Tents set up in front of the Dar al-Yateem al-Arabi school, currently housing internally displaced people. (Credit: Olivia Le Poidevin)
For two months, Dar al-Yateem al-Arabi private school in Saida’s Rahbet neighborhood was what its visitors hoped would be a brief haven — a shelter for people fleeing the thousands of bombs dropped by Israel on eastern and southern Lebanon since its mid-September escalation into open war with Hezbollah.Now, in the first days of a precarious cease-fire, and despite many breaches of the agreement, many are returning home. Thousands of families, however, have no home to return to.“The school will remain open until the last guest leaves,” says Fatima al-Baba, executive director of Amalouna, the NGO supporting the school. Read more The painful return to southern Lebanon Almost all of the 350 people who sought shelter here during the war left with the Nov. 27 truce. “But then they started coming back,” Baba says. She expects even more...
For two months, Dar al-Yateem al-Arabi private school in Saida’s Rahbet neighborhood was what its visitors hoped would be a brief haven — a shelter for people fleeing the thousands of bombs dropped by Israel on eastern and southern Lebanon since its mid-September escalation into open war with Hezbollah.Now, in the first days of a precarious cease-fire, and despite many breaches of the agreement, many are returning home. Thousands of families, however, have no home to return to.“The school will remain open until the last guest leaves,” says Fatima al-Baba, executive director of Amalouna, the NGO supporting the school. Read more The painful return to southern Lebanon Almost all of the 350 people who sought shelter here during the war left with the Nov. 27 truce. “But then they started coming back,” Baba says. She expects...
