What doctors volunteering in Gaza’s stricken hospitals witnessed under Israeli siege

Special What doctors volunteering in Gaza’s stricken hospitals witnessed under Israeli siege
At a news conference at the UN HQ in New York City last week, four doctors, who worked with teams in Gaza to support its healthcare system, described witnessing ‘appalling atrocities.’ (Supplied)
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Updated 26 March 2024
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What doctors volunteering in Gaza’s stricken hospitals witnessed under Israeli siege

What doctors volunteering in Gaza’s stricken hospitals witnessed under Israeli siege
  • During visits to UN and Washington, medics described “appalling atrocities” committed against the enclave
  • Doctors urged the international community to press for an immediate ceasefire and to allow aid into Gaza

NEW YORK CITY: Four doctors from the US, UK and France, who have been working with teams in Gaza to support its healthcare system, have described witnessing “appalling atrocities” under Israel’s military offensive.

The four specialists told an event at the UN headquarters this week that doctors in the enclave are faced with “horrific decisions” almost every day as a result of the war.

Nick Maynard, a cancer surgeon from the UK city of Oxford, has for the best part of the past 15 years been traveling to the Gaza Strip to teach, carry out surgeries, and help develop local healthcare capacity.

Because of his long association with Gaza, Maynard thought he was prepared for what awaited him when he again set foot in the Palestinian territory last December as part of the first UK emergency medical team to arrive since the outbreak of war in October.




According to the World Health Organization, there have been 164 attacks on healthcare infrastructure in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7. (AFP)

However, what he encountered during his two weeks at Al-Aqsa Hospital were “the most appalling atrocities,” he said. “I saw things that I never would have expected to have seen in any healthcare setting.”

The Israeli government says its military does not target civilians or hospitals, and blames Hamas for conducting military operations and launching rockets from crowded residential areas. Maynard rejects this claim.

Any medic who has worked in Gaza in recent months can dispel “with absolute certainty” the notion that Israel is conducting targeted bombing of Hamas militants and is protecting civilians,” he said.

“There is mass, indiscriminate bombing, killing many, many thousands of civilians, and a very clear targeting of healthcare facilities and workers, and deliberately destroying the infrastructure of all the hospitals to make it almost impossible to provide anything resembling normal healthcare to the population of Gaza.”

In fact, Maynard said Israel’s actions resemble the dictionary definition of genocide — designed to drive the Palestinian people out of Gaza.

“I spent some time looking at the definition of genocide in a variety of dictionaries,” he said. “And what is going on in Gaza fulfills every single definition of genocide that I have read.

“To those of us who’ve been on the ground there, and indeed, more importantly, all the Gazans I’ve spoken to, say the endgame of the Israeli government is to force them out completely from Gaza, to eradicate them from that land.”

Maynard was speaking at the UN headquarters in New York, where he was among a delegation of doctors meeting with UN representatives, who later met with Biden administration officials and members of Congress in Washington on Friday.

Their goal is to “instill a sense of urgency,” make sure US decision-makers and the international community “know what we know,” and hammer home that “the only way to prevent that ongoing humanitarian catastrophe is an immediate and permanent ceasefire.”

According to the World Health Organization, there have been 164 attacks on healthcare infrastructure in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, when the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel triggered Israel’s retaliation against the group’s Gaza stronghold.




More than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the conflict began. (AFP)

The UN agency says more than 400 medical workers have been killed since the conflict began. Before the war there were 6,000 beds at 39 hospitals in Gaza. Now roughly 295 hospital beds remain.

Israel has accused Hamas of building a vast tunnel network under Gaza’s hospitals, which it claims contain command centers, weapons caches, and places for holding Israeli hostages taken during the Oct. 7 attack.

“I’ve paid many visits to Al-Shifa Hospital and a lot of the other hospitals as well and I’ve never, in any service, any time during my visits, seen any evidence of military activity of any Hamas militants in any of the hospitals,” said Maynard.

“The Israelis have provided no credible evidence whatsoever to support those claims.”

Also among the doctors’ delegation was Zaher Sahloul, a Syrian-American doctor who is co-founder and president of MedGlobal, an NGO that provides emergency response and health programs around the world.

Sahloul, who was in Gaza in January, said the enclave is reaching a “tipping point.”

