Al Anwar


Al Anwar was an Arabic daily newspaper published in Lebanon. It was founded in 1959 and was one of the leading dailies in Lebanon.
In October 2018, the publisher Dar Assayad announced ceasing of the print edition of the publication after 58 years of continuous publishing. Dar Assayad also ceased the publication of its line of long-running periodicals such as its newsweekly magazine Assayad, its arts and entertainment weekly Achabaka, its women monthly Fayrouz, men monthly Al Fares and defense military monthly Al Difa' Al Arabi amongst others.

History and profile

Al Anwar was launched by publishing house Dar Assayad in 1959. The publishing house also owns nine daily, weekly and monthly publications, including Assayad magazine. The founder of the daily was Said Freiha who was an advocate of Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser. The headquarters of the paper is in Beirut.
At its initial phase, Al Anwar had just eight pages. The daily launched its website in 1996. It is published in broadsheet format.

Orientation

Al Anwar claimed that it reinforced the long-term stability and prosperity of Lebanon. It was described by BBC as an independent and centrist daily. It is further argued that the paper avoids aggressive reporting. However, during and after the Nasser era the paper had a pro-Egyptian stance. In the mid-1990s the paper was considered to have an Arab nationalist trend. In 2009, IREX, an international research board, regarded it as one of the advocates of the 14 March alliance.

Staff and content

The editor-in-chief of Al Anwar is Rafiq Khoury and its managing editor is Fouad Daaboul. Palestinian journalist and writer Ghassan Kanafani served in the editorial board of the paper from 1967 to 1969.
The daily covers both Lebanese and Arabic affairs. The last page of the daily includes sports and social news.
Following the assassination of the former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, the daily published three articles from 16 to 18 February 2005 the first two of which were written by editor-in-chief, Khoury. The last one was a commentary titled "The mentality of the paupers and a regime in coma" and was written by Rauf Shahuri. All articles condemned the assassination. In August 2013 the paper criticized the possible US-led intervention against Syria and stated the intervention would be like "Hollywood's action and horror movies".

Circulation and audience

In addition to its native readers in Lebanon, Al Anwar was read by officials, intellectuals and activists outside Lebanon. It was distributed in other Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, and the UAE.
In the 1980s Al Anwar had wide circulation in East Beirut. Its popularity in East Beirut continued until the 2000s. The circulation of the paper was 20,000 copies in 2003 and it was the fourth best selling Lebanese newspaper.
In a 2006 study carried out by Ipsos, it was found that Al Anwar had lower circulation in capital Beirut than other regions. In the capital the paper was the sixth among seven dailies, having daily circulation at 10.7%. However, it was the second daily with 12.6% in the Biqa region after Sada al-Balad which had 12.7% of the daily circulation. In Mount Lebanon Al Anwar was the fifth daily, having 38.4% of the daily circulation, whereas in southern Lebanon it was the third with 15.2% of the daily circulation.
Based on the data provided by the DAS research group the daily reported its average net daily sales in 2012 as 49.043 copies. The daily had a circulation of 6,003 copies in Europe in 2012. The same year the website of Al Anwar had 1.1 million hits and 63,010 visitors per month.

Awards

Al Anwar was awarded by different bodies, including the UNESCO Prize for Social Reporting and Columbia University's James Wechsler Award for best international reporting.