FROM THE END OF THE CAMPS TO THE EVACUATION OF THE SANJAK OF ALEXANDRETTA: THE AGBU TAKES OVER FROM THE NANSEN OFFICE
These passing difficulties notwithstanding, the Nansen Office worked hand-in-hand with Armenian and non-Armenian organizations under the auspices of the French High Commission to resettle all the Armenian refugees in new urban neighborhoods in the second half of the 1930s, and so bring the epic of the camps and shantytowns to a dignified close. The project proceeded with all deliberate speed. The upshot was a 1935 announcement by the Lebanese government to the effect that the last shacks in the Amanus and Yozgat camps would be torn down by September of that year. Complying with the government’s orders, the owners of the three hundred shacks demolished them themselves and, with Nansen Office and AGBU support, left the camps behind forever for new, permanent quarters built with their own hands. At the same time, four hundred fifty refugees families in Beirut pooled 70,000 francs and set about building a new neighborhood with the money. It was deposited in a bank account opened in the name of Vahram Leylekian, a member of parliament, and Dr. Topjian, the AGBU’s representative. Impressed by the refugees’ good will gesture, the Lebanese authorities agreed to push back the deadline for the demolition of the camps.
Most of these Armenians, the last to leave Beirut’s refugee camps, had fled from Yozgat, Tomarza or villages in the Amanus. They formed three committees, each of which included representatives from all three areas, and charged these committees with supervising the construction of new neighborhoods in Bourdj Hammoud or the vicinity. Thus the peasants from the Amanus, with the aid and counsel of AGBU officers, purchased a 38,000-pic tract of land near Dora for 1,100 Ottoman ... Read all
The Building of Armenian Neighborhoods in Syria and Lebanon
Armenian refugees waiting in the harbor of Alexandretta to board ship for Syria and Lebanon in 1939
(Coll. Archives Bibl. Nubar/Paris).