Lebanon on the edge. Syrian crisis spillover risks upsetting a precarious balance
Agustin Galli 12 July 2013

This situation worries and annoys many Lebanese: a Sunni taxi driver told me he was sick of the situation. Though he understood the Syrian war and people’s reasons to leave the country he wanted them to be relocated to refugee camps like in Turkey or Jordan. Syria had already significantly harmed Lebanon and that it was necessary to act. This type of anti-Syrian discourse has become commonplace throughout every neighbourhood and social class.

There are even villages in which curfews have been put into place for Syrians. Here, all social problems such as thefts, begging, or, even the fact of not crossing roads properly are blamed on Syrians. Following the capture of Qusair and armed confrontations between the Lebanese army and Sheikh Ahmad Al-Assir in the last few weeks, everything has changed in Syria and Beirut. Syria’s shadow is becoming more and more imposing.

The Syrian conflict is also played out here

War in Syria is becoming more and more present and the presence of Syrian refugees there demonstrates the importance of the Syrian conflict for Lebanon and the Arab world. Syrian refugees have become a constant reminder of the Syrian crisis, of the influence that the neighbouring country still exerts and of the permeability of the State and Lebanese society to regional events. The political class and political parties – pro and anti-Syrian – play a pervasive role.

Hence, one can walk through different neighbourhoods in Beirut and perceive signs of their respective positions on the revolution, the civil war, or, as they say in Lebanon, of ‘mashaakil’ (problems). Thus, Beirut’s Sunni areas and villages of the same denomination (personal observation in the Bekaa) have raised flags of the Syrian army, banners welcoming and supporting Syrians. Shiite areas support the regime through Syrian and Hezbollah flags, through photos of Bashar Al-Assad and references to Qusair and to the fallen ‘martyrs’ of the Syrian border city. Christians defend the national army’s actions (Lebanese flags in Christian quarters of the city, photos of kidnapped priests in Syria) as a symbol of national unity; attempting to distance themselves from the Syrian crisis as much as possible.

The renowned Hamra neighbourhood is now controlled by the Syrian Social Nationalist Party, pro-Syrian regime and member of the March 8 Alliance. Two years ago their members bet up anti-regime protestors in front of the Syrian embassy, previously situated in this neighbourhood. Armed confrontations between pro and anti regime, such as the pro and anti Hezbollah confrontations on May 18 are becoming more and more frequent. Syrians certainly are not spared from these attacks: more than 10 Syrians were wounded on Monday June 22 by unknown individuals as they were travelling to a TV programme by bus. The Syrian conflict and in particular its refugees demonstrate the limitations of the Lebanese social system.

Syrian refugees in Lebanon – an exception?

The causes of the Syrian refugee problem in Lebanon are the same ones faced by any country hosting over a million emigrants in its country. This is especially the case when it implies the incorporation of 20% above the local population, estimated to be over 4 million inhabitants. For decades Lebanon has had economic, employment, and resource and inequality issues.

Indeed, the second cause of problems faced by Syrian refugees can be explained by the particularities of the Lebanese state and society in which an absent state is combined with civil society. The latter is certainly mobilised and always ready to show itself, lively and ‘modern’ but divided by its leaders’ communitarianism and patrimonialism.

The third cause is the specific statist system in which Lebanon is inscribed. In a state system characterised by an inter-statist and inter-societal interpretation that prevents the complete development of the modern state, the appearance of hundreds of thousands of newcomers poses a problem extending beyond the humanitarian. This is especially the case when relations between the two countries are far from being simple since the creation of nation-states. On the contrary they are full of suspicion.

Syria never really recognised the Cedar country as a sovereign state but perceived it as one of European imperialism’s strategies to divide the ancient Greater Syria (Bilad A-Sham in arabic). Syria’s 29 year occupation of Lebanon still weighs heavily on Lebanese collective memory and political structure. This explains why refugees are a bigger burden here than in other countries hosting Syrian refugees in the region.

The fourth cause is that for a long time hundreds of thousands of Syrians have been settling in Lebanon. Consequently, it is difficult to precisely say how many Syrians are in the Cedar country. It must be pointed out that a large part of them, perhaps more than half, were based in Lebanon before events in Syria. Many came to join family members who had already settled there.

A cause of confusion is that according to the Lebanese ‘street’ there are a million, a million and a half refugees in Lebanon. Their long-standing human presence as low-skilled workers particularly in agriculture and as a cheap workforce must be taken into account. Lacking a legal framework to protect them, they attempted to make a difference by sending their earnings back to their native country. But there one could observe tourists and Syrian students who carried out part of their formation in the Cedar country. Therefore, it is necessary to take the border’s porousness and facility to cross it into account.

Many works have attempted to calculate these numbers* but we are estimating that this Syrian workforce was close to half a million people. This immigration has been a source of conflict for a very long time. There are attacks against Syrians in multiple regions, calls by parties and political groups to expel them and persistent discrimination. Hariri’s assassination in 2005 did nothing but worsen this population’s situation. Although there has been a drop in the population in the short term, in 2007 it was the same as it was prior to 2005.

In this context of the Syrian population’s doubling it is difficult, almost impossible to see a long-term amicable ‘reception’ of newcomers.

Challenges for Lebanon

In the past few weeks many Lebanese leaders are insisting on the problem of Syrian refugees. Michel Suleiman, the country’s president has underlined that a solution to this situation must be sought. But this primarily focuses on sharing the financial burden of receiving hundreds of thousands of refugees demanding international aid. The Minister for public, Ali Hassan Khalil has emphasised that the hospital system’s capacity has been surpassed and that the situation is becoming more and more dangerous. Walid Joumblatt, the Druze leader has called for the installation of refugee camps for Syrian refugees in order to facilitate displaced people’s settlement.

At the same time, Lebanese foreign policy backing the Syrian regime, more or less implicitly, as well as Hezbollah’s actions in Syria have raised a lot of criticism and reactions. Islamist militia created in Syria by Ahmad Al-Assir in Sidon, where it appears that a lot of its members were Syrian still raises questions about the country’s stability.

But the humanitarian situation weighs heavily, bordering on disaster. The United Nations has also commented on the extent of Syrian refugee problems in Lebanon, in the spheres of education and employment. Many humanitarian organisations such as ‘Association Amel’, World child or Save the Children are attempting to help Syrian children to pursue their studies. Yet, differences in study programmes, economic needs of families pushing them to work mean that only 25% of Syrian children continue to attend school. A large number of Syrian families marry their teenage daughters off to try to help them to escape from a destiny of poverty. However, it is also necessary to consider the Palestinian question: Palestinian refugees, originally in Syria, have settled in Lebanon reaching over 60,000 people. They have become refugees twice over.

The arrival of Syrian refugees in Lebanon has shaken its complex denominational balance, Lebanese foreign policy and the country’s infrastructure.

In this article we have attempted to shed light on the limitations of Lebanese state and society and problems, which the mass arrival of refugees is posing within the country. The long history of relations between the two countries, Lebanese communitarianism and the state’s weakness in the wake of events in the Middle-East demonstrate the increasing seriousness of this human and regional tragedy.

(Translated by Maria Elena Bottigliero)

Agustin Galli is a researcher based in Beirut and PhD candidate at Sciences Po Grenoble, France

*See Chalcraft John, Of specters and disciplined commodities: Syrian migrant workers in Lebanon, Middle East Report, Numéro 236, 2005; Gambill Fall 2005; AFP 23 Oct. 2001; UN 3 Dec. 2007; ibid. 13 Apr. 2009; Daily Star 8 Nov. 2005; IWPR 21 May 2008)

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