“Gaza at this stage is unlivable because of the persistent destruction of the infrastructures that are required for life,” he said.

The continued squeeze on deliveries of humanitarian assistance and commercial goods is pushing the population to the brink of famine, particularly in northern Gaza, with malnutrition and food insecurity reaching “catastrophic levels,” said Sahloul.

INNUMBERS

• 164 Attacks on healthcare infrastructure in Gaza since Oct. 7.

• 400 Medical workers killed since eruption of conflict.

• 295 Hospital beds currently available in Gaza.

Source: WHO

Chronic conditions, such as heart disease, diabetes, and various cancers that require regular medication, dialysis, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy, are going untreated as a result of shortages and the destruction of healthcare infrastructure, he added.

More than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the conflict began, including 13,000 children, according to the local health ministry.

Sahloul believes this is “an underestimate of the real numbers,” however, as roughly 5,000 people are still thought to be buried under the rubble of collapsed buildings.

And these numbers “will continue to accelerate even if the war stops right now,” he said.

“The collapse of the healthcare system will lead to pregnant women dying from bleeding and diarrhea patients dying from dehydration.”




Zaher Sahloul, who was in Gaza in January, said the enclave is reaching a “tipping point.” (Supplied)

And if Israel follows through on its threat to mount an attack on Rafah, Sahloul fears such an incursion will result in a “bloodbath,” and the death of an estimated 250,000 people.

During his address to UN officials, Sahloul showed a photograph of Hiam Abu Khodr, a Palestinian child who lost her father and brother when a bomb destroyed her home. Her mother was also injured in the blast. Hiam, meanwhile, suffered third-degree burns to 40 percent of her body.

“If you want to define post-traumatic stress disorder, this is what it looks like in the face of a child who is 7 years old,” said Sahloul.

Hiam waited weeks for an evacuation to Egypt for treatment. However, she died of her injuries two days after leaving Gaza. According to Sahloul, just 10 percent of the 8,000 patients in need of evacuation for treatment abroad have been able to leave.

Sahloul described “apocalyptic” scenes in the few hospitals that remain partially functional in Gaza, where the wounded brought into overcrowded wards are mostly treated on the floor. He described the case of 12-year-old Mohmad Abu Shahla, who arrived unable to breathe.




Any medic who has worked in Gaza in recent months can dispel “with absolute certainty” the notion that Israel is conducting targeted bombing of Hamas militants and is protecting civilians,” said Nick Maynard. (AFP)

Mohmad had surgery to remove shrapnel from his abdomen before he was whisked to the intensive care unit where Sahloul tended to him. However, the boy “never woke up.”

“We were not able to communicate with his family. We sent him to the morgue. And I made a copy of his death certificate, to keep it as a proof.”

On Thursday, displaced civilians camped out in the grounds of Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza were ordered to leave immediately as Israeli forces continued their raid on the hospital complex.

Scores of people have reportedly been killed and 70 health workers arrested during the raid, with thousands more civilians sent south to Rafah, where some 1.4 million people were already hemmed before recent attacks on Khan Younes.

While many “incredibly heroic” healthcare workers decided to stay, Thaer Ahmad, a Palestinian-American emergency medicine physician who was with Sahloul in Gaza in January and who also spoke at the UN event, chose to evacuate before the raid.

On his way into Gaza, Ahmad said he saw “hundreds of trucks” lined up on the Egyptian side of the border waiting to bring aid into the enclave.




The Israeli government says its military does not target civilians or hospitals. (AFP)

“We know that these trucks have baby formula. We know that they have many needed items,” including diapers, inhalers, and sedatives for pain relief, he said.

“This is something that we could be using for our patients who are in pain as we’re trying to reset their fractures, clean their burns. It’s an incredibly painful process and this is something that can help. We’re not able to get this into the Gaza Strip because the trucks are stalled.

“Or if someone is having difficulty breathing as you may suspect may happen as bombs are dropping, and air fills with smoke, we’re not able to get a rescue inhaler to be able to treat their asthma.

“Or diapers for families. We’ve heard of people having to use plastic bags because they cannot find diapers and if they do find them, the price is incredibly high because of inflation and the lack of supplies.

“I hope that this can bring home the urgency that exists on the ground. We need our hospitals to be able to stand. We need the bombs to stop dropping, hopefully through a ceasefire. And we hope that we can get the necessary items in to help alleviate the incredible amount of suffering that’s taking place in the Gaza Strip.”

