Olfat Mahmoud exists but is not recognised as a national of any state. She is 58, a Palestinian and stateless — one of tens of thousands of such refugees who have either fled conflict in their homeland or were born in camps.
Stateless Palestinians live in camps scattered throughout the Middle East, from Lebanon to Jordan and Syria.
While events in the West Bank and Gaza are often in the news, Mahmoud says the world turns a blind eye to refugees living outside of Palestinian territories. They call themselves “the forgotten Palestinians”.
“You’re born as refugees, it’s not your choice, you didn’t decide to be a refugee. So you’re treated as stateless,” she says. “You lose your dignity, you lose your rights, you lose everything.”
Mahmoud — who was born in Burj Barajneh, a Palestinian refugee camp in Beirut — has written an autobiography that tells of her fight to return to her homeland, Tarshiha.
She wrote the book to highlight her people’s long plight. “I work as the voice of my people, always I’ve been an activist. It will show how Palestinian refugees suffer all their life,” she says.
Read the article by Georgia Hing about Olfat Mahmoud in The Daily Telegraph.