Now Has Its 'Lebanese Heritage Month'

The month of November is now annually designated “Lebanese Heritage Month” in Canada, under legislation passed unanimously by the House of Commons on June 14 and receiving royal assent on June 20, the final step for the legislation make must go through before they come into effect.

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The project was presented by Senator Jane Cordy last April and supported in the House of Commons by Lebanese-Canadian MP Léna Metlege Diab. It aims to “recognize and particularly celebrate the invaluable contribution made by Canadians of Lebanese origin at social, economic, cultural, religious, military, philanthropic and even political levels to the construction of Canadian society of yesterday and today”.

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The celebration of “Lebanese Cultural Heritage Month” will therefore encourage Canadians of Lebanese origin to “promote their culture and traditions and make them known to other Canadians,” the law states. Lebanon’s Independence Day is celebrated on November 22 every year.

historical figures
During the second reading of the law, Ms Diab, whose parents were first-generation immigrants who came to Canada from the village of Dimane in northern Lebanon, spoke and paid tribute to several Lebanese-Canadian historical figures such as William Haddad: “a merchant’s son who was one of the first Arab Judge of Canada”, or Lieutenant Edward Francis Arab, who “gave his life for Canada” and died at the Battle of the Scheldt in 1944 during World War II.

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She also cited Lebanese-Canadian athletes, artists and diplomats, noting that many Canadian “academics and lawyers” are of Lebanese descent, as are “leaders at all levels of government and political parties, including former senators and former MPs.”

Ms Diab stated that “Canadians of Lebanese origin have been in our country since the late 19 and 400,000 people and that between 40,000 and 75,000 Canadians live in Lebanon”.

According to the Canadian government’s website on the heritage of the country’s resident Asian communities, in 2001, people of Lebanese origin in Canada were “the sixth largest non-European ethnic group in the country, residing primarily in Ontario and Quebec”. The site also mentions significant Lebanese communities based in “Atlantic Canada, particularly Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.”

Forgetting or loss of inheritance
“Unfortunately, in my experience, there are many who have forgotten or lost their Lebanese heritage, or sometimes even suppressed it. It moves me because I saw it. I’ve had conversations with these people. It’s one of the reasons why this designation is so important to so many people,” Ms. Diab added.

The government’s official website notes that Canada has welcomed immigrants of Lebanese origin since the 1880s. “It is generally believed that the first immigrant of Arab origin in Canada was a Lebanese named Ibrahim Abou Nader, who was then from the town of Zahlé.” Located in the Moutassarifat of Mount Lebanon, an autonomous region of the Ottoman Empire, located in Montreal had settled. The migratory flow then intensified during the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990) before morphing into movements of economic migrants and academics after the conflict.

The national recognition of November as “Lebanese Heritage Month” in Canada, introduced in June 2023, has been effective since 2018 at a more regional level, particularly in the provinces of Nova Scotia or even Ontario.