Back to Contents “Non-ID Palestinians There are an estimated 4,000 Non-ID Palestinians in Lebanon. These are Palestinians who began to arrive in Lebanon in the 1960s and do not hold formal valid identification documents recognized by the GoL. They are not registered as Palestine refugees with UNRWA in Lebanon and are not recognized by the GoL as they do not have valid legal status in the country. Without documentation and legal status in Lebanon, Non-ID Palestinians face restrictions on movement, risk detention and face severe obstacles in completing civil registration procedures. This situation has acute humanitarian consequences, in particular limiting access to public services from Lebanese educational and medical services, bank accounts and access [sic] to justice and formal employment. They are also denied the possibility to travel abroad. UNRWA has extended a number of Agency services to Non-ID Palestinians. (Source: UNRWA: “Protection brief Palestine refugees living in Lebanon Updated in September 2020”, p. 1) 5.1. Can stateless Palestinians obtain travel documents to facilitate their movements inside and outside of Lebanon? Walaa Kayyal, a researcher living as a Palestinian in Lebanon herself, commented directly on the aforementioned prerequisites to apply for a travel document when interviewed for this report by Asylos in October 2022: “Palestinians in Lebanon; they don’t have a passport.[...]The passport is issued by the GSO, the General Security Office and there are definitely requirements to apply for the travel document because we don’t have a passport. [...] You should apply with your ID, which is a blue ID as they call it, and the UNRWA card. One important thing to mention here is that even the GSO office for the Lebanese is different from the Palestinians. The Palestinians have a separate office even for issuing travel documents. We do not interact with the Lebanese. And definitely, the papers required are different for the Lebanese and the Palestinians. Also, the duration of when you have to renew your passport is different. For example, a Lebanese person can renew his or her passport for 10 years. For Palestinian it’s up to 5 years. It’s either 1 year, 3 years, or 5 years. For Lebanese, it’s 1 year, 3 years, 5 years, or 10 years. Also we did not have biometric passport. I think since three, four years ago we started to have biometric passports, the Palestinian travel documents are also biometric. The Palestinian travel document has the migrant sign on it, two oblique lines. We have this on our travel document just to identify us as migrants and not citizens. Before the passport was biometric, the Lebanese used to have a navy blue colour for their passport and it’s smaller in size, while the Palestinians used to have a larger size of the passport and it was brown. After they became biometric, it became the same size but the Lebanese passport is navy blue and the Palestinian passport is [...]a lighter blue colour. This is something one has to know about Lebanon: They have to discriminate in any way. You can see these discriminatory actions without words, they have to differentiate Lebanese from Palestinians in any way possible. [...] If you do not submit all your complete papers, they simply reject your order. Because they review the papers in front of you and say ‘if you don’t complete your file, we are not going to at the first place to apply for you to issue a travel document’. (Source: Walaa Kayyal, interview record, 31 October 2022) Mr Ziad El Sayegh, Executive Director of the Civic Influence Hub in Beirut and former Policy and Communication Advisor to the Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee [a Lebanese inter-ministerial government body formed in November 2005 to implement the policies of the Lebanese government towards Palestinian refugees in Lebanon] relativised the difficulties faced by Palestinians to move within the country: “This is not to say that the problem is solved. No. But there is a serious essay [essai] within the DSG, Directorate of General Security to try to find a transitional solution until-- and this is the role of the Lebanese Palestinian Dialogue Committee. I don’t know if they are following this now. It seems to me this is not the case. And of course, this is paralysing the freedom of movement for travel only. But within the country, it is not paralysing anything. They can move within the country. They can move within the country, and there is a constructive collaboration between the Palestinian authorities, stakeholders in the country, and also the Lebanese government, and also the Lebanese military and security forces. [...] I don’t know how many [Palestinian refugees in Lebanon who are not registered with the DPAR nor with UNRWA who managed to access a travel document], but I knew that some of these people succeed in terms of an official 5. Freedom of movement 47