World
‘I lost my home twice’: Sudanese mothers caught between two wars
- Bint Jbeil, Lebanon — Rufaida, 28, shifts her two-month-old son, Ahmad, from her right arm to the left.
- She stretches her free shoulder before gathering him back against her chest, soothing him with a gentle sway.
- The afternoon heat hangs over the courtyard of Saint Joseph Church in central Beirut.
- Around her, damp clothes flutter from railings and plastic chairs, while children weave between piles of mattresses and laundry baskets.
Sudanese mothers who fled one war now face another, struggling to rebuild their lives after displacement in Lebanon. Bint Jbeil, Lebanon — Rufaida, 28, shifts her two-month-old son, Ahmad, from her right arm to the left.
She stretches her free shoulder before gathering him back against her chest, soothing him with a gentle sway. The afternoon heat hangs over the courtyard of Saint Joseph Church in central Beirut. Around her, damp clothes flutter from railings and plastic chairs, while children weave between piles of mattresses and laundry baskets.
Their laughter occasionally echoes through the church grounds before being drowned out by the murmur of conversations and the scrape of chairs across stone floors. Ahmad squirms beneath his swaddling blanket, a small tuft of dark hair poking out from under the fabric. Rufaida barely takes her eyes off him.
She looks exhausted. Dark circles sit beneath her eyes, and she speaks in the weary cadence of someone surviving on only a few hours' sleep.
Source: Al Jazeera