Also among the doctors’ delegation was Amber Alayyan, a pediatrician from Texas, who has been working with Medecins Sans Frontieres for 13 years.

As a result of the scarcity of medicines, Alayyan said, doctors are faced with “horrific decisions,” sometimes having to intubate patients without anesthetics.

Displaced people with nowhere to go are sheltering in hospitals and sleeping on beds intended for patients, she said.

“What does that mean for injured people? They arrive, they get a quick and dirty surgery in an emergency room or in an operating theater, and they have nowhere to be hospitalized afterward.

“Or when they are, they’re lost in the hospital and our teams spend all day searching for the patients they just operated on 12 hours before.

“The longer the war goes on, the longer these wounds have to rot. I mean really rot. No hospital in the world — high-income, low-income — could cope with the amount of injuries that we’re seeing and the needs that we’re seeing on the ground.”

The collapse of Gaza’s health system and shortages of food have left pregnant and lactating women and their newborns especially vulnerable, said Alayyan.

These women “were already facing high iron deficiency, anemia, before the war, which put them at risk for hemorrhage during birth,” she said.




“All the Gazans I’ve spoken to, say the endgame of the Israeli government is to force them out completely from Gaza, to eradicate them from that land,” Nick Maynard. (AFP)

“With the war, it puts them in a state of undernourishment and potentially malnutrition, which means that they can’t breastfeed their children properly. The milk doesn’t necessarily come in and it’s definitely not enough.

“The other population is children under 2 years, which is the breastfeeding age. Those children need to be breastfed. If they can’t, then they need a formula. To have formula you need clean water. None of these things are possible.”

She said women are “squeezing fruit dates into handkerchiefs and drip feeding their children with some sort of sugary substance to nourish them.”

“How many people are going to need prosthetics? What is the socioeconomic status of Gaza going to look like in five years? In three years? In three months? How can this population, that is so incredibly resilient, rebuild itself? And the longer the war goes on, the harder this becomes.”




“No hospital in the world — high-income, low-income — could cope with the amount of injuries that we’re seeing,” said Amber Alayyan.

Ahmad said he has often heard it said in Gaza that “there is a war after the war.”

“And it’s a day of reckoning for the people, to think about everything that they’ve lost, all of the struggles that they’ve been through.”

He added: “Oftentimes, what we can see is there can be a paralysis by analysis. And there could be a lot of deliberations that take place.

“We just want to impress upon the people who are at the table that this is very urgent and we need things to change within the next few hours or days, not weeks.”


Lebanon’s Hezbollah vows to continue resistance after ceasefire

Lebanon’s Hezbollah vows to continue resistance after ceasefire
Updated 9 sec ago
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Lebanon’s Hezbollah vows to continue resistance after ceasefire

Lebanon’s Hezbollah vows to continue resistance after ceasefire
The group made no direct mention of the ceasefire deal
Fighters would continue to monitor the withdrawal of Israeli forces

CAIRO: Lebanon’s Hezbollah on Wednesday vowed to continue its resistance and support Palestinians, including fighters, a day after a ceasefire deal between the group and Israel was announced.
In the first statement by Hezbollah’s operations center since the deal was announced, the group made no direct mention of the ceasefire deal.
“The Islamic resistance’s operations room affirms that its fighters in all military disciplines will remain fully equipped to deal with the aspirations and assaults of the Israeli enemy,” the group said.
It added that its fighters would continue to monitor the withdrawal of Israeli forces beyond the Lebanese borders “with their hands on the trigger.”
The ceasefire deal includes the withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon within 60 days, Israeli officials said.
The deal, brokered by the US and France, ended the deadliest confrontation between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group in years. Israel is still fighting the Palestinian militant group Hamas, in the Gaza Strip.

