Philip Reynaers is a Belgian photojournalist who kindly allowed his contemporary portraits of the plaintiffs in the Sabra and Shatila case to be used for this website. His photographs are available to photo editors looking for images to supplement reporting of the court case. The image files, as they appear on this website, remain the copyright of Philip Reynaers and may not be used without his express permission.

Philip says of the photo series:

My first contact with what was to become "The Sharon Case" was through the arrival of Souad Srour in Belgium. Like a mythical "Djinn", a Middle Eastern spirit, a survivor would come back to haunt President Sharon, and ask for justice, 19 years after the Sabra & Shatila massacre.

The testimonies accompanying the complaint filed in Belgium are compelling. These simple words convey the horror of the three day massacre all too well. This simplicity left no room for doubt, if there was to be a picture story it would only be through the eyes of the men and women who spoke out. I settled for 6*6 format because of its fine, and classic portrait frame, but also because it allowed me to photgraph and not to "shoot" or aestheticize them.

So off I went, dusty days of a happy collaboration (thank you so much Sanaa) in the narrow lanes where sometimes even a small backpack was too wide!!! Thirsty days of encounters where "caoua" ( Arabic for "coffee") was shared along with their memories. It's only in situations like these that one understands how much we depend on "Others". "You don't take a picture, you kindly ask for it!," says the ad. Quite right, and I want to take this opportunity to thank all of those whom I met during my trip to Beirut in early August 2001.

To contact Philip Reynaers, please visit his website at www.preynaers.easynet.be or write to preynaers@hotmail.com