By Emilie Madi and Joseph Campbell
HAZMIEH, Lebanon (Reuters) – Migrant worker Fajima Kamara came to Lebanon three years ago from Sierra Leone, but when Israeli jets started pounding her neighbourhood with airstrikes last month, her employers left her jobless and homeless.
The 28-year-old mother-of-three had been working as a domestic helper for a Lebanese family in the eastern city of Baalbek, a Hezbollah stronghold.
As a nearly year-long cross-border conflict between Israel and the armed Shi’ite movement sharply escalated in late September, Kamara’s employers sought refuge in Dubai and told her she could not stay in their home while they were away.
Instead, they told her to go and find her “fellow African sisters” in the capital, Beirut, Kamara said.
With her phone and passport still confiscated by her employers and no time to pack, Kamara left Baalbek with nothing but the clothes she was wearing and made her way among the thousands of other displaced people to Beirut, where she hoped to find somewhere to stay.
Turned away by local shelters that were taking in displaced Lebanese, she soon found herself homeless and living on the city streets.
“I slept on the street for two days. Now I have fever,” Kamara told Reuters between sneezes.
U.N. officials said on Friday most of Lebanon’s nearly 900 shelters were full, voicing concern for tens of thousands of mostly female, live-in domestic workers being “abandoned” by their employers.
Kamara eventually found refuge at a shelter hurriedly opened by Lebanese volunteers on Oct. 1, but is worried about her future as the conflict intensifies. For now, she hopes to stay on and find another job to avoid having to go home penniless.
About 100 migrant workers and some of their children are staying at the same crowdfunded shelter, sleeping on thin cots on a cement floor and eating on wooden pallets.
Dea Hage-Chahine, who helped lead the project, said she and her team were working around the clock to expand the shelter by adding power generators and a makeshift kitchen.
Their ultimate goal is to help repatriate workers who want to return to their home countries – although most, like Karama, are without a passport.
“For now, for those who told us they want to travel, we initiated the process. For those who want to stay, for now, we have the shelter open for them, providing any needs they require. But we don’t know what’s next,” Hage-Chahine said.
In a country historically wrought by conflict and where a devastating economic crisis has crippled state institutions, grassroots efforts have stepped in across the country to help the displaced.
Lebanese authorities say Israel’s escalated offensive has displaced about 1.2 million people – almost a quarter of the population – and killed more than 2,000.
(Reporting by Emilie Madi and Joseph Campbell; Writing by Joe Campbell; Editing by Maya Gebeily and Helen Popper)
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