Staring out of a small window in Hay el Sellom, one of the most densely populated and poverty-ridden areas in Beirut, Zahraa Mustafa Omar, a mother of three from Baghdad, apologises to her guests.

“I am so embarrassed to offer you hospitality in this place. In Iraq we used to have a big house. It was lovely. We bought it when we got married’, she says, as she smiles and sits opposite her husband.

Together, two families - including a grandmother and five children – sit in one of the two rooms they share, a kitchen and a toilet. There is no bathroom. There is very little in this dark and dingy flat, but thin mattresses leaning against a wall and large plastic bags filled with belongings. Mould is visible on every wall and the air is thick with a damp smell.

“I am a doctor”, says Jawal Abbas Ali, a father of two, also from Baghdad, with a look of pride in his eyes. “But I cannot work here. I did manage to find some casual labour work on a construction site. But we were not even receiving ten dollars a day.”

“Transport is so expensive here,” Zahraa continues, “It’s nearly thirty dollars a month for each of my children to get a bus to school. I can’t afford that. I would rather not eat and not drink, if my children could then go to school, but what can I do? Not going to school is like being put back in time.”

Two million Iraqi refugees
Zahraa, Jawal and their families are among two million Iraqi refugees forced to flee violence created by the ongoing military operations together with worsening communal and sectarian violence. A further two million Iraqis are internally displaced, living in urban centres – where the majority of the fighting is taking place - forming the largest displacement of people in the Middle East since Palestinians fled their homeland in 1948.

“We used to feel sorry for the Palestinians and the Somalis. We would get upset at their suffering. Now we have the same lives as them”, said Zahraa.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’ (UNHCR) considers Iraq to be one of the most dangerous countries in the world. It has begun granting prima facie refugee status to practically all Iraqi refugees from Central and Southern Iraq.

Security for Iraqi refugees living in Lebanon is also a serious problem, but for different reasons. Lebanon is not a signatory to the 1951 Geneva Convention on Refugees, seriously limiting the protection provided by UN documentation.

“The UNHCR paper doesn’t mean anything. If we are stopped at a Lebanese army checkpoint, we will be deported anyway. We are afraid to leave the flat to search for work. The children cannot even go out to play.”

With parents not being able to move freely, finding paid employment is a crippling problem. Child labour is endemic in Lebanon, with children as young as ten working in hazardous environments including paint factories and metal works.

If not in education, girls and young women often face confinement to the domestic environment until marriage. Iraqi women and young girls have been forced into prostitution in both Syria and Lebanon.

Education Resource Centre for refugees
To help fight these problems, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) has opened an Education Resource Centre to assist over 250 Iraqi refugee families living in the southern suburbs of Beirut. NRC is working alongside the local implementing partner Insan Association, to ensure the right to education for all children and youth until the age of fifteen.

As a result of violence in Iraq and their forced migration through Syria to Lebanon, many Iraqi children and youth have been denied access to schools for years at a time. By offering psycho-social support to address their traumatic experience of displacement and an intensive programme of catch-up learning tailored to the needs of the Iraqi refugee community, the project is designed to get children back to school as quickly as possible.

For children enrolled in mainstream education, the same activities will be offered outside of normal schools hours.

The Education Resource Centre is operating as a hub building capacity in satellite sites that include local schools and community centres. Local staff have been trained to run a wide range of activities including a youth development programme and community outreach services.

“The Iraqi community face many problems here in Lebanon”, explains May Hammoud, NRC Education Project Coordinator, before adding that NRC does not limit itself only to educational activities. When NRC finds vulnerable cases her colleagues provide information of partner organisations offering services such as primary and secondary healthcare.

“That is what parents have told us they want and need. We also involve children in our programming”, says Hammoud, standing in the Centre’s recreation area, as children play around her.

Hammoud asks Fatima a girl of ten, out of breath from running with her friends, what she has been doing in the Centre. Fatima, replies: “Today I learned Arabic and English. This morning we also did mathematics and computers.”

“Which is you favourite?” asked Hammoud.

Fatima is in little doubt: “I like playing football”, she answers.