Beirut — Normally, Lilian Zaman would shop for clothes for her daughter and buy meat and sweets for Eid al-Fitr, the Islamic holiday that marks the end of Ramadan.
But now, “there’s no joy for Eid or for Ramadan or anything,” Zaman said by phone from a school-turned-shelter in the Lebanese city of Sidon, where she has moved with her family.
“Everything is hard,” she said.
As the Islamic holy month of Ramadan draws to a close and Muslims worldwide prepare for the uniquely joyous holiday of Eid al-Fitr, Lebanon has passed a grim milestone. According to the Lebanese government, Israel’s strikes have displaced more than 1 million people in the country.
Lebanon’s health ministry said 968 people had been killed by Israeli strikes in the country following the renewal of hostilities between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
Iran-backed Hezbollah entered the wider Iran war by firing rockets at Israel. This led to heavy Israeli bombardment of southern Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs, driving many from their homes.
“A lot of the children I’ve spoken to at least, their biggest wish is to spend Eid at home,” said International Rescue Committee spokeswoman Basma Alloush. “Eid is a time when all families come together, people celebrate with their relatives, and it usually brings a lot of peace and happiness to families. … Many of them spend Eid in shelters, in displacement.”
Suffering has surfaced during Ramadan with scenes of people forced to flee their homes sleeping on the streets or in tents in their cars. Some sought-after places of safety, such as schools and other places, have become shelters or are staying with relatives; Many others scrambled to find temporary arrangements. Only 130,000 people are in shelters.
For Zaman, the harsh conditions in displacement meant she could no longer observe many aspects of Ramadan – a time of fasting, increased worship and often festive communal gatherings with loved ones.
At home, he said, he fasts, prays and reads the Koran, the Muslim holy book.
Now, she has stopped her fast and said she will make up the missed days when she returns home. “Some fast and some cannot fast; there is mental stress and we are not sleeping well. … Food is the last thing on my mind, but the conditions are difficult.”
She said she and her daughter sleep with others at school if her husband sleeps in the car. “There is no consistency.”
She misses her loved ones and her Ramadan routine. “We would break our fast, pray, make coffee and drink, and I would go to the neighbors or they would come after iftar,” he recalled of the fasting meal.
Asmahan Taleb, displaced in Sidon, said the run-up to Eid had been marred by hardship.
“How can we celebrate Eid when we are displaced from our home and our land? Where is Eid? Where is happiness?” she said. “It will be Eid when we return to our homes.”
Like many others, this is not Zaman’s first move. She said her daughter was born during the previous wave of displacement from a round of fighting that stopped with a short ceasefire in November 2024. Israel continued daily strikes in Lebanon after the cease-fire, which it said was aimed at preventing Hezbollah from rebuilding.
“Lebanon for us is really now the epicenter of the immediate humanitarian fallout of this wider regional crisis,” said Carl Skau, Deputy Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of the UN World Food Programme. “People here have endured crisis after crisis. They’ve been displaced before. But that doesn’t make it any easier.”
He said the people he met were exhausted and still not recovered from the last time.
“There was a real sense of this uncertainty at the moment. How is this going to end? When is this going to end?”
And that’s not all that’s different now.
“My concern is that the money is not coming forward like last time,” he told The Associated Press. “We know there’s less money available. We know there are competing priorities. … We really need to make an effort to get donors to step up.”
As part of its response, WFP has provided more than half a million hot meals to displaced people in shelters across Lebanon since March 2.
Online, many volunteers, organizations and businesses are sharing various initiatives to prepare, package and distribute hot meals for Iftar and donate essential items from blankets and clothes to milk and medicine.
Needs are varied and plentiful.
“There is a need for shelter,” Alloush said. “There was a huge storm. We’re thinking of people sleeping outside, sleeping in non-waterproof tents, sleeping on mud.”
The IRC is distributing mattresses, pillows and blankets and coloring books, he said.
“People didn’t have enough clothes. Children ran away without any toys or activities to take their minds off the war.”
Eman Abo Khadra, the owner of a hair salon in Sidon, tried to bring some Eid cheer to some displaced children the only way he knew how: by giving them the gift of a haircut.
“It’s a moral thing. What a child knows about war or no war. … It’s about planting some joy in their hearts.”
But despite her gesture, she felt the tension taking over the youth.
“I was telling them, ‘Come on, clap; be happy; smile,’ but … the tension was high,” she said. “People are tired.”
Alia Ismail, who has taken refuge in Sidon, said it was difficult to observe Ramadan properly or touch the joy of Eid.
“We can no longer fast or buy anything for Ramadan,” he said.
For Eid, her children told her, “We need clothes; we need to go out; we need sweets,” she said. “I tell them, ‘I can’t afford it for you. No money.’
In normal times, she would clean her house, buy clothes, meat and sweets for Eid.
“Can you imagine we’ll be in the school corridor?” She said by phone that she puts clothes under her head when she sleeps because she has no pillows.
At a school in Beirut sheltering hundreds of people, some tried to recapture the traditions of Ramadan and a taste of the life they had left behind. The corridors between the classrooms were decorated with decorations. One family placed a small gas burner and some lunch packages from charities on some desks stacked together.
At school, Shaker Araka lamented how his extended family had been scattered. “We used to get together. We were in the same building. Now everybody’s in a different place.”
Nabila Hijazi said her children wonder about Eid, she buys them clothes.
“They want to live their lives,” he said. “We tell them, ‘God willing, Eid will come and we will return to our homes’.”
He said he was able to observe Ramadan normally at school and was aware of how much better his situation was than others.
Back in Sidon, Zaman said he would pray that “God will stop the war, that we may return to our homes and that there may be peace.”
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Fam reports from Cairo. Associated Press journalist Mohammad Zaatari in Sidon, Lebanon contributed to this report
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Associated Press religion coverage is supported by AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from the Lilly Endowment Inc. AP is solely responsible for this matter.
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