In the bombed south of Lebanon, the great fear of Christian villages

In southern Lebanon, emptied of many of its inhabitants, a handful of Christian villages say they are “under siege”, caught in the crossfire of Hezbollah and the Israeli army in a war that, they say, was imposed on them.

Living in the village of Rmeich, nestled in the green hills two kilometers from the border with Israel, Joseph Jarjour, 68, and his wife have already experienced nearly a year of cross-border gunfire between the Shiite movement and Israeli troops.

And for nearly three weeks, it has been open war with the intensification of Israeli air strikes.

“We are a peaceful village, we have no weapons, we have never liked war. We just want to stay in our homes,” said the retired teacher, contacted by AFP by telephone during a rare reconnection of Rmeich to the internet.

“We don't want to be part of the conflict” but “we find ourselves under siege,” he continued. “The roads are not safe, so it is very hard to reach Beirut,” even though it is less than a hundred kilometers north of the village of red-tiled houses.

Currently, 6,000 people are in Rmeich, known for its tobacco growing.

Among them, a few hundred displaced people from surrounding areas, according to Mayor Milad al-Alam. Nearby, Shiite villages now empty after bombings.

“When Israel bombs, it passes over us. And when Hezbollah retaliates, it passes over us,” says Mr. Jarjour.

– “Life has stopped” –

Residents of the Christian village of Qlayaa in southern Lebanon observe the fighting on the Israeli border, October 10, 2024 © AFP – –

In the small, multi-confessional country, the south, which is mainly Shiite, has many Christian villages. Although Israeli strikes have so far targeted them little, they are suffering the repercussions of the damage inflicted on neighboring Shiite localities.

In Rmeich, houses have cracked under the shock waves of the explosions and local vegetables are no longer arriving.

“Life stopped in October 2023,” says the mayor.

The municipality, he says, has managed to obtain the delivery of aid convoys, including one on Thursday, under escort of the Lebanese army and in coordination with the Blue Helmets deployed along the border.

“But we cannot replace the State” that many Lebanese consider to be absent even before the great bankruptcy of 2019 that brought the country to its knees, he adds.

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Despite this, everyone in Rmeich repeats that during the 2006 war against Israel, no one left.

This time again, Mr. Jarjour assures, “we will stay until our last breath, we will not abandon our village or our homes.”

When Hezbollah opened a front in northern Israel, in support of its Palestinian ally Hamas, which began hostilities in the south with its unprecedented attack in Israel on October 7, 2023, many Lebanese citizens and officials, Christians in the lead, protested.

As early as January, Maronite Patriarch Bechara al-Raï considered that the southern border had become “hostages” and its inhabitants “scapegoats,” a thinly veiled denunciation of Hezbollah.

– “Forget the war” –

View of the Christian village of Qlayaa in southern Lebanon, October 10, 2024 © AFP – –

In the village of Qlayaa, four kilometers from the border, 550 of the 900 families are still there, despite shortages of gasoline, medicines and the forced closure of the largest hospital close.

If they ignore the Israeli army's evacuation orders, it is because they are “believers and attached to their land,” says the parish priest, Pierre al-Raï.

Here, he continues, “we have done everything to ensure that there is no military installation or action.”

The village, where an immense statue of Saint George stands, lived under Israeli occupation from 1978 until the withdrawal in 2000, under pressure from Hezbollah.

A period that deeply divided the Christians of Lebanon, some taking sides with Israel and others opposing its invasion.

Today, the streets are often deserted. But solidarity is organized and no one misses church appointments.

Pauline Matta, mother of four children aged four to 18, cried when she saw the name of her village on an Israeli evacuation order. Since then, this forty-year-old admits to no longer sleeping and panicking “every time we hear an explosion or a plane breaking the sound barrier”.

She insisted on sending her children to the village summer camp.

“The drones were flying above them” but “without that, we wouldn't be able to live, like that, we forget the war a little”, she says.

“A war was imposed on us that we have nothing to do with. So why would we leave ? I'm not going to get thrown out on the roads”, she assures us.

And this despite increasingly harsh living conditions.

Because the salary of her husband, enlisted in the Lebanese army, which provided them all with a living, has melted like snow in the sun with the economic crisis.

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