A Lebanese court has sentenced food influencer Georges Hanna Dib, known online as "Dr. Food," to life imprisonment with hard labour after convicting him of manufacturing, trafficking, and smuggling 820 kilograms of hashish hidden inside cake packaging. Judge Elie al-Helou of the Mount Lebanon Criminal Court handed down the sentence, which also included a fine of 120 million Lebanese pounds (approximately $1,341) and the stripping of Dib's civil rights. L'Orient-Le Jour

Dib was sentenced in absentia, meaning he was not present for the trial and is believed to be outside Lebanon. Several Lebanese and Syrian nationals were sentenced alongside him under Lebanon's Narcotics Law, which covers the manufacturing of banned drugs. All those sentenced in absentia were stripped of their civil rights. Al Jazeera

The operation involved 820kg (1,800 pounds) of hashish produced in Baalbek in eastern Lebanon, a region historically associated with cannabis cultivation. The drugs were stored in a warehouse near Beirut before being transported to Turkiye and subsequently shipped internationally. The concealment method, embedding narcotics inside cake packaging, aligned with Dib's public profile as a food content creator. Al Jazeera

A Mount Lebanon investigative judge had recommended a life sentence with hard labour for Dib in February 2025, making the final sentencing the culmination of roughly 17 months of judicial proceedings. The case moved from investigative recommendation to definitive ruling under provisions of Lebanon's Narcotics Law, which treats the manufacturing of banned drugs as an offense carrying maximum penalties. Al Jazeera

The Al Jazeera report on the sentencing attributes its information to "reports" rather than naming a specific judicial body or official announcement, while L'Orient-Le Jour, publishing three days earlier on July 16, identifies the Mount Lebanon Criminal Court as the issuing authority. This discrepancy in sourcing granularity is worth noting for those tracking the case through secondary reporting rather than primary court records.

The fine of 120 million Lebanese pounds, roughly $1,341 at current exchange rates, reflects the dramatic devaluation of the Lebanese pound since the country's economic collapse began in 2019. A life sentence paired with a fine of under $1,500 illustrates the gap between the severity of the criminal penalty and the purchasing power of the monetary component under current macroeconomic conditions.

Baalbek's role as the production site places the operation in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, an area where cannabis cultivation has persisted for decades despite periodic eradication campaigns. The trafficking route through Turkiye aligns with established narcotics corridors connecting Lebanon to European markets via Turkish transit hubs.

Sentencing in absentia is a standard provision under Lebanese criminal procedure, allowing courts to proceed with trials and impose penalties when defendants fail to appear. Those convicted under this mechanism retain the right to a retrial if they subsequently present themselves to authorities, a legal architecture that means the life sentence is operative but not necessarily final.

The broader context here involves Lebanon's ongoing struggle with narcotics enforcement amid institutional fragility. The country's judicial system has continued to function through political paralysis, economic collapse, and security disruptions, though with intermittent delays and backlogs. The Narcotics Law under which Dib and his co-defendants were sentenced provides for some of the most severe penalties in Lebanese criminal statute, including hard labour, a punishment that remains on the books though its practical application in Lebanese prisons is subject to significant scrutiny.

The use of a social media personality's food brand as cover for a large-scale narcotics operation raises questions about the intersection of influencer culture and organized crime that go beyond this individual case. The scale, 820kg of hashish being a substantial consignment by any metric, and the international routing suggest an operation with logistical sophistication exceeding what a single individual could coordinate alone, though the court's sentencing focused on Dib and his named co-defendants rather than detailing the broader network.