With the European Union increasingly consumed by keeping migration at bay, Israel’s widening war risks sending more people the bloc’s way. Airstrikes and land incursions in Lebanon have displaced at least 1.2 million people, according to Lebanese government estimates, with one quarter of the country under Israeli military evacuation orders. Israel is seeking to weaken its enemy, Hezbollah, an Iran-backed militia based in Lebanon.
That has Lebanon’s population of more than five million people caught in between. The country is already suffering from years of severe economic and political crisis. It is also home to an estimated 1.5 million Syrians, who fled their country after civil war broke out in 2011.
While many European officials are broadly supportive of Israel’s multi-front assault, they want to avoid an exodus of war-ravaged people akin to scenes from 2015. This week’s European Council summit in Brussels saw leaders lay the foundations of a hard policy on migration – including endorsing “return hubs” for rejected asylum seekers.
In early October, the French interior minister, Bruno Retailleau, announced he wanted to take tough action against migration flows into the EU. The Netherlands and Hungary want to pull out of the EU’s pact on migration and asylum. Germany has imposed temporary controls on its land borders, while Italy has started operating detention centres in Albania.
In an interview with The Parliament, Eugene Sensenig, director of the Lebanese Emigration Research Centre (LERC) at Notre Dame University-Louaize, looked at Lebanon’s migration trends to see if the EU could be facing a repeat of its recent history.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity:
What can you tell us about migration patterns in Lebanon so far?
The first big wave, of course, was by land from the south to the north of Lebanon. It was internal displacement. And then there was and there still is displacement into Syria. Both Syrian and Lebanese refugees are now leaving in large numbers, but these border crossings are being bombed again and again. So that interrupts them, but it doesn't stop them because the border is very porous, and it always has been. Lebanon and Syria used to be one country.
What role is the EU’s migration deal with Lebanon playing, which totalled €1 billion?
There are two sides to that. One is the security side, and the other side is the social welfare of the Syrians themselves. We're doing a project right now with the NGOs who are service providers in the most northern part of Lebanon, north of Tripoli. We ask them if that money is making a difference. They say no.
We have a culture of impunity instead of rule of law. We have a highly toxic form of sectarianism instead of confessional coexistence. We don’t have a constitutional democratic system. And we don't have a functioning military. And so when these kinds of investments come, they don't really make a difference for the well-being of the population.
Of course, it’s an emergency right now – so saying you need structural reform and long-term change doesn't sound like the right answer. But we've been saying this for 20 years. And in 2014, the Germans radically cut funds to a Syrian education programme.
We said, “You want the Syrians to stay here? Don't cut the funds. Increase the funds.” They said, “No, we can't afford it.” So, in 2014, they're cutting the funds for the Syrian refugees in Lebanon. And in 2015, Turkey opened the border. So, it's been a long-term failure and dysfunction on the part of the European Union to take this problem seriously.
Lebanon’s ethnic and social tensions seem intractable. Are there examples that give you hope of a way out?
One of the conflicts that the Lebanese tend to like to compare themselves with is Northern Ireland. These solutions, these models work for better or for worse. And that's something the Lebanese are looking at. So, when we look at Europe, we look at these regional conflicts and how they've been solved. And one of the major reasons why they've been solved, along with all the structural ones, is we have leaders who have done what Gandhi said: Be the change you want to see in the world.
South Africa is also a comparison that we like to draw in Lebanon. When leaders and people in the middle and people at the bottom decide to get along, that's when it works. And we have plenty of good examples in Europe of this working when we have that.
What role does Turkey play in controlling migration?
It all depends on Turkey, of course. And the Turks are very good at maintaining their border security when they want to. And all those boats that are leaving for the Aegean, those are leaving because the Turks are allowing them to leave. If they want to close that down, they can close it down. And so basically Turkey is saying, what's in it for us? So that's a deal that the European Union could easily make with Turkey.
How does the risk of new migration waves play into the hardening conversation around migration policy in the EU?
There's an old saying: The far right asks all the right questions and gives all the wrong answers. They're going to continue asking the right questions if the other parties don't ask the right questions. I saw a similar thing in 1989 in Austria when I was still living there. A lot of do-gooders wanted to open up the borders. Poor, working-class people feel threatened — and for some pretty good reasons because semi-skilled labour is threatened.
These problems exist and they have to be taken seriously. And if the other parties don't answer the call and ask the questions and give the answers, then the far right is going to do it. And they're doing it very successfully.