Former ICC chief prosecutor tells of ‘threats to family’ during Israel-Palestine war crimes probe

Fatou Bensouda she was subjected to “unacceptable, thug-style tactics” while working as the ICC's chief prosecutor. (AP/File)
Fatou Bensouda she was subjected to “unacceptable, thug-style tactics” while working as the ICC's chief prosecutor. (AP/File)
Updated 52 min 49 sec ago
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Former ICC chief prosecutor tells of ‘threats to family’ during Israel-Palestine war crimes probe

Fatou Bensouda she was subjected to “unacceptable, thug-style tactics” while working as the ICC's chief prosecutor. (AP/File)
  • Fatou Bensouda says she was subjected to ‘thug-style tactics’ while working on cases related to Israel and Palestine, and the war in Afghanistan
  • A newspaper investigation previously alleged she was threatened by the head of Israeli intelligence agency Mossad

LONDON: The former chief prosecutor at the International Criminal Court has told how she received “direct threats” to herself and her family while working there.

Fatou Bensouda’s comments about her experiences came six months after a newspaper report alleged that the head of Israeli intelligence agency Mossad had threatened her in an attempt to get her to drop an investigation into accusations of war crimes in occupied Palestinian territories.

Appearing at a legal event in London on Tuesday, Bensouda did not mention any specific threats but said she was subjected to “unacceptable, thug-style tactics” while doing her job.

She said that while working on some of the court’s toughest cases, including those related to the conflict between Israel and Palestine, and the war in Afghanistan, she received “direct threats to my person and family and some of my closest professional advisors.”

Bensouda was the ICC’s chief prosecutor from 2012 until 2021. The Guardian newspaper reported in May that Israel’s foreign intelligence services put pressure on Bensouda after she opened a preliminary investigation in 2015 into the conflict between Israel and Palestine.

The newspaper, sighting several Israeli sources, alleged that Yossi Cohen, the director of Mossad at the time, threatened Bensouda during a series of secret meetings and warned her not to proceed with a case related to alleged Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.

Israeli authorities denied the allegations of threats and intimidation, and Bensouda opened a full criminal investigation into Israel’s actions in 2021, shortly before she left her post.

Last week, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister, Yoav Gallant, and the military chief of Hamas, Mohammed Deif, accusing them of crimes against humanity.

The warrants were requested six months ago by Bensouda’s successor, Karim Khan, as part of an extension of the investigation that his predecessor initiated. Khan accelerated the case after the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas and Israel’s subsequent war on Gaza.

During her lecture at the Bar Council on Wednesday, Bensouda, who is now Gambia’s high commissioner to the UK, said the arrest warrants issued last week focused exclusively on the events of Oct. 7 and those that followed, and did not include aspects of the wider conflict between Israel and Palestine that formed the basis of the investigation she initiated.

She said her initial probe focused on whether Hamas, other Palestinian armed groups or the Israeli military had committed war crimes in relation to hostilities that took place during 2014, and its scope included illegal Israeli settlements and the displacement of populations into the occupied West Bank.

“It will be important to ensure that the full extent of criminality in the context of this devastating … conflict is fully investigated and accountability is finally had for the benefit of its many victims on all sides of the conflict,” she said.

During her time as chief prosecutor, Bensouda also came under pressure from the US. Donald Trump’s administration imposed sanctions on her in 2020 after the ICC began investigating allegations of US war crimes in Afghanistan.

The sanctions were lifted by President Joe Biden. However, last week he described the ICC decision to issue an arrest warrant for Netanyahu as “outrageous” and said there was no equivalence between Israel and Hamas.

Neither the US nor Israel are members of the ICC. However, the 124 states that have signed up to it are obliged to act on warrants it issues if the accused visit their countries.


Hezbollah faces long recovery, officials believe thousands of fighters killed

Hezbollah faces long recovery, officials believe thousands of fighters killed
Updated 27 November 2024
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Hezbollah faces long recovery, officials believe thousands of fighters killed

Hezbollah faces long recovery, officials believe thousands of fighters killed
  • One source said the Iran-backed group may have lost up to 4,000 people
  • Hassan Fadallah, a senior Hezbollah politician, told Reuters the priority will be “the people”

