Palestinians in Lebanon Hold Little Hope for Reconstruction
Heather Murdock | Nahr el-Bared, Lebanon 11 November 2010
They call the temporary housing "barracks" or "containers." Some of the two-story blocks of rooms are made of concrete, and they are decorated. Others are made of tin.
For more than three years, about 10,000 Palestinian refugees in Lebanon have been living in the barracks, after their camp was destroyed in a three-month-long battle between the Lebanese Army and an Islamic militant group known as Fatah al-Islam.
“This house is for animals,” said Ahmed Abueid, as he poked his head into a single metal room that houses six Palestinian refugees on the outskirts of the Nahr el-Bared camp in northern Lebanon. “Animals cannot live like this. We want to go to our houses in old camp. Quickly."
Abueid is one of about 30,000 Palestinian refugees in Lebanon displaced by the war that left 400 people dead and the camp demolished. Most of the camp's buildings are still heaps of gray rubble, riddled with bullet holes.
Abueid said he was promised a new home after his building was flattened in 2007, but now has little hope that the camp will be rebuilt.
In the barracks, displaced families say they rely on the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency for small amounts of food and medicine. In neighboring towns, displaced families receive $150 a month to help pay the rent.
But the United Nations says the families may be cut off in the next few months for lack of funding. The agency has not been able to raise any of the $18 million needed to sustain these basic services in 2011.
Agency spokesperson Hoda Samra Souaiby said if help does not arrive soon, families will stop receiving aid before the end of the year.
"If the funding does not come,” she said, “more than 3,400 families would be left without rental subsidies, of course, and the whole relief operations will have to stop. But I do not think we will reach this stage, and I certainly hope that we would not reach this stage."
The reconstruction process has long been marred by delays and lack of funding. The United Nations says it has only enough money to rebuild about 25 percent of the camp.
Souaiby said there is no way of knowing when more of the camp might be completed, because the agency still needs $209 million for the project.
"Previous camps that have been destroyed in Lebanon were never rebuilt,” she added. “This in itself is a challenge. It is the reconstruction of a whole city, a whole town."
The apartments in the barracks are cramped, leaky and sometimes infested with mice and bugs. Teenage girls are sometimes forced to share rooms with their brothers, which is considered shameful by many Palestinians. They say the food, medicine and small cash subsidies they receive from the United Nations are not nearly enough, and work is scarce.
Those who do find jobs with construction companies rebuilding the camp say the pay is low, and often late.
Mahmoud Getawi is a displaced refugee, working on reconstruction of the camp. He often has to wait weeks for payments. When he asked the company why, his supervisors blamed international donors who pledged funds but have not yet delivered it. Construction is often halted when the companies do not have money.
Getawi said he thinks his new home might be finished when his children, one of which is unborn, are adults.
“Maybe they will be for my children,” he said, laughing. “Not for me.”
The United Nations estimates as many as 60 percent of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon are un-employed or underemployed. Even though there are several generations of Palestinians living in Lebanon, they are considered foreigners and need special permits to work. They are banned from working in many professions, like medicine, engineering, and law. They cannot buy or inherit property.
Wafa Abdulla Abuaudi said three years ago, after the war, international organizations provided enough food for the refugees to survive.
“After one year, they stopped,” she said, huddled in a concrete doorway in one of the barracks.
Now, every three months she gets enough food to feed her family for two weeks and has no hope that she will ever move into a new house in the camp. The first buildings might get finished, she said, but after that, the money will be gone, and the international community will forget about Nahr el-Bared.
Other women who were born and raised in the Nahr el-Bared camp, and have never been to Palestine, joked about the reconstruction. "We'll get to move back to Palestine,” one woman said,
“before we are able to move into those houses.”
The Nahr el-Bared camp in northern Lebanon was once home to 30,000 Palestinian refugees. Three years ago, it was destroyed by fighting between the Lebanese Army and a militant group known as Fatah al-Islam. Battles went on for three months, and 400 people were killed.
After the fighting subsided, the Lebanese Army took control of the camp. The United Nations and international donors pledged to re-build, and the people were promised new houses. After three years of waiting, many people say they have given up hope.
Some construction of the camp is underway. The United Nations says some people might be able to move into these buildings as early as next year, and they have funding to build another section. But unless they get more, most of the camp will remain rubble indefinitely.
Refugees who used to live in the camp are now scattered. Some live in other Palestinian refugee camps and towns in Lebanon. About 10,000 live in barracks like this one, on the outskirts of what is known as "The Old Camp," where they used to live.
Life in the barracks is hard. Some whole families pack into single room dwellings, ceilings leak, and parents say their children are often sick from the stale air in the tiny poorly ventilated rooms. One little girl's name is Nancy. Her mother says when she was two years old, Nancy was attacked by rats or mice in the barracks, and bitten several time in the face.
Residents say the United Nations gives them some food, medicine and a little bit of cash every few months. But they say the food is not nearly enough to go around. They joke that in Nahr el-Bared, if you break your leg, you will get a band aid. The United Nations says it is short of funds and even this aid could stop before the end of the year.
As international funds dwindle, life on the outskirts of the bombed-out camp goes on. Some new schools are open and some men are finding work with the construction companies that are trying to rebuild the camp. Construction worker Mahmoud Getawi is often paid weeks late, and work on the buildings is frequently stopped when the companies run out of money.
Mahmoud laughs when I ask when he expects to move into his new house. If the camp ever gets rebuilt, he says, it will be long after he is gone.
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