The photograph is simple; a line of people waiting underneath a seemingly ordinary Beirut bridge. However, the reality is anything but simple.
The image shared by Lebanon's Anti-Racism Movement (ARM) has garnered significant attention since being posted to Facebook on Tuesday. "We are a disgrace. Arrogant. Mean. Cruel. Racist. This is more than unacceptable," said one of the respondents to the post, Asma Andraos Yassine.
The people are waiting to visit family members and friends held "temporarily" in a parking facility under the Adlieh bridge that has been transformed into an underground detention center. Used primarily for migrant workers and an increasing number of refugees, the facility holds these individuals without judicial decree as they wait in legal limbo.
Family members and friends begin lining up in the sweltering August heat before 6 a.m. in hopes of visiting their loved ones. Often leaving visitors waiting for hours without success because even the visitation system is disorganized and arbitrary.
Tarek, an activist who works with ARM and requested that only his first name be shared, told StepFeed that the organization chose to share this image "because the system that the Lebanese government imposes on refugees and migrant workers is totally unjust."
He also expressed that the sympathetic reaction the post has been receiving shows that Lebanese are, in fact, concerned about these abuses.
"The majority of people in Lebanon are adverse to racism because they are also exposed to injustices by the Lebanese government, although it doesn't compare in anyway to the injustice directed toward migrants and refugees," he said.
According to a 2014 article by Al Jazeera, many of the inmates of the prison are held for months and even years. Individuals who have been held in the prison have reported that the facility has minimal ventilation, is frequently overcrowded and has virtually no natural light.
"People are here and they don't know when they will be released or deported," Secretary General for the Lebanese Center for Human Rights Wadih al-Asmar said, according to Al Jazeera. "It's a kind of legal kidnapping."
Millions of refugees from Syria, Palestine and Iraq and several hundred thousand Asian and African migrant workers reside in Lebanon. However, these individuals do not face the same legal protections or hold the same rights as Lebanese citizens.
Meanwhile, Beirut's residents go about their daily lives unaware of the suffering just below the streets they walk and drive on every day. That is precisely why organizations like ARM work so diligently to raise awareness about such unacceptable human rights abuses.