Paul Hefel-James is an independent journalist based in Beirut. He covers humanitarianism, migration and climate and energy challenges in the region. Follow him on X @paul_hj_.
Children run along the halls of St. Joseph Church in downtown Beirut after Mass as their mothers prepare lunch, run food and clothing markets outside or sit for community meetings. For a few parents, it may be the only day they see their children this week; for others, these hours on Sunday are free from worries about how to supervise their children while simultaneously fighting to make a living. Yet, despite the large presence of labor migrants and their families, parents struggle with a lack of childcare options and the obstacles their children face in accessing necessary services in Lebanon today.
Lebanon is home to more than 165,000 migrant workers, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), 70% of whom are women. Hailing primarily from Ethiopia, Bangladesh, Sudan, the Philippines and Egypt, migrants live and work under conditions that rights groups and think tanks argue amount to modern-day slavery. Under the kafala, or sponsorship, system, migrant workers are subject to the individual contracts of their employers or recruitment agencies.
Under Lebanese labor law, domestic workers are excluded from basic protections, including minimum wage requirements, collective bargaining, unionization and more. For the myriad interests involved, from recruitment agencies to government ministries and other entities, the kafala system is highly lucrative, and though there is growing recognition of the abuses of migrant workers in Lebanon, the plight of migrant children remains poorly understood and stands to become a growing issue.
Kafala contracts seldom, if ever, allow migrants to have families, leaving migrant children to face an arduous process to obtain documentation, often going without. According to Elssy Karaoghlanian, project coordinator at the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS), "Most of the children you see are children of undocumented migrants, so they are undocumented as well." Without this documentation, especially the Lebanese iqama, or residency permit, children of migrants are often not recognized as legal persons and find it impossible to access the public education system or, later, employment opportunities due to their stateless status.
Though there is growing recognition of the abuses of migrant workers in Lebanon, the plight of migrant children remains poorly understood and stands to become a growing issue.
- Paul Hefel-James
Family life among migrant workers in Lebanon is not monolithic. Different migrant communities and the demographics of migrant workers give rise to unique dynamics around having children, providing childcare and accessing education or other public services.
The gender balance of migrant nationalities varies widely, with 98% of Filipinos and 97% of Ethiopians, respectively, being female, whereas only 12% of Sudanese migrant workers are female. Nationalities with a higher female share tend to have more single mothers, for instance, whereas children of Sudanese fathers more often grow up in two-parent households.
Labor and housing conditions are another factor: 52% of migrant workers are "live-out" and have their own accommodation, while 48% are "live-in" and reside with their employers or in accommodation their employer provides, according to IOM. In cases where migrant women—who comprise 99% of live-in migrant workers—have children, these children are not allowed to live in the house of the employer. Migrant mothers who live separately from their employers may have a home for their children but still require childcare during the workday.
IOM tallied 4,665 migrant children in Lebanon as of 2025, though this number is likely a significant undercount. The number of children born to migrant parents in the country has risen over the years, alongside a shift toward live-out working arrangements. There has not, however, been a concomitant rise in formal childcare provision.
"It was clear from the start that this project should include childcare," Michael Petro, S.J., project director at JRS, said of the recently opened center between the Bourj Hammoud and Sin El Fil neighborhoods of Beirut. "Apart from all the protection needs, the medical problems, the mental health concerns, the area where we found nobody working was childcare."
JRS itself was unable to open a dedicated daycare due to funding constraints. Planning for the center began with studies in 2023 and 2024, culminating in community workshops that led to a preparation phase by August 2024.
Migrant children themselves are growing up without sufficient access to care and education, problems that worsen when they later try to join the labor market and are shut out of most employment opportunities available to Lebanese citizens.
- Paul Hefel-James
A month later, Israel went to war with Lebanon, putting those efforts on hold. JRS instead devoted energy to establishing temporary shelters for migrants who had nowhere else to go. When the center opened in early 2025, budget analysis showed that running a daycare would cost even more than providing education.
