Lebanese Arab Army

Lebanese Arab Army (LAA)
Participant in Lebanese Civil War
Flag of the Lebanese Arab Army
Active	1976-1977
Groups	Lebanese National Movement
Leaders	Ahmed al-Khatib, Ahmed Boutari, Maj. Ahmad Ma'amari, Ghazi Ghotaymi, Youssif Mansour, Ahmad Addam, Mustafa Hamdan
Headquarters	Hasbayya (Beqaa Valley)
Strength	4,400 men
Originated as	900 men
Allies	Lebanese National Movement Palestine Liberation Organization
Opponents	Kataeb Regulatory Forces Al-Tanzim Marada Brigade Tigers Militia Guardians of the Cedars Army of Free Lebanon Syrian Army

The Lebanese Arab Army – LAA (Arabic: جيش لبنان العربي transliteration Jaysh Lubnan al-Arabi), also known as the Arab Army of Lebanon (AAL) or Armée du Liban Arabe (ALA) in French, was a predominantely Muslim splinter faction of the Lebanese Army that came to play a key role in the 1975–77 phase of the Lebanese Civil War.

On January 21, 1976, at the Elias Abou Sleiman barracks in Ablah, in the Beqaa Valley, 900 Lebanese Muslim soldiers serving with the 1st Armoured Brigade (aka ‘First Brigade’) refused to fight against their coreligionists and mutined under the leadership of Lieutenant Ahmed al-Khatib, a Sunni Muslim officer in the Lebanese Army, who urged his fellow Muslims to desert. The mutiny quickly spread to other Army garrisons on the southern part of the Beqaa and within a month, Lt Khatib had rallied to his cause some 2,000 soldiers from the First Brigade, well-equipped with heavy weapons (including tanks and artillery). They became the core of the new Lebanese Arab Army (LAA), who promptly went to the side of the Lebanese National Movement (LNM) – Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) alliance fighting the Christian Lebanese Front militias on the ongoing Lebanese Civil War.

On the surface, Khatib’s rebellion seemed a spontaneous act that reflected Muslim discontent within the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) against their predominantely Christian leadership. The reality, however, was more complex. In fact, the mutiny had been secretly orchestrated by Fatah, the main Palestinian faction and had well-defined objectives. Fatah leaders – notably Yasser Arafat, Abu Iyad, Abu Jihad and Ali Hassan Salameh – had always regarded the Lebanese Army as a potential military threat to the PLO, a threat neutralized by the formation of the LAA.