Beirut

Beirut is the capital and largest metropolis of Lebanon. No current population census has been conducted, but 2007 estimates ranged from slightly greater than 1 million to 2.2 million as a part of Greater Beirut. Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coast, Beirut is the country's biggest and major seaport. It is one of the oldest cities inside the global, having been inhabited for greater than 5,000 years.

The first ancient point out of Beirut is discovered inside the Amarna letters from the New Kingdom of Egypt, which date to the 15th century BC. Beirut is Lebanon's seat of government and performs a significant function within the Lebanese financial system, with most banks and businesses based totally in its Central District, Badaro, Rue Verdun, Hamra, Ryad el Soloh street, and Achrafieh. Following the adverse Lebanese Civil War, Beirut's cultural panorama underwent fundamental reconstruction.

Identified and graded for accountancy, advertising, banking/finance and regulation, Beirut is ranked as a Beta World City by means of the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. The oldest agreement become on an without difficulty-defended island within the river that, however, regularly silted up and joined it to the mainland. Excavations within the downtown area have unearthed layers of Phoenician, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Arab, Crusader, and Ottoman remains.