Kataeb Party

The Kataeb Party – Lebanese Social Democratic Party, also known in English as the Phalanges, is a Christian political party in Lebanon. The party played a major role in the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990). In decline in the late 1980s and 1990s, the party slowly re-emerged in the early 2000s and is currently part of the Lebanese opposition. The party currently holds 4 out of the 128 seats in the Lebanese Parliament. Names The Lebanese Phalanges Party is also known as in French and either Kataeb or Phalangist Party in Arabic. Kataeb is the plural of Katiba which is a translation into Arabic of the Greek word phalanx ("battalion") which is also the origin of the Spanish term Falange. In 2021, the party changed its official name to "The Kataeb Party – Lebanese Social Democratic Party" (, Hiẓb al-Katā'ib al-Lubnāniyya – Hiẓb al-dīmūqrāṭī al-ijtimāʿī al-lubnānī). Origins The Kataeb party was established on November 5, 1936 as a Maronite paramilitary youth organization by Pierre Gemayel who modeled the party after Spanish Falange and Italian Fascist parties he had observed as an Olympic athlete during the 1936 Summer Olympics held in Berlin, then Nazi Germany. The movement's uniforms originally included brown shirts and members used the Roman salute. In an interview by Robert Fisk, Gemayel stated about the Berlin Olympics: