In the southern suburbs of Beirut, there is a place where the joy of the ceasefire with Israel has never arrived. It is called “The Shelter” and is a former event venue transformed into a shelter for migrant women following the intensification of the conflict in the country’s south. Inside there are more than 200 women, all from Sierra Leone, who worked as housekeepers for wealthy Lebanese families, before being kicked out of their homes or abandoned under Israeli bombs.

Many of them found themselves in a few days without a job, without a roof to sleep under, but above all without a document. Their “masters”, as the women call them, kept everything while they left the country or took refuge in safe places away from the bombing. Now some have returned to their old jobs to find them destroyed, still, others would like to return to Sierra Leone but cannot leave the country until they get their passports back. Despite the ceasefire, “The Shelter”, therefore, remains the home of more than two hundred migrant women who are still displaced today.

Through the voice of Lea Ghorayeb, a volunteer at the Shelter, the story of three young women who live there, we would like to tell this story which – right now that the spotlight on Beirut has turned off – seems important to us bring to light.