Two new reports on the plight of displaced women in Lebanon and efforts to address the problem

As Safir newspaper published yesterday two different reports on the plight of women displaced from Syria. The first article covers a Palestinian NGO initiative called “Tawassol” which is implemented by Beit Atfal Assumud and which attempts to help tens of displaced Syrian women as well as Lebanese women and Palestinian women from Syria acquiring simple skills which will enable them to secure paid home based work or work within different institutions. In the Rashiddiyyah camp in South Lebanon, tens of displaced women from Syria attend the Beit Atfal Assumud training centre to learn skills which allow them to respond to their families’ needs and expenses.  According to Doris Abu Nasser, one of the beneficiary women, “learning skills will allow women to secure income especially that the conditions of displaced women from Syria and their families continue to deteriorate and given the tightening of aid to the displaced”.  The coordinator of the Tawassol initiative in Tyre, Abeer Nawf, notes that the current training workshop benefits 15 Syrian and Palestinian displaced women and is the third to be implemented and seeks to empower women socially and economically.
The second report reflects the experience of displacement and the promises that failed to materialize through the stories of two women displaced from Syria.  The first woman called Aisha is a mother of two.  One of her children has a severe heart condition.  The family lived in the displacement camp of Marj during a period of one year and a half before she decided to return home as she realized that there is no place for her in Lebanon and death in her country is more dignified than bearing hunger, sickness and humiliation in Lebanon.  The second story is that of Umm Fahed, a woman in her fifties who came recently to Lebanon as she could not longer bear to live under ISIS although she comes from a religious and conservative family and went to pilgrimage in Mecca a few years ago.  Umm Fahed says that hunger in Lebanon is better than living under ISIS.  Umm Fahed who came with her son whilst her husband remained home to guard their house noted that “freedom is beautiful”.
Source: Al-Safir, Al-Safir 16 July 2014