REFUGEES IN LEBANON

Syrian refugees in an informal camp on Lebanon’s Bekaa Plain in the summer of 2015. Lebanon has about 1.5 million Syrian refugees. In this country of 4 million inhabitants, the exiles settle in « informal » camps, the only ones tolerated by the Lebanese state. These are private plots of land rented – often at prohibitive rates – by Lebanese landowners to refugees from Syria. In these camps, the men are idle, because legal work is forbidden to Syrian refugees in Lebanon. For Syrian men, it is very difficult to maintain their dignity, as war and exile have deprived them of the social role of family breadwinner, psychologists in NGOs working in the field note. Lebanon, Zahle, July 15, 2015. PHOTO © OLIVIER PAPEGNIES

Reference: LIB002