Syrian refugees in Lebanon en route back to their homeland on Dec. 8, 2024 the day after the fall of the Assad regime. (Credit: Mohammad Yassin/L’Orient Today)
BEIRUT — The National Litani River Authority (LRA) announced on Thursday that it had begun dismantling an Syrian refugee camp in Bar Elias, a town in the Bekaa's Zahle district, as part of a campaign to evacuate 34 camps illegally set up on the banks of the Litani River, citing the polluting of the river's environment.
The measures was announced 15 days prior and the warning applied to 34 Syrian refugee camps located all along the river.
In a statement released by the LRA, it announced that as part of its campaign to free up public access to the river, it had started its operations in "camp number 46" in preparation for a complete evacuation. The camp, which is managed by Khaled Ali Shehadeh, consists of approximately 50 tents.
The initiative is "the direct result of strict measures taken by the Authority to end encroachments on public river properties and to protect water resources from pollution sources due to wastewater discharges, polluted water, and solid waste in the riverbed," the statement says.
The LRA, a public institution established in 1952, called on Ministry of the Interior, the governors, and security forces, for support in continuing on with the rest of the evacuations and warned that "any refusal to evacuate after the deadline constitutes an explicit violation of the law, exposing its perpetrators to legal action and forced evacuation at their expense."
Lebanon been host to nearly 1.5 million Syrian refugees since 2011, the beginning of the brutal Civil War in Syria. Many of the refugees took shelter in the Bekaa or northern Lebanon, due to the proximity to the Syrian borders. Conditions for Syrian refugees in Lebanon are dire, with support mostly coming from humanitarian organizations, many of which have seen their funding drop in recent months.
The regime change in Damascus, with Bashar al-Assad's fall in December 2024, raised hopes for a gradual return of these refugees to their homes, however the security situation in Syria remains tenuous and at times bloody. Only a minority of Syrians have returned to their homeland, while at the same time, more refugees have fled Syria, specifically from the minority Alawite community, of which the former dictator was affiliated.
