Fatahland

Fatahland
أرض فتح (Arabic)
ʼArḍ Fatḥ
1969–1982
Map of Lebanon in 1976 during the Lebanese Civil War. Lands controlled by the PLO and its allies are shown in light green.
StatusMilitia-controlled territory
CapitalWest Beirut
Common languagesArabic
Religion
Islam
Christianity
Druze faith
Chairman of the Executive Committee of the PLO 
• 1969–2004
Yasser Arafat
Historical eraLebanese Civil War
1969
1970–1971
• Start of the Lebanese Civil War
1975
1976
1978
1982
• Siege of Beirut and relocation of PLO to Tunisia
1982
Population
• Refugee population in 1969
235,000
• Refugee population in 1982
375,000
CurrencyLebanese Pound
Preceded by
Succeeded by
Lebanon
State of Free Lebanon
Syrian occupation of Lebanon
UNIFIL
Today part of Lebanon

Fatahland (Arabic: فتح لاند Fatḥ Lānd or أرض فتح ʼArḍ Fatḥ; Hebrew: פתחלנד Fateḥland) is an informal term used to refer to the areas of Lebanon which were under the control of the Palestine Liberation Organization (Fatah being its largest faction) during the Palestinian insurgency in South Lebanon. At its height described as a "state-within-a-state", it was one of many militia-controlled "cantons" — such as "Maronistan" and the Civil Administration of the Mountain — which supplanted the authority of the Lebanese central government as it collapsed during the Lebanese Civil War.

The term is sometimes employed today to refer to Fatah's governance over the Palestinian enclaves in the West Bank, as opposed to Hamastan, in the context of the Fatah–Hamas conflict that has been ongoing since 2006.