Palestinian From Lebanon Refugee Camp Reaches San Francisco, Turns Right Around

He realized Ein el-Hilweh wasn’t so bad after all.

San Francisco, August 14 – A man who escaped an Apartheid camp outside Beirut, where the descendants of those who fled war with the nascent Israel in 1948 may not hold most jobs or enjoy anything resembling the rights of long-term residency, let alone citizenship, in their country of birth, managed to smuggle himself out of the squalid, walled-in village, secure passage to Europe, and from there to the US, finally got to the destination of which he’d dreamed, a progressive, pro-Palestinian haven in Northern California, only to discover a city so horrid, so crime-ridden, that only hours after arriving, he went back to the safer environs of the camp.

Hassan Halabi, 27, recounted Monday his journey out of Ein el-Hilweh in southern Lebanon, a “refugee” camp for Palestinians whose parents, grandparents, or great-grandparents left their homes in what was to become Israel, ahead of an onslaught of Arab armies and irregulars into the territory of Palestine, to get out of the way of those armies’ anticipated triumph over the newly-created Jewish State of Israel, after which the clans would return to their homes and enjoy the spoils of victory over the lowly Jews – only to get stuck in Lebanon and elsewhere when the Jews withstood the onslaught and repelled the invaders.

Halabi found a way to bribe the guards who keep the UN-defined “Palestine Refugees” restricted to the Ein el-Hilweh camp; make his way to the coast, where smugglers, for a hefty price, spirited him by sea to Southern Europe; from there, he made his way to a US diplomatic facility and requested asylum, citing conditions for Palestinians in Lebanon. The US Department of State approved his request and flew him to New York, from where Halabi contacted acquaintances and relatives who helped him travel to the West Coast and reach San Francisco, of which he’d dreamed since his preteen years – and, upon encountering a city rampant with drugs, human feces, used hypodermic needles, homeless encampments, automotive burglaries, robbery, shoplifting, violence, and total lack of political will to address any of it, realized Ein el-Hilweh wasn’t so bad after all, and returned there.

“I’d rather be held in limbo and poverty as a political tool to pressure Israel forever than set foot anywhere near San Francisco again,” he declared on his flight back to Beirut. “I thought I knew Hell before. I thought the prison-like restrictions on movement, employment, and individual rights were the worst human society had to offer. But now I’ve been to San Francisco, and I appreciate Palestine Refugee camp life much more than ever.”

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