A suburb in northern Lebanon with no football field of its own has become an unlikely hub of Socceroos fever, with residents of Jabal Mohsen — a neighbourhood in the city of Tripoli — staging their first-ever street festival in support of Australia at the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
On 19 June, a lengthy motorcade wound through local streets, packed with supporters waving Australian flags, dressed in green and gold, and setting off flares. Videos circulating online showed an entire street taken over by die-hard fans, some carrying AI-generated banners of Socceroos players, others leading chants of "Aussie, Aussie, Aussie! Oi, oi, oi!"
A Heartfelt Thank You to Australia
One of the march organisers, Omran, captured the mood from the window of a moving car, shouting to the crowd: "This is the least we can do for this great country! This is just our way to say 'Thank you, Australia, from Jabal Mohsen!'"
Fellow organiser Ali, 38, said his passion for Australian football stretches back to his admiration for Socceroos legend Tim Cahill, and that his young children are already fluent in "Oi, oi, oi!" He described the festival, held on 19 June, as a way to express solidarity with friends and family members who have built lives in Australia.
"In almost every household in Jabal Mohsen you will find that one of the family members lives in Australia," Ali said. He himself has a brother living in Sydney. "[The parade] was a way to give back to the Aussie community both here and in Australia."
Jabal Mohsen is home to Tripoli's Alawite minority community, and some of the festival's organisers were Australian citizens who happened to be in town visiting relatives.
Deep Roots Between Tripoli and Australia
Australia's ambassador to Lebanon, Tom Wilson, said the affection for Australia in Tripoli is well established and goes back decades.
"A lot of the Lebanese Australians who came to Australia in the 70s and 80s are mainly from Tripoli … so there's really strong connections there," he said, adding that it is common to see Australian flags displayed around the city.
Those connections are not just emotional. Ambassador Wilson described a regular practice in which diaspora members in Australia pool funds electronically to help family back home in times of need. "If someone needs an operation or urgent assistance for something, they send a message into WhatsApp, and they all throw in a couple hundred bucks," he said. "There's an appreciation of Australia from these people because they know the community is willing to do that."
It is worth noting that Lebanon has never qualified for a FIFA World Cup — and this time around, the Socceroos were among the sides to end Lebanon's qualifying campaign. Despite that, no ill will appears to have diminished Jabal Mohsen's enthusiasm for Australia. Similar community festivals were held in the neighbourhood this year for Brazil and Germany, reflecting other nations where Lebanese diaspora communities are strongly represented.
A Community That Loves Football Without a Field
Suleiman, a 30-year-old sports photographer with the North Lebanon Football Association, is himself a supporter of both Australia and Brazil at this year's tournament. An admirer of the game's greatest players, he told of the bittersweet relationship his community has with football.
"Jabal Mohsen is alive, it breathes sports and loves football, but unfortunately it does not have a football pitch," he said, speaking through a translation app.
Despite that absence of basic infrastructure, the passion is clearly not in short supply. For a neighbourhood that has to celebrate the world game without even a local ground to call its own, throwing a full street festival — flares, flags and all — for a team on the other side of the world is a remarkable expression of what football, and family, can inspire.
