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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 July 2021
Palestinian camps in Lebanon have turned once more into “transitional zones of emplacement” for thousands of people recently fleeing the Syrian conflict. In this context, the plural subjectivities emerging within the camps highlight a further connection between spatial marginalization and precarious legal statuses. My research hinges on the interconnectivities evolving around the Palestinian Bourj el Barajneh camp and Hezbollah-controlled Beirut southern suburbs moving from an ethnographic insight of the Palestinian football society. Inside the “Refugee Football Leagues,” Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese players find a space in leagues whose matches are mostly disputed within the numerous refugee camps scattered throughout the national territory. Moving from newcomers’ strategies for protection, the essay investigates how refugees living in camps experience different scales of mobility and develop a wide range of practices that extend beyond the camp's boundaries, exploring how imperceptible and hyper-mobile tactics of existence re-elaborate Palestinian refugee camps into meaningful places of elusive contestation.
1 Such estimates were confirmed by several organizations operating inside the camp. However, it is difficult to find reliable data on the number of inhabitants in each camp due to the lack of recent surveys. According to a report drafted in November 2017 by Basmeh & Zeitoneeh, a Syrian NGO operating inside the camp, Palestinian refugees from Syria and Syrian comprise 50 percent of the 40,000 camp residents. Full report available at: https://www.alnap.org/system/files/content/resource/files/main/bz_november_2017_barriers_to_education_for_female_and_male_syrian_youth_in_shatila_and_bourj_al_barajneh.pdf.
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4 See Amnesty International's report: “Denied Refuge: Palestinians from Syria Seeking Safety in Lebanon” (2014), http://www.amnesty.nl/sites/default/files/public/mde180022014en_1.pdf (no longer active).
5 According to UNRWA, 31,500 Palestinians from Syria were recorded in Lebanon in 2016.
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25 John Urry, Mobilities (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2007), 234.
26 Joel Rookwood, “Learning, travelling, writing, communicating - a central quest in academia,” in The Sporting Image: What if?, ed. Clive Palmer (Preston: UCLAN University Press, 2010).
27 Pierre Bourdieu, “Sport and Social Class,” Social Science Information 17 (1978): 819–40.
28 Henri Lefebvre, “The Right to the City,” in Writings on Cities, eds. Eleonore Kofman, and Elizabeth Lebas (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Wiley-Blackwell, 1996).
29 Urry, Mobilities.
30 All my teammates and a great majority of my interviewees are young men, as the camp's narrow streets during night-time are almost exclusively frequented by male residents, for a number of structural, social, and cultural reasons that go beyond the scope of my research. Nonetheless, moving from the football field, I conducted a few interviews with my teammates’ family members – including women – when visiting private households. These informal conversations proved particularly significant throughout my life and fieldwork inside the camp: my feeling of “familiarity” inside their houses especially was decisive in the sharing of our respective past biographies, as well as the framing of the relationship outside the banality of a football field.
31 Diana Martin, “From Spaces of Exception to ‘Campscapes’: Palestinian Refugee Camps and Informal Settlements in Beirut,” Political Geography 44 (2015): 9–18.
32 Jad Chaaban, Nisreen Salti, Hala Ghattas, Alexandra Irani, Tala Ismail, Lara Batlouni, “Survey on the Socioeconomic Status of Palestine Refugees in Lebanon 2015” (Beirut: The American University of Beirut, 2016).
33 Carole Alsharabati, and Jihad Nammour, Perception of Security among Refugees and Host Community (Beirut: Universitè Saint-Joseph de Beyrouth, 2017).
34 Published by the Institute Des Sciences Politiques, Universitè Saint-Joseph de Beyrouth: “Perception of Security among Refugees and Host Community”. The report is available at: https://www.usj.edu.lb/intranet/actu/pdf/5663.pdf.
35 See Estella Estella, “Syrians in Akkar: Refugees or Neighbours? Rethinking Hospitality towards Syrian Refugees in Lebanon,” Refugeehosts, January 15, 2017, https://refugeehosts.org/2017/01/15/rethinking-hospitality-towards-syrian-refugees-in-lebanon/.
