A Syrian migrant family in Lebanon flees Israel’s bombardments after a heavy Israeli airstrike: hezbollah conflict displaced residents
Children’s laundry hung from some of the classroom windows to dry. Most of the families were only wearing clothes when they arrived.
A couple sat down and watched social media videos to see if their home was still standing. For security reasons, they asked to be identified as parents of their eldest son Ali, using the names Um Ali and Abu Ali, which mean Ali’s mother and father, respectively.
She says that the children were screaming and crying when the missiles were near the cars. The mother took 10 family members into a car and drove to her hometown because her husband, who was hit in an Israeli airstrike, was in a cast.
The army turned a divided highway into a single route north after many people fled south Lebanon. A 50 mile drive stretched out in seven or eight hours, as panicked families crammed into any vehicle they could find.
A Lebanese woman’s dream come true: an Israeli air strike kills a family of nine in a border village
Um Ali says in addition to not talking, her daughter has been unable to sleep and her heart races. Standing behind her mother, the girl says she’s OK, but then buries her face in her mother’s shoulder and starts to cry.
A person comes and makes your kids live in fear, blood and destruction according to her mother. People don’t accept living like that, to be humiliated and see their lives torn apart.
It was too early for the sense of loss that comes with displacement to kick in. Abu Ali, a construction worker, and his wife refer to life in their border village in the present tense.
Um Ali looked at the memory of life in the countryside and said she grew everything and raised sheep. We have a happy and beautiful life.
Earlier in the day, an Israeli airstrike killed a family of nine in a Lebanese border village, authorities said, as Lebanon struggled to deal with a rising death toll, a wave of tens of thousands fleeing their homes and the possibility of an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah.
The first day of classes in a city filled with displaced people: a young girl’s room outside a soccer field behind a school
Some boys are kicking a blue ball on a concrete soccer field behind the school. In the courtyard, two sisters from the border town of Nabitieh sit on a low wall. The young woman has her nails manicured in a bright purple. Her sister has long dark hair.
They slept in their clothes when the strikes began, so they could get away early the next morning.
The streets of the capital are packed with displaced families. Hotels are for those who can afford it. The family was asked to choose five rooms but the man only asked for five for a night.
A woman is sitting with her sister at a table, talking about how they have been trying to find an apartment, but everyone wants so much money or six months in advance. They were afraid of being attacked by Israel so they didn’t want to be identified.
Families sit in plastic chairs around a courtyard at a school in the center of Lebanon to share news of their houses being destroyed in the south.
Many Lebanese fleeing the south took refuge with relatives in Beirut and other places, or searched for apartments to rent. But according to the U.N., about 40,000 of them sought shelter in more than 200 schools, which the Lebanese government asked to accommodate displaced people.
The cars pulled up on Tuesday outside the metal gates of Ahliah School. The aid official waved them on to the other schools. With more than 600 arriving in 24 hours, there was no room left.
It was supposed to be the first day of classes at the K-12 private school. Ahliah had to make room for families by clearing out desks and putting them in the hallways.
Israeli strikes and the israel-Hezbollah campaign in Lebanon are still viewed as a remnant of the Israeli-Hamas war
Netanyahu vowed at the UN to keep degrading Hezbollah until they achieve their goals, which dims hopes for a cease-fire.
The last Israel-Hezbollah war went on for a month and wreaked havoc on Lebanon in 2006 and they fear that will happen again. Or worse, they fear, Lebanon could suffer devastation on the scale caused in Gaza by Israel’s nearly yearlong campaign against Hamas.
At least 25 people were killed in Israeli strikes early Friday, Health Minister Firass Abiad said, bringing the death toll in Lebanon this week to more than 720. He said there were many women and children dead.