Although adoption from Lebanon isn’t big enough for a Yahoo group or its own category on the Adoption.com forums, it does happen, and it does make the news.
This story about a family from New Hampshire proves it … but Boy Howdy!!! it ain’t easy, or often.
According to the US State Department Website’s page on adoption from Lebanon, only four immigrant visas were issued for adoptees in 2006.
Laura Gabriel’s family counts for one of those.
Laura’s husband, Scot, comes from Lebanese stock, so adopting from there had appeal. The couple went to Beirut to begin the process in May of 2006. Weeks later, Scot returned home, and left Laura to finalize.
The child, a now 19-month-old boy named Logan, was with her, but not allowed to leave the country.
In July, Israel began dropping bombs on Beirut. With no passport for the baby, and certainly not willing to travel without him, he and Laura were stuck, along with her mother and Scot’s father.
Back and forth to the bomb shelter between phone calls to Scot who was hounding everyone he could find, politicians and the press, to do what they could to get things moving so his family could get out of the war zone and return home, became the order of each day.
Ultimately successful, the baby was granted “humanitarian parole” … such an imposing term for such a little guy … and allowed to leave Lebanon.
A military helicopter, a US Navy warship and a military plane later, Laura, Logan, et al, arrived back on US soil.
Four hundred thank-you notes were due, including a couple to Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and former Congressman Martin Meehan, D-Mass., who were instrumental in getting Logan the clearance he needed to come into the United States.
And now, one year later, the family is doing the happily-ever-after thing.
Adoption from Lebanon is obviously potentially fraught, but there are no residency requirements and adoption can take between four months and one year.
The religion of the child has more to do with anything than does government, as churches and church officials make the rules and adoptions must be approved by these and religious courts.
For example, Muslim children are subject to Shari’a law that does not allow for adoptions as generally perceived in the US. See the State Department flyer on Adoption from Islamic Countries for more information.
Catholic children can only be adopted into families where at least one of the parents is Catholic, Armenian Orthodox kids need to have at least 15 years difference in age between child and parents, and so on. (Those wanting to adopt some Orthodox kids may be asked to produce proof of infertility.)
There are also Maronite kids, Greek Orthodox, Armenian Catholics and Greek Catholics, all with their own controls over children in their care.
There are no adoption agencies in Lebanon, and in addition to the church officials, attorneys who specialize in family law handle adoptions.
That blog was right on cue for me- just the other day I was wondering whether Lebanese international adoptions were possible! Very interesting regarding the control of religious organisations/churches…
~Stefanie
Happy I helped.
Hello, do you know a name of a lawyer, agency, or orphanage in Lebanon that deals with adoptions? I would appreciate any kind of help. Thank you.
Does anyone know how to find the name of an attorney in Lebanon to contact? Thanks! Lisa
Hi! We know an attorney who can help. We adopted out daughter from Lebanon last year. Let me kow if you need a name. Anne
Hi Anne
I am interested in adopting a child from Lebanon and I don’t know where to start. I am from Australia my father is lebanese orthodox and mother is maronite. Can you please help me, i don’t know where to start. Thank you Vivien
Sorry Anne email: vivien_k1@hotmail.com
Thank you
Please can I have the contact
details too for
the lawyer
Can you send the details
of the lawyer to my friends
email:fivos_fivou@yahoo.com
with thanks
chris
Hi Anne…pls can yo help us too,….
I live in the US, we are both Lebanese ( I am now 38 yrs old ) & are looking to adopt from Lebanon.
can u give us some hints & name to contact for this process??
Thank you soooo much i truly appreciate your help
Hello Anne, do you know a name of a lawyer, agency, or orphanage in Lebanon that deals with adoptions? I would appreciate any kind of help. Thank you.
can you give us any information you have from your own experience and successfully adopting a child in lebanon?rose
Hello A G Sawan. Could I ask you to send me that name of the lawyer? I am not sure if you are logging in here anymore. I just hope you are. Or if anyone got a reply from Anne, please please email me littlemermi@yahoo.com. THANK YOU.
anne~
I am very interested in the name of your attorney. Please email me at joeycarlton@msn.com
Thank you
Anne–would you share your attorney’s name with me? My email is krtoney@hotmail.com. My husband and I are looking into Lebanese adoption but don’t know where to start. Thanks, Kari
My husband and I are also interested in adopting from Lebanon and would appreciate the name of the attorney..my email is christinacovelli@gmail.com. thanks
I am very interested in the name of your attorney. Please email me at aromany@msn.com
I wonder if you got lucky by adopting a kid from lebanon, How did it go was it difficut process, how many months you have to stay in lebanon to finish your formalities and paper work and if you don’t mind asking you how much did it cost. were you happy or disappointed please let me know. your respond is highly appreciated.
my email address is : aromany@msn.com
I am currently in Beirut in the middle of an adoption and could sure use the name of a good attorney here who might be able to help. So, Anne, if you are reading, please, please contact me either via email (info@wolfwareinc.com) or this blog.
hii I am not sure if your process was completed yet. were you able to adopt?? what do we need? Do u have a lawyer?
