Employees at Rafik Hariri University Hospital had been preparing for the worst for months. Nursing staff performed drills in the parking lot, rehearsing the transfer of patients from on-call rooms to the bomb-proof concrete structure. He had also left one of the buildings on the hospital campus free so that doctors could take their families there, in the event of massive bombings, without having to worry about their safety.
All the drills seemed to pay off last Friday night, when dozens of bombs fell on Dahie and residents of this southern Beirut suburb ran to the safest place they could think of: the hospital. People came to Rafik Hariri’s gates to ask to be able to stay in the parking lot until the bombing stopped, but the staff could not let everyone in.
The passage had to be left free for the wounded who arrived and for the numerous victims expected after the air attacks which devastated a block of houses in the neighborhood and ended the life of Hasan Nasrallah, leader of the Shiite group Hezbollah, as confirmed first. Saturday thing.
Residents had to stay outside the hospital gates, as close to the building as possible, until Israeli bombing of Beirut’s southern suburbs – considered a Hezbollah stronghold – subsided in the morning. The injured began arriving as soon as the neighbors left.
Hospitals in the southern neighborhoods transferred patients to Rafik Hariri and other nearby medical centers, after the Health Ministry ordered their evacuation. Contrary to what was expected, the victims of Friday’s attack against what would be the headquarters of Hezbollah showed up in trickles: 11 dead and 108 injured, according to the latest figures from the Ministry of Health.
Where six buildings once stood, powerful Israeli bunker bombs had left deep craters, making search and rescue efforts difficult. Accustomed to searching through rubble after twelve months of crossfire between Hezbollah and Israel, Lebanese rescuers found themselves facing a level of destruction never seen before. Two days after the attack, the death toll continues to rise.
worst fears
With medical staff exhausted after two weeks of events that left a thousand dead and thousands injured, the Lebanese hospital system managed to overcome this crisis. Despite this, no one is optimistic about the new military escalation, which includes the possibility of a ground invasion of southern Lebanon by Israel, as its army has warned in recent days.
“We face a great psychological challenge: we fear that basic supplies will be interrupted; If this situation continues, I fear we will be left with nothing,” says Shoshana Mazraani, director of the emergency department at the public hospital in Marjayoun, in the south of the country and where UN peacekeepers (including Spanish troops) are deployed).
These fears are increasing as Israel intensifies its bombing campaign over large areas of the country, particularly the south and east, as well as south Beirut – where Hezbollah has a strong presence.
The phones of residents of the town of Chebaa, on the Lebanese-Israeli border, began ringing on Saturday. It was an Israeli government employee asking them to immediately evacuate their homes because they would soon be attacked. “They told us which route to take, they even called the police. Everyone got scared and ran away; The bombardment of the city began just ten minutes after the calls,” said Mohammed Saab, mayor of Chebaa, in a telephone interview with Tutor. Israeli attacks destroyed three houses in Shebaa, according to Saab.
Rumors of other similar calls began circulating on social media and neighbors began informing each other about areas that were going to be attacked. Residents of a building housing displaced people in the village of Baakline, in the mountains of southeastern Lebanon, were rumored to have been evacuated after receiving a call. Later, one of the residents of that building said that these were just rumors and that the Israelis had not called anyone.
At the street intersections of Beirut there were groups of Lebanese soldiers. Especially without vehicles. The sound of Israeli drones flying over the area prompted residents to step out onto their balconies in search of columns of smoke on the horizon indicating a recent attack.
“It is impossible for them to set foot in Lebanon”
The official period of mourning following Nasrallah’s death only began on Monday. Some residents of the capital still refuse to believe that religion is no longer there. “They said they killed the said (Mr.) Hasan Nasrallah, something that until now 90% of people do not believe in,” says Amir, 24 and owner of a store in Karkoun al Druze, a neighborhood of Beirut where Sunnis and Shiites live together. “That’s what the media want us to hear, that’s what I think,” he adds. “It will take time to come back. If he comes back and is alive, things will get worse. [para Israel]”.
As Amir speaks, media report that rescue teams discovered Nasrallah’s body a kilometer and a half from where the young man is. Another neighbor shares Amir’s opinion: the leader of Hezbollah, who became a myth for his sympathizers and adversaries after three decades at the head of the political and armed movement, could not be dead. Hezbollah announced his death, but it was only a ploy to deceive the Israelis.
According to Amir and his neighbor, the Israelis would be arrogant if they even considered a ground invasion. “It is impossible for them to set foot in Lebanon; For ten of them, there will be a hundred of us facing them,” declares Amir who, although Sunni, supports the role of the Lebanese Shiite organization born to fight against the Israeli occupation.
Despite the boasting with which some Lebanese view the possibility of an Israeli invasion, doubts remain about the state’s ability to deal with this eventuality. “They said they had been preparing for a year, but look what happened last Friday, no one expected it,” laments Yusuf, who owns a store next to Amir’s. “I’m afraid it will be like 2006 again, at the time it was very hard, food reserves were exhausted and supplies were scarce,” he recalls.
Israel launched an offensive against Hezbollah in July 2006, but the weeks-long war left around 1,000 civilians dead and significant destruction of civilian infrastructure, including Beirut International Airport.
Today, the lack of preparedness is evident in central Beirut, where displaced families from Dahie huddle under the few trees in a park to protect themselves from the afternoon sun. Among those who lost their homes, some view with concern the prospect of further fighting, whether the projectiles come from Israel or are aimed at Israel. ‘I want the situation to improve, I want everyone to be at home, sitting with their families,’ Murshid Yusuf says, after Israeli bombing in southern Lebanon kills his wife and destroys his house . “I want people to be able to go out and be happy, nothing more.”
Text translated by Francisco de Zárate and published by elDiario.es
