A Bangladeshi national (L) is greeted by a relative upon her arrival from Lebanon at the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka on October 21, 2024. — AFP
The first Bangladeshis airlifted home after fleeing Israeli air strikes in Lebanon recounted the relentless fear of living in a city constantly shaken by explosions. On Monday night, the initial 54 of approximately 1,800 Bangladeshis seeking to escape the strife-torn Mediterranean nation returned to Dhaka on a government-sponsored flight. Some abandoned long-established lives in Lebanon for an economically uncertain future back home. Bangladesh's foreign ministry estimates that between 70,000 and 100,000 of its nationals are working in Lebanon, many as laborers or domestic workers.
For 68-year-old Abul Kashem, who resided in Beirut, Lebanon's coastal capital, for nearly four decades, including during the heavy fighting of the civil war, the recent barrage of strikes was unprecedented. "I have never witnessed a war like this," said Kashem, who worked at a gas station before it was reduced to rubble. "Everything around the fuel pump where I worked has been destroyed," he said upon his arrival on a plane chartered by the UN's International Organisation for Migration. Israel significantly intensified its air campaign against Lebanon's Hezbollah group last month, subsequently launching a ground offensive aimed at pushing the group back from its northern border. Hezbollah has been firing thousands of projectiles into Israel over the past year, displacing tens of thousands of Israelis.
The Bangladeshi workers, striving to earn money to send back to their families in South Asia, found themselves caught in the midst of a conflict that erupted around them. "Five buildings near my residence were demolished," said Mohammad Hossain, 28, who returned from Beirut with his wife and one-year-old child. "The attacks were so intense; the cars are almost melting." Nearly a month of all-out war has claimed at least 1,489 lives in Lebanon, according to an AFP tally based on Lebanese health ministry figures. Bangladesh's Business Standard newspaper reported that at least five Bangladeshi citizens were among the wounded, while thousands have fled border zones with Israel northward into Lebanon.
"I feel very good after returning to my home country," Hossain said, as returnees were embraced by relatives, some in tears. "When the plane left the airport in Lebanon, I immediately felt peace in my mind." Those returning must now seek employment at home, with Bangladesh undergoing a political transition following a student-led revolution that ousted the autocratic former leader Sheikh Hasina on August 5. Their income loss will be deeply felt by their families in a nation where over five percent of GDP comes from personal remittances, according to the World Bank. Bangladesh's foreign ministry, which stated that Dhaka is bearing the cost of the flights, added that 65 more citizens would return on Tuesday. Ruma Khatun, 30, said she had initially fled to Beirut seeking refuge but did not feel safe there and was among the first to sign up to leave. "The situation is very bad," she said. "When we were taking off from Lebanon...we heard the sound of bombing."
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