Lebanon’s oldest newspaper, Annahar, has partnered with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to publish a special edition that uses its own disrupted layout to draw attention to the country’s displacement crisis.
Launched on World Refugee Day, The Displaced Edition deliberately rearranged the newspaper’s pages, misplaced headlines and shifted stories into the wrong sections to give readers a sense of the uncertainty experienced by displaced families. Even the front page was moved from its usual position, turning the act of reading into a reflection of displacement.
The initiative comes as Lebanon continues to grapple with one of its worst humanitarian crises, with more than one million people forced to leave their homes. Proceeds from every copy sold were directed towards humanitarian response efforts through UNHCR and its local NGO partners to support essential relief.
The campaign extended beyond the newspaper, with displaced visuals used across broadcast and film. During Annahar’s primetime news bulletin, the news presenter appeared deliberately cropped off-screen to reinforce the campaign’s central message.
Nayla Tueni, Editor-in-Chief of Annahar, said: “When 1 in 5 people in Lebanon is displaced, nothing stays in place. Not our homes, not our lives, not our dignity. At Annahar, we refuse to let their struggle be ignored. The Displaced Edition puts their stories front and center. A call to see them, hear them, and act. For the people of Lebanon, this is a reckoning: displacement is not invisible. Their pain is real. Their voices matter.”
Karolina Lindholm Billing, UNHCR Representative of Lebanon, said: “We are proud to partner with Annahar, one of Lebanon’s most longstanding and influential media institutions, on this special edition on displacement. By bringing the stories and experiences of displaced people to the forefront, this initiative complements UNHCR’s efforts to raise awareness of the challenges facing affected families across Lebanon. It is a powerful reminder that solidarity, being present on the ground – with and for the people – and a whole-of-society collaborative approach are at the heart of supporting families and communities to regain their safety and dignity and rebuild their homes and lives.”
Ali Rez, Chief Creative Officer for IMPACT BBDO, added: “More than simply tell the stories of displaced Lebanese people during these unfortunate times, we wanted readers to feel the discomfort and uncertainty that displacement brings. And the best way for a newspaper to do that was to disrupt its own order.”
According to the campaign’s creators, the initiative aimed to ensure Lebanon’s displacement crisis remained in focus on a day dedicated to refugees worldwide by encouraging readers to experience, rather than simply read about, the disruption caused by displacement.
