The Lebanese Minister of Interior and Municipalities, Judge Bassam Mawlawi, sent a letter to local authorities on May 2, 2023 in order to initiate a national survey campaign aimed at enumerating and registering displaced Syrians in various villages and cities. He used “the current circumstances that Lebanon is going through” and “concern for the supreme national interest” as a pretext. However, the text highlights the way in which this survey and subsequent decisions reflect a discriminatory view of the Syrian refugees, treating their presence as a threat. The decisions taken by some municipalities further limit the movement and rights of the refugees, leading to bureaucratic barriers and evictions. The text draws parallels to Michel Foucault’s concept of “biopolitics,” where authorities control and reshape the lives of the population, imposing restrictions on the right to access housing, thus significantly impacting the human rights and dignity of refugees.

Read details in Arabic here.