Lebanon: Migrants are among most at-risk amid Lebanon escalation
Displaced migrant communities trapped between impacts of war and humanitarian response that often excludes them
After one month of escalated bombardment and blanket evacuation orders by Israeli forces in Lebanon, more than one million people have been forcibly displaced. Among those most at-risk are migrant workers from African and Southeast Asian countries, as well as other minorities who are increasingly cut off from humanitarian assistance.
As they struggle to afford medical care and navigate restrictive legal systems, displaced migrant communities are now trapped between the impacts of war and a humanitarian response that often excludes them. The International Organization for Migration estimates around 30 per cent of the identified migrant communities in Lebanon (approximately 48,000 people) are displaced or living in high-risk areas.
“We ended up on the road, searching for shelter, knocking on doors that wouldn’t open, asking for help that never came. There was nowhere for us. No safety. Just the road beneath us.
Salam, displaced migrant
Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is providing care to displaced people across Lebanon, including migrant workers and other minorities. Our response includes supporting local community kitchens that deliver meals to displaces migrants and people living in areas that are high-risk or subject to blanket evacuation orders. MSF has also distributed more than 2,000 relief items to over 100 migrant community houses and shelters, including blankets, mattresses and hygiene kits.
Medical referrals have doubled at Bourj Hammoud clinic
In response to the growing needs arising from Israel’s escalation of attacks, MSF has expanded through our mobile clinics reaching forcibly displaced communities across Beirut and surrounding areas. Our teams are also providing care at the MSF clinic in Bourj Hammoud, a northern suburb of Beirut. Together, the Bourj Hammoud clinic and two mobile clinics are now providing about 3,000 consultations per month.
Since early March, medical referrals from MSF’s Bourj Hammoud clinic have doubled, with many patients requiring blood transfusions, intensive care admissions or surgery. Other humanitarian organizations are struggling to fill gaps due to lack of funding, leaving many patients without access to essential care.
“I was living in Dahiyeh [a suburb in southern Beirut] when the bombardment started,” says Salam, a displaced migrant receiving healthcare from MSF mobile clinic in Ghosta, Mount Lebanon. “We fled that same night, not knowing where to go. We ended up on the road, searching for shelter, knocking on doors that wouldn’t open, asking for help that never came. There was nowhere for us. No safety. Just the road beneath us.”
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Migrants are being even more sidelined
Most migrant workers in Lebanon come from Ethiopia, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka to do domestic and other blue-collar work. They have been systematically marginalized under Lebanon’s kafala (sponsorship) system, which grants them minimal rights, including health coverage.
Migrant communities in Lebanon already face significant economic, legal and social barriers to accessing basic services. Many are now sheltering in overcrowded accommodations arranged by community leaders or sleeping on the streets. Some report being explicitly turned away, discriminated against or deprioritized from formal collective shelters in favour of Lebanese nationals.
“Even before Israel’s latest military escalation in Lebanon, migrants’ access to healthcare was severely limited by language barriers, systematic discrimination, cost of health services and residency status,” says AbdelHalim Abdallah, MSF project coordinator in Beirut. “Now, with nearly a fifth of the country’s population forcibly displaced, migrants are becoming even more pushed to the sidelines, with devastating consequences to their health and survival.”
On March 29, MSF treated over 300 migrant patients in our Bourj Hammoud clinic and two mobile clinic locations in Beirut and Saida. Over 170 patients from Ethiopia and Bangladesh sought MSF’s healthcare services in Saida alone. Most of them were either displaced or haven’t had access to healthcare for months. That day, the team had to send two babies to the emergency room. The patients just kept coming.
While families are left homeless and displaced, their health needs are also exacerbated by disruptions to care, high costs of medicine and lack of access to care due to irregular residency status. Although access to care has been severely constrained for migrant communities in the past, it’s become even more challenging as the needs across the country have dramatically grown.
Around one quarter of the medical consultations MSF teams have provided to migrant communities are for people with chronic illnesses. Many of these patients have been cut off from their medication by forced displacement or other barriers to accessing healthcare. MSF teams are also observing significant gaps in access to women’s healthcare and mental health services, even in places where primary healthcare is being provided by other agencies.
MSF’s work with migrants in Lebanon
MSF has been providing specialized care for migrant communities since 2019 through the support of volunteer community health educators who speak Amharic, Bangla, Sinhala, French, English and Arabic. These volunteers ensure migrant patients can communicate with our healthcare professionals.
Since 2024, MSF’s clinic in Bourj Hammoud has been providing primary healthcare, mental health support, sexual and reproductive care, social services as well as health promotion.
To scale up our response to the current escalation, the clinic is now open six days per week and has two mobile medical units covering the needs of migrant workers and displaced Lebanese families in over 20 locations in neighbouring districts in Mount Lebanon.
