Emergency Response

March 2024

Our community of Syrian and Palestinian refugee women in Lebanon have been strongly affected by the regional violence that has re-erupted in the Middle East since October 7th.

Israeli airstrikes on the south of Lebanon and in Beirut have displaced over 100,000 people, exacerbating fear and instability, and the continuing escalation in the cost of living including food prices in a context where 90% of the population was already dependent on humanitarian aid.

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, the dedicated body for Palestinian refugees, has lost the majority of its funding. UNRWA supports some 250,000 people in Lebanon, running schools, hospitals and providing humanitarian support. The Lebanese government is warning that the suspension of UNRWA’s services could create a humanitarian catastrophe that threatens the country’s stability.

In addition, witnessing the events of October 7th itself and the scale of death and destruction in Gaza, has been re-traumatising for women who have lived through attack and bombardment and lost loved ones themselves.

OUR RESPONSE 

• Providing food baskets of emergency long-life provisions for 60 vulnerable families, to help with the rising cost of living, and to keep in case of rapid escalation of conflict, shops closing etc. For the first time we have started supporting Lebanese as well as refugee Palestinian and Syrian families, in recognition of the huge need among the Lebanese people themselves.

• General humanitarian assistance including help with shelter, education and legal support.

• Group theatre therapy sessions for Palestinian refugee women in Lebanon, to help them cope with the trauma of what they are seeing on the news, hearing from relatives, and what they have lived through themselves.

We are a small grassroots organisation supporting some of the most vulnerable refugee families. It is a drop in the ocean compared to the huge need, but we do what we can and our support makes the crucial difference between survival and destitution, hope and despair, for those in our community.