News

Lebanon Postpones Daylight Saving Time Shift By 1 Month

The decision has left Lebanon waking up in two different time zones this morning.

Published

4 years ago

March 26, 2023

Nour Nasir

lebanon postpones daylight saving time shift by 1 month

AFP

In a last-minute decision, Lebanon’s government announced that the shift away from daylight saving time would be postponed by a month, extending DST until the end of Ramadan. As a result, while most Northern Hemisphere countries automatically advanced their times by an hour yesterday, the people of Lebanon were left confused about the exact time they should set their alarms on Sunday morning.

In an alleged video leak shown by news outlet Megaphone, Lebanon’s prime minister, Najib Mikati, and parliament speaker Nabih Berri discussed the postponement, with Berri insisting on delaying the switch away from DST.

Most digital devices with network access, such as smartphones and computers, switch in and out of daylight saving time automatically, so Lebanese citizens were asked to adjust their clocks back an hour manually.

Also Read: A Line-Up Of Over 100 Shows Comes To Snapchat This Ramadan

Although public institutions are forced to abide by the government’s decision, many private businesses ignored the request and continued to follow the existing schedule. The confusion has left Lebanon — a small country that can be transversed east to west in less than two hours — with two separate time zones.

The chaos has resulted in missed appointments, TV channels displaying different times, and even Google searches with the wrong timestamps.

News

Microsoft Plans $10 Billion-Plus Gulf Expansion Despite Iran Conflict

Security is shaping Microsoft’s approach, from resilience work with governments to what it will say about how the money splits by country.

Published

4 days ago

September 24, 2026

Nour Nasir

Microsoft

Microsoft is planning more than $10 billion of investment across the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait through 2030, Vice Chair and President Brad Smith told Reuters, calling the spending schedule aggressive. The Iranian conflict that began on February 28 has not persuaded the company to scale back.

“We’re sustaining all the investments we planned to make before this conflict started, and we are in fact adding to them,” Smith said. The $10 billion-plus total does not, however, show how large those additions are.

The investment, which Smith described as part of Microsoft’s continued infrastructure expansion, is aimed at cloud and AI infrastructure and at the company’s growing regional operations. Microsoft also intends to put more than $400 million into subsea and terrestrial connectivity across the Middle East by 2030.

The spending fits the region’s own ambitions too. Gulf governments have been investing heavily in AI infrastructure as part of a push to diversify their economies beyond oil and gas and turn themselves into global technology hubs. Major cloud and AI providers have been drawn in part by the land and relatively low-cost energy on offer.

Microsoft is widening its partnerships with regional AI companies, though not on identical terms. In 2024, it invested $1.5 billion in Abu Dhabi-based G42 for a minority stake, and Smith currently sits on G42’s board. Saudi Arabia’s Humain and Qatar’s Qai are working with Microsoft on selected priority areas, but Smith said the company does not plan to make capital investments in either.

Also Read: Egypt’s Mobile Wallets Are Booming, But Cash Still Has Power

The conflict has added another strand to Microsoft’s work in the region. Since it began, Smith said, the company has supported regional partners with digital resilience assessments, and it is now working with Gulf countries through a digital resilience initiative focused on preparedness and the protection of critical data.

So far, the company has given no country-by-country breakdown of the investment, citing security among other factors. So while the headline figure is public, how Microsoft divides the spending among the four countries is not.