‘Informal Tent Settlement’

On September 13, 2015October 1, 2015 By norefugelebanonLeave a comment

We visited an Informal Tent Settlement (ITS) a few days ago which is about 2 miles from the ‘settled’ refugee camp I’m staying in. The situation here in the surrounding area is less acute than in the Bekaa valley I’m told. There are tent settlements scattered throughout the countryside every few hundred metres or so. Each one home to several hundred Syrian refugees. My host Melad works with the children in this area and has good relationships with the men who live here. With the NGO Warchild I will be working with these children also. Melad is a third generation Palestinian refugee so it was interesting to see the solidarity shown from Syrians to Palestinians. One of the men told Melad that his children had fought and died fighting for Palestinians during the revolution. That’s solidarity. Palestinians in the region, such as my friends in Nahr al Bared have been there since 1949- 66 years! Without the potential for return to Syria then these ‘tent villages’ may start to resemble Palestinian camps over time. Palestinians themselves spent their first few decades in exile living in tents.

In Nahr al Bared itself there are between 2-3,000 Palestinian-Syrian refugees. These are Palestinian refugees, exiled from Palestine during the 1948 ‘Arab-Israeli war’ (others also fled the 1967 ‘six-day war’) who settled as refugees inside Syria but who have recently been made refugees yet again. Some fleeing Assad, others fleeing Daesh (ISIS) as in the case of the Yarmouk camp as I was informed by former Yarmouk residents in Nahr al Bared- one side is besieged by Assad and the other by Daesh. The exodus of Palestinians from Syria and the likely exclusion of them from EU asylum policy, given they are not technically full citizens of Syria, highlights the fluidity and complexity of the situation and also urges that all refugees are consulted and considered when searching for real solutions to the current crisis.

As with all refugees I have met they were immediately welcoming and happy to share what they have with outsiders. We ate a meal and then they offered Sheesha. Unfortunately I don’t know Arabic so I wasn’t privy to the entire conversation Melad had with the men from Homs. They did tell me about one child they had with them who’s parents were killed during the Assad government’s onslaught against rebel held Homs more than 3 years ago. The young child, Faraz, had travelled with his neighbours to this camp in Lebanon.

Ahmad showing me round the tent settlement

The residents had been at this camp for 3 years now and are searching for ways to move on. There is some limited schooling available to the kids here and NGOs like warchild help provide other services. Some limited opportunities for seasonal work is available for the adults in the surrounding farms, this with dubious legality and naturally, very low wages. Even with the small comfort provided by these limited opportunities, it is a cramped space on a rented field and is certainly not somewhere for any number of people to stay for a long period of time. 3 years in this place must be torture. Melad pointed out to me several other areas where there had been ITSs which had been moved. The local farmers rent plots of land via the UN and other agencies so when any contract expires the people are vulnerable to being moved on again. There was one camp by the barren coast-line where a whole settlement had been moved, yet one elderly man remained. He was living in a dilapidated makeshift tent in the middle of the field.

We are on the western slopes of the snowed capped Mt. Lebanon mountain range, the winters are cold and wet, though not as harsh as those in the Bekaa valley on the other side of the mountain range where there are many more refugees. One thing I noticed about the camp was that it consisted mainly of women, children and elderly men, presumably these are the ones not yet able to make the perilous sea crossing to Turkey or Europe. They did say that they planned on making the journey, perhaps they were waiting for the ‘right time’. I don’t know but it’s clear that 3 years and counting in this purgatory only makes the sea voyage more appealing by the day.

Nahr Al Bared Kid’s Club

On September 13, 2015October 1, 2015 By norefugelebanonLeave a comment

There are kids everywhere you go here, playing in the streets, ruined buildings, waste grounds and also working in all kinds of jobs. I have seen kids manning scrap yards, garages, carting wheelbarrows on building sites and looking after shops.

happy kids just hanging around on the streets

There aren’t many facilities for them to be distracted by, there is no playground area, swing park or anywhere to run around. There are some places like a small cafe where the boys play on playstations and there is the makings of a fair-ground with a ferris wheel but it needs a fair bit of investment. All the trees were destroyed in the war, the rocky coast-line is in fact comprised not of rocks but mostly debris from the buildings destroyed in 2007, most vacant pieces of land become prime spots for fly-tipping as is the only river in the camp and much of the coast line so playing in the water is as filthy as playing on the land here. Palestinians, despite being surrounded the sea here, are banned from using boats, even small dingheys aren’t permitted by the Lebanese army. One potential source of income is off limits to them, nevertheless they fish from the rocks regularly. It would make such a difference if they could use boats or even for the kids to play on some small canoes or row-boats.

