‘I have been exposed to many wars’: Civilians near Israel’s Lebanon border brace for conflict israel

TeaThe leafy streets of Kfar Rosh Hanikra are yet quiet and peaceful. This is not just the effect of the scorching heat of July. The kibbutz is just a few hundred meters from the disputed border that separates Israel from Lebanon, on the western level of what Israelis call their northern gateway into the ongoing conflict.

The kibbutz’s 1,000 citizens were immediately evacuated after surprise attacks from Gaza into southern Israel via Hamas on October 7 killed 1,200, mostly civilians, and abducted 250.

For the next nine months, partly all the survivors remained there, others scattered throughout northern Israel, living with relatives, in rented flats or in resorts.

“They say they don’t want to come back home because they don’t feel safe,” said Janet Tass, 73, who went out with others last year but returned to her small home after a day or two. “The feeling of losing this place was so deep and terrible that I could not bear it.”

In all likelihood, fearing fighting between Lebanon’s Hezbollah, which has complex checkpoints on the ridge just north of Kfar Rosh Hanikra, some people are hurrying home.

For months, the militant Islamic group has fired mortars, missiles and rockets into Israel and sent drones to carry out bombing raids, primarily targeting communities south of the UN-controlled border. 16 soldiers and many civilians have been killed in the attacks.

In response, Israel has bombed and shelled villages where Hezbollah forces are based and killed senior commanders with airstrikes. Israeli operations in Lebanon since October have killed 450 people, most of them Hezbollah fighters, but at least 97 civilians have also been killed. Approximately 100,000 people were forced to flee their property.

The unfortunate exchange banned cuts to the entire fight. Analysts say neither side wants such a conflict at this time, even though all agree there is a danger of tensions escalating. Israel has pulled out unused forces in Gaza and is stepping up conditions for more than 60,000 Israelis displaced home from communities bordering Lebanon.

Many in Israel are fixated on this future – the latter’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, made a high-profile trip back and forth to Washington – as to when the fighting might come in the past.

Senior Israeli generals have announced they have signed off on an offensive plan to oust Hezbollah from power across the border, with the militant group’s chief Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah warning of a fight “without rules and without limits”.

Some witnesses say they believe it is unlikely that Netanyahu will chance a new fight against an enemy that experts say is far more capable and potentially damaging than Hamas. Is. The truth is that no one knows when a typically catastrophic conflict might occur, or what the easy ways are to avoid it.

“Nobody wants war – not Israel, not Hezbollah, not Iran – but it’s very difficult to see how you can resolve the situation without it,” said Professor Danny Orbach, a military historian at the Hebrew College of Jerusalem.

Kfar Rosh HaNikra determines Israel’s long and highly disputed border with Lebanon, which runs from the coast around the hills and later to the mountains of the Golan Heights in the north. The primary coastal road to the north and a nearby naval base reinforce its strategic importance.

The kibbutz has been affected by all of Israel’s conflicts. It was founded in 1949 on the site of a Palestinian village, whose population was forced to flee during the war leading to the establishment of Israel. Civilians fought in the Six-Day War of 1956 and later in 1967.

When Palestinian armed groups established their bases in southern Lebanon in the early seventies, Rosh Hanikra found itself under fire.

“I remember putting my kids to sleep and then taking them to the bomb shelter,” said Tass, who only a year or so ago moved to Israel entirely from her London home. The Kibbutz was attracted by the traditional socialist and environmental rules of the genre. life.

Israeli retaliation for such raids caused devastation in Lebanon and significant civilian casualties. In 1982, Israeli forces surrounded and shelled Beirut along the border in search of their elusive adversaries.

A low-level rebel fighting followed, followed by a major conflict in 2006 that led to a stalemate and a painful relative peace that was broken in late October.

Tass was walking her dog on the hill behind the kibbutz and when she was given the house she found the way inside. Unenthusiastic about immediately following the directions, he and his companions left after 5 days for a daughter’s house in the far south.

“I have been living here for 53 years and have seen many wars but I have never been asked to leave. “We are devastated by what happened in the south,” he said.

However, Tass stayed with relatives for a while before deciding to move back home to her husband, 91-year-old uncle, and dog. Most of Hezbollah’s attacks are aimed at confrontations towards the west and a few attacks around Rosh Hanikra, most recently two weeks ago, have caused minor damage.

“It was shocking for us to leave,” he said. “But most people in the kibbutz, even those who do not have children, say they do not feel safe enough to return.”

This is a problem for Netanyahu. Israeli officials have said they want displaced children from the north to enroll in their own schools when the academic year begins in September. Financial losses are increasing due to suspension of work in farms and companies bordering Lebanon.

Tourists don’t make their way to the famous beaches and caves near Rosh Hanikra, or Nahariya, just south of the kibbutz, where the streets are crowded with uniformed reservists making their way to the precincts of Israeli military equipment. a struggle.

Tass said she is now grappling with a potential fight and its consequences.

“Now I don’t get on the floor when an alarm goes off. At my age, I probably won’t be able to get up again,” she said. “If I was kidnapped or captured, I would want them to release me. “I don’t want anyone to be killed to save me.”