Back to Contents In a peer-reviewed article about Palestinians’ access to the labour market in Lebanon published in 2022, academics Samih Eloubeidi and Prof. Tina Kempin wrote: “[...] About 63% of Palestinians live in twelve camps scattered across the country. The camps are described as ‘urban ghettos comprised of concrete blocks with corrugated roofs, narrow alleys with sewage and water pipes and covered with a maze of makeshift electric wires’. Overcrowding, unemployment, poor housing conditions, and low standard of living are common. About two-thirds of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon live in poverty, with higher poverty rates inside the camps. The camps perpetuate structural violence, limit social and economic integration, and have increased tensions and hostility towards Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. Palestinians are subjected to many human rights violations in their daily lives and do not enjoy the same kind of freedoms and rights as other foreigners living and working in the country. The confinement to camps, restricted freedom of movement, and little access to educational and income-generating opportunities over a span of decades and generations have left the community in destitute condition.” (Source: Samih Eloubeidi & Tina Kempin Reuter/ The International Journal of Human Rights, “Restricting access to employment as a human rights violation: a case study of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon”, 11 April 2022, p. 3) In its series of country reports for 2021, the US Department of State wrote about Lebanon: “E. STATUS AND TREATMENT OF INTERNALLY DISPLACED PERSONS Fighting in 2007 destroyed the Nahr el-Bared Palestinian Refugee Camp, displacing approximately 30,000 residents, of whom an estimated 27,000 were registered Palestinian refugees. Many of the displaced resided in areas adjacent to the camp or in other areas of the country where services of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) were available. A comprehensive, multiyear plan to rebuild the Nahr el-Bared Camp began in 2008; the project was approximately 70 percent completed at year’s end. Remaining reconstruction was not fully funded, with a 60 billion Lebanese pound ($40 million at the official exchange rate) shortfall remaining. Of the 27,000 Palestinians originally displaced following the camp’s destruction, 14,706 had returned to newly reconstructed apartments in the camp as of June, and the temporary settlements that provided housing for them near Nahr el-Bared Camp were being decommissioned. As of September, two of the five plots had been closed and the land handed back to the respective landlords in their original condition, a third plot was almost fully vacated, and the two remaining plots were being dismantled.” (Source: US Department of State (USDOS) “2021 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: Lebanon”, Section 2. Respect for Civil Liberties, March 2022, p. 22) The same source further stated that: “Access to Basic Services: The government did not consider local integration of any refugees a viable solution. The law considers UNRWA-registered Palestinian refugees to be foreigners. UNRWA provided health, education, social services, and emergency assistance to registered Palestinian refugees residing in the country. The amount of land allocated to the 12 official Palestinian refugee camps in the country has changed only marginally since 1948, despite a fourfold increase in the population. Consequently, most Palestinian refugees lived in overpopulated camps, some of which suffered heavy damage in past conflicts (see also section 2.e., Status and Treatment of Internally Displaced Persons). By agreement with the government, Palestinian security committees provided security for refugees in the camps.” (Source: US Department of State (USDOS) “2021 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: Lebanon”, Section 2. Respect for Civil Liberties, March 2022, p. 28) The French newspaper Le Monde published an article about a refugee camp in Lebanon and the situation of its inhabitants: “In Al-Jalil [a UN-recognised refugee camp situated in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley], the misery is not as glaring as in other camps. 11. Situation in the camps 118