Zidane runs a kids club in the camp, he and others who help drive a an open-sided bus through the camp playing music, saying hello to people along the way and generally just having a laugh as much as possible.

on Zidane's magical mystery bus — on Zidane’s magical mystery bus

The camp is 6 sq km so when you consider there are 30,000 residents in mostly low-rise accommodation, a large chunk of the camp is still in ruins, other parts are wasteland and other areas around the 3 Lebanese military checkpoints are blocked from being useful for security reasons, then you are left with a very small strip of land with very little breathing space. It’s quite shocking to walk the perimeter of the camp and to think that this is the horizon for all the children here for most of their upbringing, a polluted and bombed out few sq kms with next to nothing of real interest.

With the money we raise the goal is to provide safe spaces for the children to play. There are spaces available we just need some time and money to get these areas into decent condition.

Foze! My host Khalil's fantastic wee nephew — Foze! My host Khalil’s fantastic wee nephew

kids 'playing' in the rubbish — kids ‘playing’ in the rubbish

No Borders

On September 7, 2015October 1, 2015 By norefugelebanon1 Comment

It took a few days for the reality of the camp to sink in. Flying in to Beirut, staying in one of the uber-trendy neighbourhoods with all the art-exhibitions, street art, hipster bars and fancy restaurants, was exactly the kind of place I usually detest but this is the middle east, there are bombed out buildings and classic cars everywhere, so it was actually kind of cool. Then taking the 1980s style, demolition derby bus up north the following day to change at Tripoli, a really delapidated and tense city, full of soldiers on their way to and from duty, that was an experience in itself. Then the final bus further north and up to the camp, seeing all the soldiers, the destitute by the road-side, the roadblocks and barbed wire, more bombed out buildings, the occasional black ‘islamist’ flag in some neighbourhoods was also eye-opening for a sheltered westerner like myself. It sounds stupid to say it but the area is so Mad-Max looking that it almost doesnt feel real. There is smoke and rubbish everywhere and all the vehicles and buildings look a few decades past their useful life. My friend Grazia speaks Arabic so to make myself feel even more of a lost westerner I was just following her along the road and nodding to whatever the soldiers were barking at us at the checkpoint. We got through with no dramas, by now it was pitch dark and we walked along the unpaved, unlit, dirt track along the sea front for a bit until a taxi stopped to offer us a lift. He asked if we were going to Melad’s (everyone knows Melad) so we jumped in. When we arrived at Melad’s we got out and had forgotten to pay him but he had started to drive off so Grazia ran after the car to pay him. That is typical of the Palestinians I have met. Can you imagine anywhere else in the world where a taxi driver wouldnt tell you exactly how much you owe him?

Enjoying the experience and hospitality here lulled me into a warped sense of comfort. Sitting round with some men in the evening the picture of the young Kurdish boy Aylan started coming through on people’s social media. Melad showed me the picture and I gave the usual reaction of sadnesss but didn’t really think about what it really meant. Before going to sleep I checked facebook to see people arguing over whether or not to show pictures of dead children on social media, some people were disgusted that this offensive picture had disturbed their peace and one ‘friend’ commented that he had had to go to the inconvenience of making himself ’30 friends lighter’. As pathetic as it sounds, because I had already spent time at the camp among many refugees who hoped to make the journey themselves and who were connected to many of the most unfortunate through familial ties and friendship, but I still maintained the perspective of a disconnected outsider. Seeing the extreme disconnection back home and the perverse nature of the dialogue contrasted with the hopelessness of those I was with. It is no longer possible to view the victims as the other and to pretend these tragedies happen far away to people we know nothing about. To the Palestinian refugees Aylan was one of them, they know everything about his tragedy and short life, disconnection is not an option for them and so too with us we cannot allow ourselves to remain disconnected and to consider issues of refuge and asylum as talking points or a way to stroke our egos by jumping on board the ‘welcome refugees’ bandwagon as welcome though it is, many of the causes which create suffering for so many refugees, Syrian and Palestinian alike lie within our own actions and the actions, non-actions and interventions of our own governments. It is not enough to open our borders and welcome refugees, as necessary and as helpful as that is in the short-term, without addressing the causes of these many tragedies. Melad’s take on the refugee crisis speaks volumes, “opening European borders is not a solution, what is the point of opening those while the borders of Palestine remain closed.”

About this blog.

On September 5, 2015October 1, 2015 By norefugelebanon1 Comment

Sheikh Abdoul and the kids having a laugh

My name is Tony Collins, sometimes a professional bagpiper and other times a political activist of sorts.

I’ve been working at a circus in China for the past year and when the opportunity arose recently, I decided to travel to Lebanon with my bagpipes to meet people at Nahr al Bared, a Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon, 10 miles from the Syrian border. I will be starting work with the NGO War Child Holland working with children suffering the effects of war using muic and games to entertain and get to know these amazing kids.

This blog will document the many enlightening, warm and heart breaking encounters I am experiencing along the way and hopefully shine a spotlight on the stories of some of Lebanon’s most forgotten refugees.

No Refuge Lebanon

Tag: NGO

‘Informal Tent Settlement’

Nahr Al Bared Kid’s Club

No Borders

About this blog.