Hello-
Can you anyone PLEASE help us? We are trying to adopt a child (hopefully) from Lebanon, can anyone please give us any advice or info that will help us with the process. Maybe an attorneys name and number and length of visits there. thank you in advance and God Bless You!!!!! My e-mail address is amyvanlacken@comcast.net.
amy,
did you have any success with your adotion of a lebanese child or getting the information?rose
For those who adopted recently. I have a few questions that may help us all…
How long was the process?
Did you adopt an infant?
How were you able to find him/her?
Thank you! I appreciate any imput.
ferristerry@yahoo.com
Hi Anne,
I would appreciate the name and phone number of the attorney you recommend in Lebanon. My e-mail is pamelacinquini@hotmail.com
Hello Anne
please can you send me the name and the phone number of the attorney in Lebanon.
i would appreciate it ..
thank you.
fidele.hamzeh@msn.com
Hello, Kifak Anne.
We have been working for the past year with both a US adoption lawyer and a cousin, who is a lawyer in Beriut. We meet all of the requirements for the Lebanese Catholic adoption, but because we want to raise the child in another country, have hit several road blocks with the various adoption houses. Also we are having a very difficult time getting anyone at the US Embassy to speak to (contacting) any of us in regards to the correct paperwork required for a child to enter into the USA. Our Lebanese lawyer, who did the rounds at various orphanages also said to adoptive a child under 3 yrs is almost impossible. Thus if you or anyone else has a Lebanese legal connection we too would like it very much if you could forward the details to us too. Kind Regards, Roberta and Fouad Sacr
rsacr@mac.com
roberta and fouad,
were you able to adopt? can you offer any advice or guidance in the steps and contacts? my husband is from lebanon and I am from the us. we are both catholic and understand the adoption willgo through the church but that it is very complicated. any inforamtion you have would be helpful. rose
I would be interested in the attorney’s details, please Anne
markjnash@hotmail.com
I am also intersted in any experiences of adoption in Syria.
My wife and I are Antiochian Orthodox
I am interested in the name of the lawyer from Lebanon as well.
Thanks so much,
Monique
moniquebrowder@gmail.com
I am also interested in a lawyer to assist us in adopting a child from Lebanon. I am also wondering about how long the adoptions take and what age the children are. Thanks so much for any information you can share!
Nicole
kncblind@hotmail.com
If you need adoption in Beirut,Lebanon try to contact this reputable law firm with which I had a successful and excellent adoption on their email address: Mattarlaw@Mattarlaw.com
You could visit their website as well:
http://www.Mattarlaw.com
If someone could please email me with any information they have it would be great.
My husband and I are just starting this process and hope to adopt from Lebanon.
Please email me at amanda.burch@delta.com Thanks
Please email the name of the lawyer at Hanangimzo@hotmail.com
there was 11 adoptions in 2008 out of Lebanon to the USA and barely 7 in 2007. Have ANY of you checked with the US State Departments requirements for Lebanon??
http://adoption.state.gov/country/lebanon.html
It is highly desireable that you be Lebanese (or one spouse) I know of NO ONE that has adopted without some kind of Lebanese connection. Whether you are Maronite, Armenian, Lebanese, etc., It will only be a Christian child that you get as Islamic Law FORBIDS the buying and selling of children via adoptions. It is very clear that the Quran expects a relative or village member to care for the child.
Not sure how any of you thought adopting from Lebanon was easy? Do you even know about the history or the cultures?
watch out for the postings from attorneys or others that have claimed to adopt from Lebanon contact the state department ..and the embassy information at the bottom.
Hi All, I am new to the site and very interested to have any information regarding a good family lawyer, how to advice and anything else that I can pass on to my dear friend who is determind to help myself and my husband realise adoption from his home country of Lebanon. He has a sister who is a Lawyer and we are due to go for a visit in a few months time to set the wheels turning. We are busy collecting as many documents as possible and hope to make an introduction with some church associates of our friend who will also help with the process
Your help is much appreciated and I hope to keep in touch with you all to see how you are progressing along your path to adoption.
email address: alex1113@cogeco.ca
As an adoptee from Lebanon who has returned to his country of birth to live, I was intrigued to read this story about “Logan” and his voyage out of Lebanon, where you say he is now “thriving”.
I would like to simply point out the bias inherent in your story, and the disturbing undercurrent of “salvation” that you attribute to adoption, which is belied by the facts “on the ground” here in this country.
I am going to guess that Mr. Gabriel is born of immigrant “stock” as you put it, spanning generations, as witnessed by his Anglicized name (Jibril would be the local family name). Perhaps he is a new emigrant to the United States. In either case, the decision to adopt from Lebanon without mentioning the fact that such adoptions are handled by the various Christian sects within the country speaks of a particular bias that you have no problem airing when you refer to Hezbollah as “a militant Islamic group based in Lebanon”. You could just as easily say “a militant Christian group based in Lebanon”; that you might not is most telling.
