BEIRUT — Armed customers stormed at least five Lebanese banks on Friday to demand access to their own funds, which have been trapped by Lebanon’s worsening financial collapse.
Such holdups have become increasingly frequent as the country sinks deeper into an economic crisis that has led banks to impose strict limits on currency withdrawals to avoid collapse. The interior minister warned on Friday that the attacks were destroying order, but to many Lebanese, the desperate bandits have become folk heroes.
A series of holdups this week were carried out by mostly middle-class depositors carrying real and toy guns.
The Lebanese lira currency has lost more than 95 percent of its value since 2019, reaching a new low this week of about 38,000 to the dollar.
The banks have forced depositors with U.S. dollar accounts to withdraw their money in Lebanese pounds instead and at an exchange rate far below the market rate.
Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said a depositor stormed a BLOM bank in Beirut on Friday, holding several staff and customers hostage.
Lebanon News, an online channel, identified the gunman as Abed Soubra. Mr. Soubra, speaking with an injured hand wrapped in bandages, said withdrawing his $50,000 U.S. in Lebanese currency would have cost him $35,000 at the bank’s exchange rate.
“That means they were going to rob me,” he said.
Also on Friday, a depositor armed with a rifle took bank staff and customers hostage at a branch of the Lebanon and Gulf Bank, according to Lebanon’s MTV News. It said after several hours of negotiations, the bank agreed to release $15,000 to his brothers in exchange for the gunman turning himself in.
The country’s interior minister, Bassam al-Mawlawi, held an emergency meeting of Lebanon’s security council and vaguely blamed instigators that he said were inciting depositors — possibly an allusion to one or more of the country’s many political factions or militias.
“This destroys public order and makes other depositors lose their rights,” he said.
The country’s banking association responded to the spate of attacks by saying it was closing banks for three days starting Monday.
A founder of an advocacy group for depositors, Rafic Ghraizi, said that after almost three years of banks blocking withdrawals, people had grown desperate.
“No action has been taken by Lebanese authorities or the Lebanese judiciary,” he told The New York Times. “The depositors have found no other option to try to take their money out. The street is boiling,” he said, referring to rising public hostility.
Mr. Ghraizi said he viewed the three-day closure by the bank association as an escalation.
“It is a humanitarian issue,” he said. “Some depositors need their money to cover medical expenses for their families.”
Last month, Bassen Hussein, 42, stormed a Beirut bank with a rifle, taking hostages and threatening to kill everyone and to set himself on fire. He said he needed to withdraw his $200,000 life savings to pay for an operation for his father. Mr. Hussein was detained by police for several days and then released.
The United Nations has said more than 80 percent of Lebanese are now living in poverty. The government is also unable to provide basic services with many hours of electricity cuts per day and shortages of basic medicines.
The economic collapse is blamed on political chaos and widespread corruption.
A group of Parliament members walked out of the chamber on Friday, halting talks to discuss this year’s budget. The country has failed to put in place measures needed to qualify for a $3 billion International Monetary Fund bailout.
Some of the attackers have become folk heroes. Videos posted on social media show large crowds gathered outside some of the banks in support of attackers inside.
One customer, Sally Hafez, on Wednesday used what turned out to be a toy gun to demand $13,000 from her account, saying it was to pay for her sister’s cancer treatment.
“My sister is dying in front of me and no one wants to help us,” she told Lebanon’s al-Jadeed TV. “We have nothing to lose.”
She said she had begged the bank manager to help her and he said he could release $200 a month, which she said was less than the cost of one injection of medication.
Ms. Hafez said she made sure to sign a receipt for the $13,000.
