Residents fear that firefights across the border could escalate into a major clash.
Tension has been high for days along Lebanon’s border with Israel, with frequent firefights between heavily armed militants in Lebanon and the Israeli army.
This scenario raised fears that the violence could escalate into a larger clash.
Not far from the border on the Lebanese side, in the southern town of Bein Jbeil, silence reigned in the streets. Most of the shops were closed.
Many residents here, and in other border villages, have left their homes, fearing that an escalation of the war between Israel and Hamas will turn this area, dominated by the powerful Shiite Islamic group Hezbollah, into another front in the conflict.
Half a dozen men, among the few people seen outside, sat around a plastic table. Some ate pizza; others smoked. They didn’t seem worried.
“I’m not leaving unless [a situação] it will get out of control, which I doubt,” said Mohammed Baidoun, 52, under the watchful eye of Hezbollah vigilantes who rushed in from various directions as soon as we arrived. “I have faith in the resistance we have here… I believe at the bottom of what [o Hezbollah] will protect us.”
The question of what Hezbollah will do looms over the entire country.
The group, like Hamas, is considered a terrorist organization by the United Kingdom, the United States and other countries. Its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, has remained silent since the war between Israel and Hamas began.
Naim Qassem, Hezbollah’s number two, described the group as “completely ready”, saying it would not be intimidated by calls from the United States and others to stay away. But their secretive nature makes it difficult to know what preparations they might be making.
Israel has long considered Hezbollah, which is also a social and political movement created in the 1980s, as a much more powerful force than Hamas: the group has a vast arsenal of weapons, including precision-guided missiles that can strike at depth Israeli territory, as well as tens of thousands of well-trained and battle-experienced fighters.
Hezbollah’s actions have been limited to cross-border attacks, along the blue line defined by the United Nations, the unofficial border between Lebanon and Israel.
The group exchanged rocket and artillery fire with the Israeli army several times a day, while its allied Palestinian factions also carried out attacks, including several attempted incursions into Israel from southern Lebanon.
The clashes resulted in deaths on both sides, including civilians.
And residents are also fleeing to the Israeli side.
Last week, the Israeli army said it was evacuating people from the northern town of Kiryat Shmona, which has around 20,000 residents. The site has been hit by rockets in recent days.
Days earlier he had announced the evacuation of 28 communities and created a no-go zone 2 km from the border.
Tension in Lebanon has further increased after the explosion in a hospital in Gaza.
Israel was immediately blamed by Hamas, but the Israeli military said the explosion was caused by a failed Palestinian militant rocket.
Hezbollah, however, defined the action as a “massacre” perpetrated by Israel and, in Beirut, hundreds of its followers protested, chanting anti-American and anti-Israeli slogans. But it was a small demonstration of what the group described as an “unprecedented day of anger.”
A source close to Hezbollah thinking, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the group’s actions will be determined by what happens in Gaza. “If the Israelis invade [o território]”, the source said, “this will lead to a regional catastrophe.”
Some believe the decision on what to do next will likely come from Hezbollah’s main backer, Iran.
Israel accused Tehran of ordering Hezbollah to carry out a series of attacks on its territory last weekend. Tehran, however, said the “resistance front,” its alliance of forces in the region with groups in Syria, Iraq and Yemen, could lead to “preemptive action.”
Before the latest outbreak of violence, the consensus among observers was that neither Israel nor Hezbollah were interested in another war, as many still remember the devastating month-long conflict in 2006.
Lebanon has been suffering from a years-long economic crisis and internal political infighting has left the country without a functioning government or president, while sectarian divisions have been exacerbated.
West of Bein Jbeil, in the border village of Dhayra, Israeli retaliatory attacks last week targeted the local mosque and some houses.
Sabrina Fanash, a 36-year-old resident who moved to Beirut after the war began, openly criticized militants who she said were using her predominantly Sunni village for their attacks.
“It’s not right that our homes remain like this. Who will rebuild them?” she said, walking through the rubble of her cousin’s partially destroyed house.
“We are all sad… We depend on God, God will protect us.”
Source: Terra
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