Conflicted presence: The many arrivals of Palestinians in Lebanon

Abstract

Abstract No refugee arrival is ever a single event. Arrival repeats, but it is not the same each time. Each arrival is shaped by previous experience as well as future expectation. Considering the multiple layers that constitute refugee arrival is thus necessary to understand such experiences. Palestinians, who have experienced many arrivals, offer an instructive case. This article focuses on Lebanon, where Palestinian presence has always been challenged, and challenging. And this presence has also undergone many changes over the years. Approaching presence through the lens of the built environment, it explores how the construction, inhabitation, and destruction of buildings change over time and are historically layered. The article takes up three distinct moments in Palestinian history in Lebanon: (1) the early years/first arrival; (2) the time of revolution [thawra]; and (3) rebuilding after destruction by Israeli invasion and the Lebanese civil war. Together, these snapshots of different layers in cumulative arrival offer a textured image of Palestinian presence. An exploration of these layers shows that the formal recognition that derives from hereness is often the smaller part of its impact. Presence has a power that regularly defies the discursive, legal, and even affective limits that people and governments seek to put on it.