Fear grips Syrian communities as violence surges in Lebanon
The killing of a member of a right-wing Christian political party in Lebanon last week, attributed by the army to Syrian carjackers, unleashed a torrent of violence and threats against refugees, leaving many afraid to leave their homes.
17 April 2024
Beirut, Lebanon – For the seventh evening in a row, Abed and his brother George watched the sunset on Sunday from their small balcony in Burj Hammoud, a historically Armenian town just east of Beirut. The brothers, who fled to Lebanon from Homs in 2015, had not left their apartment for a week, too afraid to venture into the streets below where violence against Syrians has spiked.
It began with the killing of Pascal Sleiman, a senior official of the Lebanese Forces (LF), a right-wing Christian political party opposed to the Syrian regime and its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah. The Lebanese army said Sleiman was abducted and killed in a carjacking attempt on April 7 by Syrian gang members who later transported his body to Syria. The LF party, meanwhile, has called his death a “political assassination until proven otherwise.”
Sleiman’s killing sparked a wave of xenophobia and hate crimes against Syrians in Lebanon, a country where anti-refugee sentiment was already soaring.
“It’s like house arrest,” 43-year-old Abed told Syria Direct. “It has become very frightening for Syrians to leave their houses.” Both brothers asked to be identified only by their first names for safety reasons.
When information spread about the reported involvement of Syrians in Sleiman’s death last week, supporters of the LF and other right-wing parties took to the streets throughout Lebanon, attacking Syrian refugees, the Access Center for Human Rights (ACHR), a human rights organization based in Beirut and Paris, reported.
Over the following days, dozens of Syrians were assaulted and threatened with expulsion by Lebanese residents of predominantly Christian areas. At the same time, the Lebanese police and army clamped down on Syrians, closing businesses, confiscating motorcycles and evicting Syrians without residency documents on the basis of pre-existing government orders.
On April 15, the governor of Lebanon’s North governorate announced a ban on “gatherings of displaced Syrians,” following in the footsteps of municipalities that enforced bylaws restricting Syrians’ movement in the aftermath of Sleiman’s killing.
“We have emphasized to the security forces the necessity of strict enforcement of Lebanese laws on Syrian refugees,” Lebanon’s caretaker Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi said after an emergency meeting on April 9. “The Syrian presence is unacceptable and Lebanon cannot bear it, and it is obvious that many crimes are committed by Syrians.”