36 Starting in April 2015, both in the cases of “entry for work” and “entry not for work”, the applicant needed to provide a “pledge of responsibility” at the General Security Office and pay a fee of $200 per person above 15 years old for a 6-month residency permit (Janymr, 2016). However, the difficulty in collecting the required documents, the cost of the sponsor, and the volatility of the whole sponsorship system, which is very much relegated to the informal level, created a challenging procedure that most Syrians were unable to follow.
37 Internal security management is exercised by the Palestinian military forces linked to the PLO, that in some cases collaborate with the Lebanese Army patrols located on the outskirts of the camps in case of military joint operations.
38 Rami Siklawi, “The Dynamics of Palestinian Political Endurance in Lebanon,” The Middle East Journal 64.4 (Autumn 2010).
39 Khouloud (December 2014, 14). Personal interview, Nahr el-Bared camp.
40 Fatma (November 2016, 10). Personal interview, Nahr el-Bared camp.
41 Abed (November 2016, 10). Personal interview, Nahr el-Bared camp. Abed here refers to the Lebanese Army checkpoint located on the costal road leading to Tripoli
42 Elena Fontanari, “Afterword: An Ethnographic Gaze on Power and Refugees,” Ethnography and Qualitative Research 1: 143–155.
43 Gorokhoff, P., “Création et évolution d'un camp palestinien de la ban- lieue sud de Beyrouth Bourj el-Barajneh”. Politiques urbaines dans le Monde Arabe (Lyon: Maison de l'Orientméditerranéen), 313–329.
44 Sherifa Shafie, “Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon,” Forced Migration, 2007, retrieved from http://www.forcedmigration.org/research-resources/expert-guides/palestinian-refugees-in-lebanon/fmo018.pdf.
45 Mohammed Kamel Doraï, M.K., “Palestinian Refugee Camps in Lebanon. Migration, Mobility and the Urbanization Process,” Palestinian Refugees. Identity, Space and Place in the Levant, 67–80.
46 Latif, N., “Space, Power and Identity in a Palestinian Refugee Camp,” Asylon(s) 5 (2008), retrieved from http://www.reseau-terra.eu/article800.html.
47 Abu Ahmad (October 2016, 10). Personal interview, Borj el-Barajneh camp.
48 Lundsfryd Heide-Jørgensen, “A World of Checkpoints: Border Crossing Experiences of Palestinian Refugees from Syria in Lebanon” (Master's Thesis, University of Lund, 2014).
49 Rosemary Sayigh, “Greater Insecurity for Refugees in Lebanon,” Middle East Research Information Project, March 1, 2000. https://www.merip.org/mero/mero030100.
50 Souheil El-Natour (October 2016, 26). Personal interview, Mar Elias camp.
51 Rowell, A., “Hezbollah Shooting Stokes Palestine Ire”, Now News, September 12, 2013, https://now.mmedia.me/lb/en/reportsfeatures/hezbollah-shooting-stokes-palestinian-ire (no longer active).
52 Abu Ahmad (October 2016, 10). Personal interview, Bourj el-Barajneh camp.
53 Khaled (March 2017, 21). Personal interview. Bourj el-Barajneh camp.
54 Nadya Hajj, Protection and Chaos: The Creation of Property Rights in Palestinian Refugee Camps (New York: Columbia University Press, 2016).
55 Hussein (October 2016, 20). Personal interview. Bourj el-Barajneh camp.
56 Joel S. Migdal, Boundaries and Belonging: States and Societies in the Struggle to Shape Identities and Local Practices (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2004).
57 Joelle Hatem ed., Planning the City through Play: Youth Efforts in Making Communal Football Fields in Beirut (Beirut: Project by Public Works Studio, 2016).
58 Gabiam N. and Fiddian-Qasmiyeh E., “Palestinians and the Arab Uprisings: political activism and narratives of home, homeland, and home-camp,” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies (2016).
59 Khalil (October 2016, 23). Personal interview, Beirut.
60 Gulick, John, “The Ethos of Insecurity in Middle Eastern Culture,” in Responses to Change: Society, Culture, and Personality, ed. DeVos, G. A. (New York: D. Van Nostrand Company, 1976)Google Scholar.
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