According to a report in the Palestinian news agency WAFA, Palestinians living in Lebanon suffer “do not enjoy several important rights.” Where are the pro-Palestinian activists around the world?
By United with Israel Staff
The Palestinian Authority news agency has acknowledged that the Palestinians are persecuted in Lebanon.
Despite that fact that anti-Israel demonstrators around the world, claiming to defend Palestinian human rights, promote BDS against the “apartheid” Jewish State, an article published by WAFA on Saturday indicates that in Lebanon, the home base of the Hezbollah terrorist organization, Palestinians are treated as second-class citizens.
According to the article, titled “New Lebanese labor minister supports changing laws that discriminate against the Palestinian refugees,” Palestinian refugees do not enjoy equal rights.
“Almost half a million Palestinian refugees are registered with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestine refugees in Lebanon with half of them living in 12 refugee camps under dire conditions characterized by overcrowding, poor housing conditions, unemployment, poverty and lack of access to justice. Palestinians in Lebanon do not enjoy several important rights; for example, they cannot work in as many as 39 professions and cannot own property,” the report says.
Mustafa Bayram, Lebanon’s new labor minister, announced that he supports changing the discriminatory laws. “He told Palestine TV that he will do what he can to make sure the Palestinian people do not remain subject to injustice or treated unfairly in their host country,” WAFA reported.
“I say to my Palestinian friends: I will be their voice of support when it (their situation) is brought before the cabinet,” Bayram said, according to the report.
The minister, the report continues, said he will do what he can “to amend laws that deny justice for Palestinians in Lebanon with regard to labor rights in a manner that does not conflict with Lebanese laws and the interest of the Lebanese worker.” He will “spare no effort” to cooperate with others “who have constructive suggestions on this matter” in order to remove “the obstacles that prevent real progress in the issue of work rights for the Palestinian refugee in Lebanon.”