As Petro explained, the Lebanese Ministry of Health requires higher standards for childcare providers, including the presence of medical personnel, safe kitchen areas and a higher staff-to-student ratio than in a typical school. The guidelines exist to protect young children but also drive up the cost of running a licensed daycare center.
Instead, many migrants turn to informal arrangements. Some leave their children with neighbors or family members during working hours, but this is not without risk. "A lot of migrant women who safely thought they could leave their children with their neighbors or family members had their children abused, whether physically or sexually—it's happened a lot. That's why there's a bit of reservation right now," Karaoghlanian said.
To address the gap, some migrant women run informal daycares and look after dozens of children at a time, albeit without the resources or safety guidelines of an official childcare center. "A lot of these women are very attentive…they're filling a need for other mothers that is not being taken care of," Petro said. But the informal conditions can lead to horrific accidents. "The informal [daycares] of course are cheaper than registered ones, but they're dangerous. I have buried children who have died in them."
Some community collectives are looking for a way forward, including childcare as part of a broader project of connecting migrant workers to resources and advocating for greater rights and recognition. Nehna Hon, a feminist collective serving migrants in Lebanon, began receiving funding in 2021 and has built a network of care with community members, offering food, basic necessities and psychosocial services while running a small daycare.
Although the organization is small, with a core of about eight volunteers, it seeks to make migrants visible and signal support. As co-founder Kitty explained, this is reflected in its name, Arabic for "We are here." Nehna Hon members are identified by their first names to protect the privacy of migrant volunteers.
The daycare program serves a dozen children, and part of the work includes countering harmful narratives targeting migrant children in Lebanese society. "There is no system for them," Rahel, a daycare volunteer who arrived from Ethiopia when she was just 15, said. "They know a lot. They see a lot of racism."
Rahel and her colleague, Tima—an accomplished actress who explores the struggle against the kafala system onstage—both have children of their own. Rahel tells her son "to stand together because we don't have anybody," she said. "We teach them to be ethical people so that in the future they can teach others."
By that measure, Nehna Hon and other community organizations are making progress. "Ten years ago, people didn't know about kafala," Tima said. And in the future, Kitty said, "We want to be a bridge for other groups."
The future is a constant preoccupation for migrants and the organizations supporting them alike. Humanitarian funding had dropped to its lowest levels in at least a decade, making it difficult to sustain—to say nothing of expanding—vital services.
The Lebanese government is pushing to regularize migrant workers' status by allowing them to find new sponsors without needing permission from their previous employers. Organizations that work with migrants say there are signals, however, that the authorities will follow this initiative up with greater enforcement and deportations. Migrant children themselves are growing up without sufficient access to care and education, problems that worsen when they later try to join the labor market and are shut out of most employment opportunities available to Lebanese citizens.
Kolshi Angilma, a legal intern at JRS, was born in Lebanon to Sudanese refugee parents. In one of the more fortunate cases, Angilma enrolled in private school using her United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) document and another identity document obtained from a local official, or mukhtar. "I studied, I graduated here, all my life was here," she said.
Yet, despite graduating from law school in 2024, Angilma cannot join the Lebanese Bar Association because she does not have citizenship. Non-governmental organization (NGO) work allows her to put her legal skills to use, but she is shut out of practicing law in Lebanese courts, cannot travel outside Lebanon and is not entitled to the same rights and protections as Lebanese citizens.
During Pope Leo XIV's visit to Lebanon in December 2025, migrants brought some of these issues to greater attention. Loren Capobres, a Filipina former domestic worker who now works with JRS, spoke to the pope in front of a national audience: "Migrants like me are not just workers. We are coworkers, we are contributors in this country, helpers, builders."
"We care for children, cook meals, clean homes and carry burdens, often silently." Unfortunately, there are few resources available to make those burdens lighter, though some migrants and organizations that support them are working for change.
The views and positions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of DAWN.
