Iraqi Refugees Live in Lebanon’s Shadows

by Karen Button

In the crowded Christian neighborhood of Sad el-Bouchrieh Amer chain-smokes cigarettes in the small one-bedroom apartment where his family of five now live. His wife, Nadwal, and their three sons listen silently while he recounts their harrowing escape from Iraq to Lebanon. “We were fortunate even to have arrived here,” he says, though the life is far from easy. Once a shop owner, Amer now feels lucky just to have a delivery job in a country where he is not legally allowed to work. He earns $10 USD a day.

As Christians living in Basra, life before the US-invasion was not easy, says Amer. After the invasion, it became a hell.

“Under Saddam, we lived downtrodden. But circumstances after the invasion became unbearable. Sadr’s forces took over the city and immediately the threats began.”

Amer owned a liquor store that quickly became a target of Moqtada Sadr’s Mehdi forces. One day, the militia drove by shooting into his store and a customer was killed. Amer quickly sold everything and closed the store. He then found a job with an Italian NGO that was providing aid to refugees who’d fled Saudi Arabia and Iran, where he worked for nearly three years.

But the intimidation continued. Threatening letters were dropped at the door of the Christian family, accusing them of being “dirty non-believers.” Nadwal took to wearing the hijab in public, removing it when she would enter the church. Then, Amer began to be warned about working with foreigners. After sending messages to his cell and calling him at home, the militia began following Amer until the day they caught up with him.

“I was giving a ride to some friends and my youngest son was with me in the car. We were followed and suddenly they began shooting at the car. I yelled for my son to get down on the floor. One of my friends was shot in the shoulder and I was shot here,” he says, pulling up his shirt to reveal a long, thick scar on his chest. “Then, they shot the gas tank and the car was in flames!”

Fortunately, a British patrol was nearby and heard the gunshots. When they showed up, the militia members fled.

“My son’s legs were completely burned. We were taken to the hospital, but we couldn’t even get complete medical care. There was a shortage of drugs and the hospital had been taken over, pictures of Saddam replaced by Sadr. I didn’t feel safe there because they can follow you even into the hospital and shoot you in your bed. No one can stop them!”

They were taken to a friend’s medical clinic where the bullet lodged in Amer’s chest was finally extracted and his son’s burns treated. Terrified, the family fled their house that night, accepting the protection of a Muslim friend. The friend helped find a new car and the family fled for Mosul, where they had relatives, two days later.

“I was nine months pregnant,” Nadwal adds quietly. “I gave birth in Mosul, but the baby was completely deformed and died immediately…” she trails off with tears in her eyes.

On top of this, Nadwal’s relatives urged them to leave, frightened themselves. Christians have been targeted and persecuted by militias in Iraq, driving most to flee. “They told us they couldn’t even protect themselves. But, we had no documents and didn’t know what to do. We were so scared and so stressed,” Amer continues.

After staying just 3 days, with Nadwal, Amer, and their son still recovering, the family of 5 decided to flee to Lebanon, where Amer had a cousin. With their life savings of $4,000 on them, they left early one December morning with a smuggler who promised to get them into Syria for $200 each.

After successfully entering Syria, the family nearly at the Lebanese border when they were stopped and arrested by the mukhabarat (intelligence). “They beat me and my [eldest] son very badly. I begged them to just hit me because this boy had never been touched in his life, but they didn’t listen,” Amer says sadly. “When I told them I had stitches in my chest, they hit me there, too. This was all in front of my family. I’ve never been so humiliated before.”

Amer and Nadwal had both hidden their remaining money on their bodies, which the police quickly found when searching Amer.

“I was so scared they would search me too,” Nadwal adds. “This was all our savings.”

“I was about to collapse from the beatings when they found the money,” Amer continues. “At that point, they stopped the beating and forced me to sign papers that we would return to Iraq. They told me to forget about the money, to leave and talk to no one. They said if they caught us at the border again, ‘I knew what would happen’. I was covered in blood with cotton in my nose when we arrived in Damascus.”

Still without documents, the family’s last hope was with another smuggler who promised to get them into Lebanon. After paying $150 per person, they were driven to the base of a mountain where, after an arduous 7-hour uphill trek in the mud, they had safely crossed.

The family arrived to the cousin’s house exhausted and still recovering from wounds and childbirth. But, they had arrived.

Now, a year and a half later, they have registered with UNHCR and are hoping for resettlement. Meanwhile, none of the children are attending school. The two eldest boys, a 16- and 14-year old, both work to help support the family. The youngest, still traumatized by the shooting incident in which he was burned, refuses to go, unwilling to be separated from his family.

“Thankfully, we are all still together and we’re still alive, because many Iraqis don’t even have that,” says Amer. “But, I had to quit school in order to support my family. Now,” he says sadly, “this is happening with my eldest son and he was the smartest kid in his school before.”

For the first time, Saymon, the eldest speaks up from across the room. “We’ve suffered everywhere, in Iraq, in Syria, in Lebanon. I feel that I’ve never seen a good day, and I wish for more.”

Shaking his head, Amer adds, “I can’t believe I used to help the refugees and now we are refugees ourselves.”

While the family hopes for resettlement elsewhere, they live in Beirut very cautiously. Like other Iraqis in Lebanon, they live mostly under cover for fear of being arrested and deported.

Lebanon, like Syria and Jordan, is not signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention, which gives recognition and legal status to those seeking a safe haven. Christians especially have fled to Lebanon, where they are 15 percent of the Iraqi population compared to just three percent in Iraq.

Iraqis can still sometimes obtain a one-month tourist visa either at the border or from the Lebanese Embassy in Baghdad, but it cannot be extended. Most are smuggled across the border, which Lebanon recently reinforced with a 7,000-troop presence. As a result, the majority of Iraqi refugees are in Lebanon illegally, where they are referred to as “illegal migrants”. If they are caught, they are jailed, then sent back to Iraq.

Fearful of being stopped at military checkpoints, numerous since last year’s war, or randomly by police, who then send them to jail where they await deportation, most Iraqis are living in the shadows.

Amer says he and his family all stick close to home and rarely leave their neighborhood. “If I’m stopped at a checkpoint, they’ll arrest me. It happens all the time, and to people that I’ve known.” Even on their street they don’t always feel safe. “There are frequent fights here and one night the police filled the streets when I was on my way home. I was alone and just hid until they finally left. I arrived home hours late and my family had no idea where I was.”

“I was terrified he’d been arrested,” says Nadwal. “Sometimes when there’s fighting in the streets we just lock ourselves in the house to be safe because we’re here illegally. We arrived here safely, alhamdullallah, but we live in a prison.”