UMAM D&R has been interested in issues related to the missing since it was founded. Not only are these issues part of the legacy of the civil war, but in a way they are also the most persistent components of that conflict. Overall, the issue of missing persons is one of ongoing human suffering: lives in limbo, whereabouts unknown, and families who forever remain victims of the disappearance of their relatives. Try as one might to close the civil war chapter and move on, a looming question mark over the fate of a loved one makes it impossible. In 2008, UMAM D&R began working on the issue in 
a project called Missing, seeking to facilitate an easy, almost tactile expression of that ongoing drama.

Out of "Missing" a new project emerged, one focused specifically on the wicked carceral network under the thumb of the Assads – both father and son. During Lebanon's civil war, hundreds, possibly thousands, of Lebanese were taken by the Syrians and their local collaborators and brought across the border and thrown in Syrian cells.

UMAM D&R has been interested in issues related to the missing since it was founded. Not only are these issues part of the legacy of the civil war, but in a way they are also the most persistent components of that conflict. Overall, the issue of missing persons is one of ongoing human suffering: lives in limbo, whereabouts unknown, and families who forever remain victims of the disappearance of their relatives. Try as one might to close the civil war chapter and move on, a looming question mark over the fate of a loved one makes it impossible. In 2008, UMAM D&R began working on the issue in 
a project called Missing, seeking to facilitate an easy, almost tactile expression of that ongoing drama.

Out of "Missing" a new project emerged, one focused specifically on the wicked carceral network under the thumb of the Assads – both father and son. During Lebanon's civil war, hundreds, possibly thousands, of Lebanese were taken by the Syrians and their local collaborators and brought across the border and thrown in Syrian cells.

During a series of meetings in the spring of 2012 with the Association of Former Lebanese Political Detainees in Syria (LPDS), UMAM D&R and former prisoners in Syria discussed the trauma of incarcerated life across the border while brainstorming possible methods of advocacy. "Shared Suffering: Exploring the Abyss of Syrian Prisons" began as a way to bring attention to a marginalized topic that the majority of people knew very little about. In fact, most former detainees are released back into society without any care or compensation from the Lebanese government. The men are forced to carry with them the weight of an experience few can relate to. 

Amidst these group meetings, an idea arose: perhaps the best avenue of advocacy would be a live performance, one that would be viewed by ordinary people with little to no knowledge on the issue. In the months that followed, some of the former prisoners became actors, reaching diverse audiences and raising advocacy about the disappeared.

All the while, UMAM D&R and LPDS continued to work together on matters related to imprisonment in Syria, putting on additional events and working on various documentation projects. Given that the Lebanese state had never made any serious effort to investigate what happened to its disappeared citizens, and had done even less to welcome these people back into the country, there was a need for increased activism and discussion on the subject. As if to provide additional validity to "Shared Suffering," the issue of repatriation for former prisoners in Syria made its way through Lebanese parliament. Although this was viewed as a positive sign, Syria’s transition from revolution into civil war during the course of the initiative showed that it will be longer yet before the Gordian knot of disappearances into Syrian prisons becomes undone.