BEIRUT: With the bodies of its fighters still strewn on the battlefield, Hezbollah must bury its dead and provide succour to its supporters who bore the brunt of Israel’s offensive, as the first steps on a long and costly road to recovery, four senior officials said.
Hezbollah believes the number of its fighters killed during 14 months of hostilities could reach several thousand, with the vast majority killed since Israel went on the offensive in September, three sources familiar with its operations say, citing previously unreported internal estimates.
One source said the Iran-backed group may have lost up to 4,000 people — well over 10 times the number killed in its month-long 2006 war with Israel. So far, Lebanese authorities have said some 3,800 people were killed in the current hostilities, without distinguishing fighters from civilians.
Hezbollah emerges shaken from top to bottom, its leadership still reeling from the killing of its former leader Hassan Nasrallah and its supporters made homeless en masse by the carpet bombing of Beirut’s southern suburbs and the destruction of entire villages in the south.
With a ceasefire taking hold on Wednesday, Hezbollah’s agenda includes working to re-establish its organizational structure fully, probing security breaches that helped Israel land so many painful blows, and a full review of the last year including its mistakes in underestimating Israel’s technological capabilities, three other sources familiar with the group’s thinking said.
For this story Reuters spoke to a dozen people who together provided details of some of the challenges facing Hezbollah as it seeks to pick itself up after the war. Most asked not to be named to speak about sensitive matters.
Hassan Fadallah, a senior Hezbollah politician, told Reuters the priority will be “the people.”
“To shelter them, to remove the rubble, to bid farewell to the martyrs and, in the next phase, to rebuild,” he said.
Israel’s campaign has focused largely on Hezbollah’s Shiite Muslim heartlands, where its supporters were badly hit. They include people still nursing casualties from Israel’s attack on its mobile communications devices in September.
“I have a brother who was martyred, a brother-in-law who was wounded in the pager attacks, and my neighbors and relatives are all either martyrs, wounded or missing,” said Hawraa, a woman from south Lebanon with family members who fight for Hezbollah.
“We want to collect our martyrs and bury them ... we want to rebuild our homes,” said Hawraa, who stayed in her village until she was forced to flee by the Israeli assault in September. She declined to use her full name, citing safety fears. The Israeli offensive displaced more than 1 million people, the bulk of them from areas where Hezbollah has sway.
A senior Lebanese official familiar with Hezbollah thinking said the group’s focus would be squarely on securing their return and rebuilding their homes: “Hezbollah is like a wounded man. Does a wounded man get up and fight? A wounded man needs to tend to his wounds.”
The official expected Hezbollah to carry out a wide-ranging policy review after the war, dealing with all major issues: Israel, its weapons, and the internal politics of Lebanon, where its weapons have long been a point of conflict. Iran, which established Hezbollah in 1982, has promised to help with reconstruction. The costs are immense: The World Bank estimates $2.8 billion in damage to housing alone in Lebanon, with 99,000 homes partially or fully destroyed.
The senior Lebanese official said Tehran has a variety of ways to get funds to Hezbollah, without giving details.
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, a close Hezbollah ally, is urging wealthy Lebanese Shiites in the diaspora to send funds to help the displaced, two Lebanese officials said.
The officials also expected significant donations to come from Shiite religious foundations across the region.
Hezbollah did not immediately respond to a detailed request for comment for this story. Iran’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

’THE RESISTANCE’ WILL CONTINUE Hezbollah has indicated it intends to keep its arms, dashing hopes of Lebanese adversaries who predicted the pressures generated by the war would finally lead it to hand them to the state. Hezbollah officials have said the resistance — widely understood to mean its armed status — will continue.
Hezbollah opened fire in support of Palestinian ally Hamas on Oct. 8, 2023. Israel went on the offensive against the group in September, declaring the aim of securing the return home of 60,000 people evacuated from homes in the north.
Despite the resulting devastation, Hezbollah’s Fadlallah said the resistance put up by its fighters in south Lebanon and the group’s intensified rocket salvoes toward the end of the conflict showed Israel had failed. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says its campaign has set back Hezbollah decades, eliminated its top leaders, destroyed most of its rockets, neutralized thousands of fighters, and obliterated its infrastructure near the border. A senior US official said Hezbollah was “extremely weak” at this moment, both militarily and politically. A Western diplomat echoed that assessment, saying Israel had the upper hand and had almost dictated the terms of its withdrawal. The ceasefire terms agreed by Israel and Lebanon require Hezbollah to have no military presence in an area between the Israeli border and the Litani River, which meets the Mediterranean Sea some 30 km (20 miles) from the frontier.
Hezbollah, which approved the deal, has not declared how it intends to help implement those terms, including whether it actively hands its arms to Lebanese troops who are deploying into the south, or leaves the weapons for soldiers to find.
Israel complains Hezbollah, which is deeply rooted in south Lebanon, never implemented the same terms when they were agreed to end a previous war in 2006 war. Israel says the group was preparing for a large-scale assault into northern Israel, pointing to its military build-up at the frontier.
Andreas Krieg of King’s College in London said Hezbollah had retained considerable capability.
The performance of its “core infantry fighters in southern Lebanon and rocket attacks deep into Israeli territory in recent days showed the group was still very, very capable,” he said.
“But Hezbollah will be very much bogged down in the effort of rebuilding the infrastructure and also, most importantly, securing the funds to do so,” he said.

