Girlfriend Is Being Tortured And Abused In The Middle East As Part Of A Hate Crime. What Can Be Done?

My location: Fl, United States My girlfriend’s location: near Beirut, Lebanon

All names in this post are fabricated and Americanised for simplicity and discretion.

My girlfriend and I are both 20s Middle Eastern women (she is Lebanese) in an LGBT relationship. We met in school in the US, started the relationship in the US, and we both are dual citizens (US citizen and citizen of our middle eastern country). My gf, Kathy, went back to Lebanon with her mother to visit her family for the summer.

Exactly two weeks ago, her mother, Megan, sat her down and confronted her about knowing about our relationship. She found out when Kathy gave Megan her new phone after Megan’s phone broke. Kathy started using her old phone. This allowed Megan access to Kathy’s iCloud and passwords, which got her into Whatsapp and allowed her to read our messages.

Starting in the US, her mother struck Kathy with her shoe, got a Lebanese doctor in the US to forge a doctor’s note to remove her from university (and from me), and got Kathy’s spare dorm room key somehow and entered the building and went into Kathy’s room at 2am to see if she was there (she wasn’t). The building is scanner-access only where we need to scan our student IDs to get in, so she must have followed a student in. Spare keys are locked in the back room only available to residence life staff (we are both resident advisors) so she could have tricked a desk assistant to get access.

In Lebanon, after confronting her, Megan threatened Kathy with telling her dad and my parents about this relationship, and also threatened her with her education in that she might not let Kathy finish her degree. Kathy, worried about her safety if her dad knew and trying to protect me from getting outed, went along with her mom. Megan sent Kathy to a reform camp where they tortured her (hit and beat her, drink vinegar, locked in isolation, etc.). She returned after three days. Megan also took Kathy’s phone and texted her friends asking for my contact info. She removed location sharing Kathy had with her friends and I, and also removed Kathy’s sim card. She had Kathy’s dad transfer all of Kathy’s savings out of her account, took Kathy’s credit cards, and took Kathy’s passport. When she returned from camp 1, Megan tricked Kathy into getting injected in the stomach with what we assume is some kind of hormone therapy. Megan also has struck Kathy herself and spit on her, verbally abused her, and has restricted her access to all electronics.

Last week, Kathy was sent to another camp again where she was brutally gang sexually assaulted and injected. She tried to escape and was again locked in isolation. She returned Friday evening and has been locked in her room by Megan.

Kathy’s US passport is set to expire end of July, there are few flights to and from Lebanon with the war, and Kathy is worried about the potential for this to backfire if lawyers are brought into this. A friend of hers in the US is trying to contact the embassy but it’s been hard to reach them, likely because of the war.

I’ve so far contacted some LGBT NGOs in Lebanon and MOSAIC got back to me but cannot help without Kathy’s consent. This is difficult because she can barely contact me, let alone an organisation. Would the US embassy in Beirut help at all? Is there any subtle way to extract her and get her sent to, say, a European country? Are there any better subreddits to post this to? This has to be handled with maximum discretion to avoid her mom getting some forged documentation that Kathy is of unsound mind. What can we do, please help.