Perched on the side of a mountain some 50km from the Syrian border, St John's monastery in Lebanon is home to around a dozen hermits and priests.
A printing press that published books in Arabic, the world's first, can still be found within its halls.
Today, the monastery has become an educational refuge for Syrian children hoping for a future that was removed from them when the regime under Bashar al-Assad indiscriminately dropped barrel bombs on his own people.
In one class...
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Already a member? Login hereNikolaj joined EUobserver in 2012 and covers home affairs. He is originally from Denmark, but spent much of his life in France and in Belgium. He was awarded the King Baudouin Foundation grant for investigative journalism in 2010.