Adam Hinton, Beirut

The Shatila refugee camp was set up by the Red Cross to house the thousands of Palestinian refugees who arrived there in 1948. The current population is estimated to be over 22,000 as the camp population has increased with the arrival of Palestinians fleeing from the Syrian Civil War. These people are crammed into an area of one square kilometer, making it a highly densely populated place to live. The Lebanese government refuses to grant any citizen rights to the Palestinians, some of whom have spent their entire lives in Lebanon. The government provides no basic services such as electricity or water to the camp so the community organised these for themselves. A mass of electrical cables and water pipes dangle above the narrow alleyways as people improvise to get basic provisions. Adam traveled to the camp to record how the people live under these conditions. Seeking to show how camps such as this develop; the architecture, the chaotic infrastructure and the pressure this puts on the people who must live among it.