"The Permanent Temporality"

 

 

 

 

BASIC INFORMATION

 

Shatila is a refugee camp located in the south of Beirut. Originally, it was conceived as a temporarily camp of tents created and managed by the Red Cross. Today, more than 60 years have passed since its creation, and it can be defined as a dark and overcrowded labyrinth where about 28.000 people live in a small area of less than one square kilometer; thousands of them have arrived as a result of the war in Syria. According to the UNRWA, Shatila is one of the Palestinian refugee camps with poorest sanitary conditions in the Middle East. Due to the lack of habitat, refugees are forced to build in a disorganized manner new residential complexes on top of the existing buildings as families grow. That’s why, security risks are high, and constructions are carried out without any control or supervision. Moreover, the camp lacks the most basic services, and, at best, those are in deplorable conditions.

 

 

KEY FACTORS

 

 

The Lebanon and Beirut do not provide public services to Shatila. On the contrary, everything is organized internally in an anarchic way. The infrastructure of the Camp is in a catastrophic state of repair. It only has one defective power generator; consequently, families have replaced it by their own means. Streets and passages are narrow, barely paved and a messy grid of electrical cables is hanging above them, creating dark and highly dangerous tunnels. It must be noted that those cables are directly exposed to weather conditions and intertwined with any kind of pipes in poor conditions.

 

Most Palestinian refugees live below the poverty line. Besides that, in Lebanon they do not have access to the Lebanese nationality, they cannot own property nor access most of the professions. The Lebanese government has been issuing a “document de voyage pour les refugies palestiniens” that allows them, with many difficulties, to travel abroad. Finally, most of the children living in Shatila are the third or fourth generation of Palestinian refugees living in the camp; a temporality that has got enduring.

 

 

 

 

(1) According to the UNRWA health conditions in Shatila are “extremely bad”.

(2) The grid of high voltage cables covering the streets of Shatila are in a pity state and short-circuits with dramatic consequences are common.

(3) The habitat in Shatila is oppressive and suffocating; there are no playgrounds for children.