Asma Ibrahim, an unemployed woman who lives in a cramped shack in northern Lebanon, has no idea why she was refused a welfare benefit for the country's poorest people — money that would prevent her five children from going to bed hungry.
"People in need are not receiving anything," she said by phone from the deprived Akkar region, adding that she had been calling a government hotline twice a week to ask why she was turned down after applying more than a year ago.
In the absence of an explanation, she blames corruption, and is angry that some of her neighbors are receiving the aid. "How is that supposed to make me feel?" she said.