On the streets of Nabatiye, just 12 kilometers from Israel, you see more cats than people. Not only because it was already almost empty when the Israeli army urged the population to leave immediately half a month ago (40,000 inhabitants before the war, the largest town in the fraction of Lebanon on which an evacuation order weighs), but because it has just experienced its worst bombing in two decades, turning 15 parts of the city gray with dust. But, even though they are few, those who remain in Nabatiye (especially the elderly and poor with little strength and money to flee to other parts of the country) knew that, every day at 10:00 in the morning, they could go to a municipal building to receive free food, water and basic medicines that they previously bought in the shops (now closed) or the market (busted by four missiles).
This Thursday, an hour before the handover, the Israeli aviation launched a series of bombardments that crowned Nabatiye, almost simultaneously, with columns of smoke. One, directly against that municipal building, during a meeting of the crisis cell to analyze the needs of neighbors and displaced people. The missile killed 16 people: the mayor, seven municipal workers (a councillor, the media manager…), four emergency services employees and four neighbors who were preparing to collect aid or passed by the wrong place at the time. mistaken.
It is the first direct attack of the war against the headquarters of a civilian government authority in Lebanon, but the Israeli army issued a generic statement: “Aircraft have hit dozens of Hezbollah terrorist targets in the Nabatiye area that include infrastructure sites.” terrorist, Hezbollah command centers and weapons storage facilities, placed by Hezbollah next to civilian infrastructure, using the civilian population as a human shield.”
Mohammad Shbib survived the attack – okay: he doesn’t even count among the 52 wounded – and is counted next to the rubble. He works as a security guard and says that the explosion caught him drinking coffee right next door. “It’s as if, suddenly, (the explosive wave) propelled me,” he says. “I got up and heard people shouting ‘Help!’ Aid! We all know each other here, so I recognized some of the voices.”
First, he climbs the stairs to the top of the building, which served as an aid warehouse, to illustrate how, two hours before the missile fell, he himself was helping the mayor and his son load things. He then removes the diapers that were going to be distributed from a damaged vehicle. He doesn’t seem angry. He just wants to show it. “This van and that other one over there were on fire. Have you seen the movie Rambo? That’s how I felt, like I was inside that movie. Only now do I think I have recovered my hearing since then,” he says.
24 hours later, there was no need to search for clues deep in the rubble. They were presented at every step, like the municipal lists scattered on the floor (cleaning shifts, police guards, an old urban planning report…). There are images of those moments before, in Shbib’s eyes, Nabatiye became Rambo’s Vietnam. Less than an hour earlier, the mayor, Ahmad Kahil, had recorded himself packing pita breads into boxes to distribute to those remaining at the municipal level, which authorities estimate in some towns to be around 3% or 4% of the population.
“It was horrible,” recalls its medical director, Shafi Fouani, at the hospital in the city of Lebanese People’s Aid. “All the ambulances arrived, unloaded the wounded and returned frequently. In addition, we had to refer those we could to other hospitals, because in these situations you need to free up beds. in case there is another attack”.
Ambulances on the way to hospitals
on the road From the coast, you can count the cars on the fingers of your hands. Once inside Nabatiye you can only see a few ambulances on the way to the hospitals, a couple of police cars, another private car and a solitary motorcycle. Bombings are heard and seen in the background, further south. And suddenly, the whistle of rockets launched in the other direction: towards Israel.
With a Shiite majority, but with a significant Melkite minority, the flags contain praise for Hussein (the grandson of Muhammad, revered in Shiite Islam) or Hezbollah. An immense poster of Imad Mugniye (the top Hezbollah commander assassinated with a car bomb in Damascus in 2008 in a joint operation by the intelligence services of Israel and the United States) covers an entire façade.
Almost no one dares to come: the Israeli army’s Arabic-speaking spokesman, Avijai Adree, has urged civilians to go north of the Awali River, between 60 and 90 kilometers from the Blue Line (the border with Israel). He has also made it clear that they will open fire on suspicious vehicles south of the Litani River, which marks the border of the area of operations of the blue helmets, where Israel carries out its land incursion, and has called on them to limit their movements: “Be careful, you are not allowed to go south. It can put your lives in danger.” Nabatiye is between both rivers, just four kilometers from the Litani to the south and east.
It doesn’t matter how long the street is: you can’t see a single open shop. Only in less exposed parts, and searching, does a grocery store appear that throws away what it had. They need to source supplies in larger cities, such as Sidon or Beirut. An elderly neighbor takes advantage of journalists coming to ask them to bring him large bags of bread.
Physical condition matters more than position. Whoever can lend a hand to those who cannot help themselves, such as families who remain locked in their homes or the only neighbor who moves through the streets: an elderly man with two crutches to walk and an apparent intellectual disability.
The mayor’s death – and the circumstances in which it occurred – have been the biggest straw that has been filling the camel’s back in Nabatiye. “Medical facilities, mosques, historic markets, residential complexes and, now, government buildings are being reduced to rubble“said the humanitarian coordinator for Lebanon, Imran Riza, in a statement.
Just three days before, Israel launched four missiles at the soul of the city: its historic market. It dates back to 1910, from the Ottoman period, and the rubble today occupies two entire blocks. Emergency services fought the fire in 12 residential buildings and 40 stores, according to a statement.
Vegetables and fruits, without vendors
Smoke still rises from small fires among the rubble. In an abandoned street stall, vegetables and fruits are still displayed for customers, now covered in dust and without a seller. The bombing has also damaged access to the tomb of one of the city’s favorite sons, Hassan Kamel Al-Sabbah, an inventor who made his career in the United States and whose name is probably not better known due to his origins and his premature death. in a traffic accident in New York that occurred in 1935.
The succession of attacks on Nabatiye has led the Lebanese Prime Minister, Nayib Mikati, who has just had a diplomatic dispute with Iran, Hezbollah’s patron, to accuse the international community of “encouraging the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin, with its silence.” Netanyahu, after the “intentional attack against a municipal meeting.” “If all nations in the world are powerless to stop the blatant aggression against the Lebanese people, does it make sense to turn to the UN Security Council to demand a ceasefire? What can deter the enemy from his crimes, that has even attacked to peacekeeping forces (UN, Unifil) in the south? And what solution can be expected in these circumstances?”