I would only point out that the Hezb is a valid political entity, has been elected democratically to its positions within the parliament, and the Shi’a which make up its constituency are as Lebanese as Mr. Jibril’s family, despite attempts to paint them as being “based” here, instead of having a right to be here.
What is interesting is that the political dispossession of this people goes hand in hand with the dispossession of adoptees, many of us coming from Muslim families–abducted, brokered, absconded with–by missionary organizations seeking to weaken a certain population within the country, and reflective of similar efforts in other countries: Indigenous peoples in North America and Australia; children from Reunion Island in France, etc.
Most disturbing is that the Senators listed in the article as helping “Logan” leave Lebanon with a special humanitarian visa are the same Senators who deliberately and with malice aforethought allowed the destruction of Lebanon’s infrastructure and civilian population centers to take place. I remember very clearly during the war an interview on CNN featuring Senators Lott and Feinstein, talking about the usurping entity in Palestine’s right to “defend itself”–meanwhile, the television screen behind them showed the headquarters of the Civil Defense in Sour, which housed among other caritative organizations the local Red Cross and Red Crescent, revealing the nature of this war, in which no one was spared: hospitals, Red Cross workers, ambulances, convoys of medicine and supplies, sites of former massacres, funerals of those killed in the bombings of the previous day. The adoption of one infant from the midst of this uncivilized carnage does nothing to change the truth of what happened here.
That these cowardly Senators would have the nerve to expound on Israel’s so-called “right” in front of such an image speaks long as to the American viewpoint of this country, especially when only a year earlier, the United States was supposedly “standing with” Lebanon and its dubiously entitled “Cedar Revolution”. What was the Eagle Tribune’s stance concerning the war here? Frankly, I’m almost afraid to ask. For falser friends are hard to come by, especially when i also remember the evacuation of Americans from Beirut coming in stages–first, “all-Americans”; second, Americans by marriage; third, Americans by naturalization.
I am in the third category. I remember a photo of my naturalization, eating cake decorated to resemble the American flag. but I also remember as if it were yesterday waking up to mega-ton bombs falling a scant half-mile from my house. And I will never forgive those who gave the green light to such violence, or those who support it via their mediated efforts, such as this one. Unlike the Jibril family, I had no problem deciding to stay. Mr. Jibril might pause to consider what it means to decorate his son with American flags when it is this nation that saw to it that over 1200 civilians were killed during this war, a third of them children. I shudder to think that perhaps this now-father might wish certain segments of the population dead here, especially when he has no guarantees that his son is not of these people.
Take it from me, this is a perfectly valid scenario, given the trafficking, and brokering, and criminal profiteering that takes place here in Lebanon outside of all governmental oversight and purview. That anyone would continue to aggravate such criminal activity by adopting from Lebanon is therefore complicit in this criminal activity, as are those who do not denounce their country’s foreign policy and economic and political wars on the Third World that result in the poverty that creates “orphans” in the first place.
“Logan” has family and community here in Lebanon, as do I. As do all of the adoptees from Lebanon who have returned trying to find a sense of closure to their identity and to their lives. To not see adoption as a political act is to validate a certain worldview that is being resisted more and more both here in Lebanon and around the world. I have written about this subject in the local press:
Al-Akhbar:
http://www.al-akhbar.com/ar/node/55670
Dissident Voice:
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/02/re-evaluating-adoption-validating-the-local/
What it comes down to is this:
Adoption is a violence, based in inequality; it is candy-coated to make it seem about family and children, but it is an economic and political crime, a treating of symptoms and not of disease; it is a negation of families and an annihilation of communities that are not seen as having an intrinsic human value equal to that of those adopting, for reasons having to do with race, with class, and with a preconceived notion of what makes for a “valid” life in this world.
And so “Logan” was supposedly “saved”, and this gets media attention; while 400+ other children died in this conflict, and no one raises any cry of outrage. Where is the justice? How do you even begin to justify such a horrifyingly lopsided equation?
Inch’allah “Logan” will one day come back and know his roots, and will know that it isn’t eating falafel that makes him of this place–it is his roots, his family, his heritage, his community, his local culture, his language, and his ties to former generations that he has been displaced from in what can only be termed a great and tragic violence. And that perhaps, unlike the Pabulum forced on us our entire lives, there was a life here for us that we will never know. I wish him peace.
as-salamu aleikum.
Hello all, seems that attorneys in Lebanon is the hot topic – has anyone really found a good attorney in Lebanon? If so, please email me at lisavdr@bellsouth.net
Thank you so much.
Was anyone lucky to get any help or details for the adoption process in Lebanon???
pls can yo email me to: souzy111@yahoo.com
Thanks
Would be extremely grateful if any of the members above could pass me information that they believe is useful in adopting from Lebanon. I am British, my husband Lebanese (both Christian) but live in the GCC so I think we are going to need a good Lebanese family lawyer!
Please send to sarah.khouri@gmail.com
Thank you
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