HIGHLIGHTS
• World Humanitarian Day event in Lebanon celebrates those who dedicate their lives to humanitarian service.
• Lebanon Humanitarian Fund allocates $15.5 million for 23 projects.
Lebanon celebrates World Humanitarian Day
Exhibition highlights impossible choices faced by refugees
Humanitarian workers stand on the front lines of war and disaster, risking their lives every day in the most dangerous places to support the severely vulnerable. Over the past 20 years, almost 4,000 aid workers have been killed, wounded or kidnapped in the line of duty.
World Humanitarian Day, celebrated on August 19, commemorates those who dedicate their lives to humanitarian service. The event marks the anniversary of the 2003 bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Iraq.
In Lebanon, OCHA celebrated World Humanitarian Day – whose 2016 theme was ‘One Humanity’ – through a multimedia exhibition in Beirut and Baalbeck. Five interactive multimedia stations displayed short videos of Syrian refugees talking about their real-life experiences of facing impossible choices. They tell their stories of fleeing the war and leaving everything behind, of escaping the bombs, and of the challenge of affording medication. Khansa, a woman from Syria, describes living under the ruins of a building for more than a month, along with several other neighbors. After fleeing the conflict, she came to Lebanon as a refugee. Qousai, an 18-year-old boy who suffers from anemia and a growth disorder, explains how he was forced to drop out of school after he could no longer afford treatment (see ‘Qousai’s story’ on p.4). The short film ‘Watani, My Homeland’ by Marcel Mettelseifen shows the path of a Syrian family who lost their husband and father in the war, and sought asylum in Germany.
Dreams for the future
The photo exhibition “When I Grow Up”, by Vincent Tremeau and Meredith Hutchison, was also presented at the WHD event. It shows children from several African countries and Syria, dressed up as their dream professions and talking about their aspirations for the future.
Today, the scale of human suffering around the world is greater than at any time since the Second World War. As a result of conflict and disaster, more than 130 million people around the world need humanitarian assistance in order to survive.
Together, they would form the tenth most populous country on Earth. To raise awareness, signs with key facts and figures were placed around the World Humanitarian Day venue to inspire humanitarians and the general public to do more. A video highlighted key statistics about humanitarian needs around the world.
Raising awareness and inspiring action
Building on the World Humanitarian Summit, the event also featured the global “Impossible Choices” campaign through an interactive Humanitarian Quiz which shows the choices refugees have to make through the game “Would You Rather?”. The campaign urges members of the public to tweet their leaders and ask them to commit to action. Humanitarian workers who attended the event actively participated in the Comments Booth, taking photos of themselves holding up their messages to the Syrian refugees. The event showed the difference humanitarian assistance can make in a person’s life, and sought to inspire the community to do more as humanitarians.
For more information about World Humanitarian Day and OCHA’s activities, visit the WHD website and follow us on Twitter.