’REPAYING THE DEBT’
Hezbollah has been handing out cash to people affected by the hostilities since they began, paying $200 a month to civilians who stayed in frontline villages, and offering more as people were forced to flee the areas, according to recipients.
Since the start of the escalation in September, Hezbollah has been paying around $300 a month to help displaced families.
The group has made no secret of the military and financial support it gets from Iran, which shipped huge sums of cash to in 2006 to aid the homeless and help rebuild.
Hezbollah supporters say more will be on the way. One, citing conversations with a local Hezbollah official, said the group would cover a year of rent for the homeless in addition to furniture costs.
Addressing the Lebanese people in an October sermon, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said “the destruction will be replaced... repaying the debt to the wounded, bleeding Lebanon is our duty....”
The World Bank, in a preliminary estimate, put the cost in damage and losses to Lebanon at $8.5 billion, a bill that cannot be footed by the government, still suffering the consequences of a catastrophic financial collapse five years ago.
Gulf states Qatar, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia helped pay the $5 billion reconstruction bill in 2006, the last time Hezbollah and Israel went to war. But there has been no sign that these Sunni-led Arab states are ready to do so again. Hezbollah conducted a lot of reconstruction work after the 2006 war, financed by Iran and using its construction wing. The project was directed by Hashem Safieddine, a Hezbollah leader killed by Israel 11 days after Nasrallah, in a sign of the bigger challenges it will face this time round.
“For Hezbollah the priority is to guarantee the loyalty of the Shi’ite community. The destruction has been enormous and it will impact the organization,” said Mohanand Hage Ali of the Carnegie Middle East Center.


57 dead in army-miltant clashes in northern Syria: monitor

57 dead in army-miltant clashes in northern Syria: monitor
Updated 27 November 2024
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57 dead in army-miltant clashes in northern Syria: monitor

57 dead in army-miltant clashes in northern Syria: monitor
  • Clashes followed “an operation launched by Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said
  • The air forces of both Syria and its ally Russia struck the attacking militants

BEIRUT: Militants launched a surprise attack on the Syrian army in the northern province of Aleppo on Wednesday, sparking clashes in which 57 combatants were killed, a war monitor said.
Clashes followed “an operation launched by Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham” (HTS), the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, referring to a militant group led by Al-Qaeda’s former Syria branch which controls a chunk of northwestern Syria.
The Observatory said “26 members of Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham and allied factions” were killed, as well as “31 members of the regime forces.”
The air forces of both Syria and its ally Russia struck the attacking militants in the area for the first time in years, the Britain-based Observatory said.
The Syrian conflict broke out after President Bashar Assad repressed anti-government protests in 2011. It has killed more than 500,000 people, displaced millions and battered the country’s infrastructure and industry.


Displaced residents return to South Lebanon, Israeli army breaches ceasefire twice

Displaced residents return to South Lebanon, Israeli army breaches ceasefire twice
Updated 27 November 2024
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Displaced residents return to South Lebanon, Israeli army breaches ceasefire twice

Displaced residents return to South Lebanon, Israeli army breaches ceasefire twice
  • Najib Mikati says Lebanese army developing operational plan for the South
  • Nabih Berri: We are entering a new phase, and the moment of truth for the unity of Lebanon has arrived

BEIRUT: As soon as the ceasefire between Hezbollah and the Israeli army took effect at 4 a.m. on Wednesday — after hours of airstrikes targeting Beirut, its southern suburbs, the Bekaa, the South, and even Akkar in the far north — returning residents quickly transformed the tragic scene into one of “victory.”

Roads leading from Beirut to the South and Bekaa were crowded with hundreds of vehicles loaded with families and their belongings heading back to their villages.

