“This was the US,” said one man, gesturing at the still smoking air strike site to one side.
“We know it is not the American people, they are nice to us,” said another, standing beside him. But “[US president Donald] Trump is crazy. He is a terrorist, he is a vampire.”
The men were standing in Beirut’s southern suburbs, known as Dahiyeh, on Thursday. The area – home to roughly half a million people – has been under Israeli evacuation orders for a week now. Every day it is hit by new air strikes; and the night before – when warplanes rumbled low and loud above the Lebanese capital – was particularly heavy.
The latest bombardment came after Hizbullah said it was intensifying its attacks on Israeli forces and military sites. UN peacekeeping mission Unifil said it detected more than 120 projectiles launched from Lebanese territory towards Israel on Wednesday night, as well as seven Israeli air attacks and more than 120 incidents of artillery fire. Two people in Israel were injured, according to Israeli media.
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Lebanon’s ministry of health says the death toll in Lebanon since March 2nd has risen to 687, including 98 children and 62 women. More than 1,700 people have been wounded.
Dahiyeh is known to be a stronghold of Hizbullah, which bars journalists from taking photos or videos there without permission. On Thursday, the group did allow us to report, but only from one location.
Some businesses were still open, visible on the journey there, and there were other signs of normal life, including people and vehicles on the streets.
But the drive was also accompanied by a crunching sound, as the car’s wheels rolled over glass scattered across the ground; and many shopfronts, homes, pavements and vehicles were coated in grey ash or debris. Graffiti on a wall read “die Israel” and “Israel devil”.
The permitted vantage point was beside Mar Mikhael Church, where at least two air strike sites were visible, but journalists’ attempts to walk further were prevented.
Men at the site said it was too dangerous, due to the random air strikes by Israeli forces, and that people in the affected areas were likely to be aggressive because they were upset. There is also a widespread suspicion that foreigners may be spies, collecting information that leads to further assaults.
When darkness falls, the rest of greater Beirut still lights up. But Dahiyeh stays dark now: many residents visit during the day, but they leave to sleep elsewhere.
Every day or two, the Israeli military repeats its mass evacuation directives, which many legal experts and humanitarian agencies argue breach international law, as the forced movement of civilians is prohibited except when strictly temporary and required for their safety or military need.
Lebanon, with a population of roughly 5.8 million – thought to include more than 1.5 million refugees – is around one seventh the size of the Republic of Ireland. Lebanese authorities say that at least 816,000 people have registered as displaced since war began in the early hours of Monday, March 2nd.
The UN says that at least 200,000 of those are children. Israeli forces issued a sweeping new displacement order on Thursday, expanding the area in southern Lebanon that it says people must completely evacuate from.
Many displaced people sleep along Beirut’s seafront, in their cars or in newly erected tents. But the Mediterranean beach area known as Ramlet al Baida became yet another danger zone early on Thursday morning, when Israeli strikes – which came without warning – killed eight and injured 31 people, according to Lebanon’s ministry of health.
Later on Thursday, Lebanese security forces cleared and blocked off the road the attack took place on, saying there was still an unexploded missile that it was unsafe to approach.
Standing nearby were two Syrian sisters, Mrash and Shakra Ibrahim Inaza.
Mrash said they fled war in Syria 15 years ago, and were waiting for resettlement to a safe country with the United Nations.
“We can’t go back to Syria. We have no houses. We want to go to Europe,” she said. She said they were “not yet” in direct danger in Lebanon but “we hear the noise [of bombing] at night.”
Shakra said she had been displaced from Dahiyeh with her family and was renting a room in the Palestinian refugee camp Mar Elias in west Beirut. Seven people stay in a single room, which costs them $200 a month, she said.
Still, “the children are afraid at night, they didn’t sleep because of the noise of the bombing,” she said, gesturing at her 8-year-old son, who she said is out of education.
The expansion of strikes is enforcing the sentiment that nowhere in Lebanon is safe any more. On Thursday afternoon, more warnings came through for further strikes on central Beirut. Some people in an upmarket part of the Christian neighbourhood of Achrafieh came out on their balconies or stood in the street, taking photos and filming, as a warning shot and then three bigger attacks hit the neighbourhood of Bachoura nearby.
One striking aspect of life in Beirut during the war is how normal activity can continue just streets away from an air strike. Many residents say they are exhausted and anxious after years of crises, yet they feel they have little choice but to keep going.