People disregarded army warnings to stay away from damaged buildings or those reduced to rubble, citing fears of unexploded missiles. Upon reaching their neighborhoods, whose features had drastically changed, residents climbed the ruins, entered partially destroyed homes, or stood among what remained of their homes, a scene that vividly depicted the pain of war.

The harsh images of destruction and the tears of women over their lost homes were met by the younger generation filled with a determination to speak of “victory.” Celebratory gunfire filled the air, and Hezbollah flags and images of its former Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah were raised atop the rubble of the buildings.

Neighborhoods in Beirut’s southern suburbs, which had turned into ghost towns for two months, came back to life with the sound of honking car horns.

Hezbollah organized a tour for journalists in Beirut’s southern suburbs, where the smell of fires and the dust of explosives still emanated from the flattened buildings.

Traffic jams and chaos ensued as Ministry of Public Works bulldozers cleared rubble littered with people’s belongings, memories, children’s books, and toys from the middle of streets.

The road to the South was packed with thousands of cars, with many passengers waving Lebanese flags, declaring they were “returning to their villages, and if their homes are destroyed, they will stay with neighbors.”

Although many of those returning avoided routes damaged by Israeli airstrikes, life in some villages looked likely to be extremely challenging because of the lack of essentials such as water, electricity and operational shops.

The return did not include those border towns into which the Israeli army had advanced and destroyed homes. Reports indicated that civil defense teams were retrieving the bodies of party members killed in battles that no one had previously been able to recover.

Despite the destruction in frontline villages, some youths from the border area approached them. In Aita Al-Shaab, they burned the Israeli flag, while others challenged Israeli tanks stationed in villages such as Kfarkela, Khiam and Odaisseh. They took photos in front of the tanks, flashing victory signs, while photojournalists moved in to capture the moment. Israeli soldiers fired five artillery shells and warning shots in response, to push them away from the area, the first breach of the ceasefire agreement.

A second was reported by Hezbollah’s Al-Manar channel, which stated that “Israeli drones flew over the skies of Marjayoun and Khardali.”

The Israeli army acknowledged opening fire on those it described as “suspects in several areas of southern Lebanon” and affirmed that it would “respond with fire to any breaches of the agreement.”

In Khiam, photographer Mohammed Al-Zaatari suffered gunshot wounds to his leg in the town when the Israeli army opened fire.

The Lebanese army subsequently closed all access to Khiam due to the presence of the Israeli army in the area.

Some of the returnees to Nabatieh departed at dawn from Akkar, the region to which they had fled in the far north. Ahmad and his companions said: “We set out before the ceasefire took effect and arrived in the Zahrani area as the agreement came into force. The scene of destruction in Nabatieh is alarming, yet it was anticipated.”

On the way to the Baalbek-Hermel region, residents celebrated the ceasefire in their own way by slaughtering sheep in Tamnine El Faouqa.

The Israeli army focused its attacks on the city of Baalbek and surrounding villages just before the ceasefire was scheduled to take effect. Airstrikes, which targeted civilians, hit occupied and unoccupied residential buildings, with some attacks involving phosphorus bombs.

Fifty civilians were killed in the Baalbek-Hermel region during the ceasefire, including a 16-day-old infant named as Jaafar Ali, alongside 10 members of his family.

The Talais family lost 11 members, including children, was killed. In the city of Baalbek, four members of the Wahbi family were also killed their lives.

The recent Israeli airstrikes targeted the last land crossings connecting Lebanon to Syria in the north, particularly the official Al-Arida Border Crossing, disrupting work in the area.

Minister of Public Works Ali Hamieh said during his inspection of the Masnaa Border Crossing that “Al-Arida Border Crossing will be opened within 48 hours.”

Amid these developments, images of Wafiq Safa, Hezbollah’s coordination and liaison unit head, circulated on social media, showing him in good health. This was his first appearance after an assassination attempt a month ago in Beirut, resulting in the deaths and injuries of dozens of civilians.

The Council of Ministers convened under the chairmanship of Najib Mikati to discuss the state’s arrangements for the ceasefire phase and its implementation.

Mikati described the ceasefire as “a new day that we hope will bring peace and stability.”

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said: “We are entering a new phase, and the moment of truth for the unity of Lebanon has arrived.”

Hezbollah MP Hassan Fadlallah said that Hezbollah has “a program related to reconstruction, but this is a shared responsibility.”