Cities are empty and farms languish as war stalks the Israeli-Lebanese border

The border between Israel and Lebanon has become a landscape of abandoned towns and neglected farms, as escalating tensions and tit-for-tat attacks between Israeli forces and Hezbollah militants have displaced more than 150,000 people in both countries.

Prospects for an end to cross-border hostilities have only dimmed since Tuesday’s killing of a senior Hamas leader in a suburb of Beirut, the Lebanese capital, fueled growing fears of a wider war. The attack is widely blamed on Israel.

In northern Israel, near the border with Lebanon, military evacuation orders have kept people from their homes for almost three months, amid daily rocket attacks by Hezbollah and other armed groups in Lebanon. The prolonged disruption and economic fallout have increased pressure on the Israeli government to end the attacks.

“People are being shot at every day,” said Moshe Davidovitz, leader of a regional council in the western Galilee region of northwestern Israel. ‘Every day they come across hiding places. It’s unbearable and it can’t continue. We can no longer be a sitting duck at a shooting range.”

Many residents near the border work in agriculture and are all but cut off from the farms, greenhouses and chicken coops that provide their livelihoods, Mr. Davidovitz said. Day trips to tend their farms are fraught with risks: a farmer, a father of three, was killed last month during a strike from Lebanon as he drove to his apple orchards in Mattat, just south of the border.

In southern Lebanon, where many residents also work on farms, some expressed fear, resistance or resignation as they grappled with whether to flee Israeli attacks on Hezbollah targets. Those who have left have received little help from the Lebanese government, which has suffered a financial collapse due to years of corruption and mismanagement. In Israel, the government pays for housing and meals for displaced residents.

Mohamad Srour, the mayor of Aita al-Shaab, a Lebanese town of 12,000 people less than a mile from the Israeli border, said 10 people had been killed there in fighting along the border.

“I didn’t want to leave town,” Mr. Srour said. “I went back and forth. But now I’m gone for good.”

Imad Zayton, 69, who lives with his wife and three children in the southern Lebanese city of Deir Kifa, about 10 miles from the Israeli border, has so far chosen to stay put.

“Hezbollah is defending my country,” said Mr Zayton, who runs a small printing company. But he added that “if things get worse,” his family would have to leave town, although he plans to stay.

“We won’t have a choice,” he said.

The death of Hamas official Saleh al-Arouri, who was killed in an explosion, has only increased fears of a wider conflagration in the region.

At Mr al-Arouri’s funeral on Thursday, many vowed to avenge his death as his coffin, draped in the Hamas flag and topped with a rifle, was carried in a procession through the streets of Beirut. Mourners also carried coffins containing the bodies of two Hamas members – including a commander of the armed wing, the Qassam Brigades – who were also killed in the explosion.

“With our souls and our blood we will redeem you!” the mourners sang, as gunfire rang out and crowds of young men jostled to catch a glimpse of Mr al-Arouri’s coffin.

As the procession arrived at a cemetery in the Shatila Palestinian refugee camp, the voice of Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s main political leader, sounded over a loudspeaker system, and the crowd fell silent.

“The enemy believed that killing the leaders would deter them,” said Mr. Haniyeh, who lives in Qatar. He added: “The enemy has failed and will never succeed.”

Other speakers echoed threats made by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in a speech a day earlier. “The enemy must know that there will be a response, and this incident will not go unpunished,” said a Hezbollah official, Hassan Hoballah.

On Thursday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant met in Tel Aviv with Amos Hochstein, a senior adviser to President Biden, to discuss the crisis at the Israeli-Lebanese border. Afterwards, Mr. Gallant said in a statement that there was “a short window for diplomatic engagements.”

The defense minister echoed recent calls from other Israeli officials for “a new reality in the northern arena, which will allow the safe return of our citizens,” without specifying how Israel might achieve that.

The Biden administration has pushed for a deal to ease tensions and move Hezbollah forces away from the border, but with little apparent progress. On Thursday, the Israeli army said it had responded to a new round of attacks from Lebanon by launching airstrikes on a Hezbollah observation post and an anti-tank unit.

As fighting continued along the border, the Israeli army continued to bomb the Gaza Strip, where the United Nations says nearly two million residents have been driven from their homes and many are starving. An attack on Thursday on a house west of Khan Younis, the largest city in southern Gaza, killed at least 14 people and injured several others, including women and children.

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report. On Thursday it said it had attacked Hamas infrastructure around Khan Younis and dismantled a tunnel shaft in the area.

The displacement of Israelis is the largest in the country’s history.

Of the 200,000 Israelis who have moved since the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, more than 80,000 live near the border with Lebanon. The decision to move them was motivated not only by Hezbollah’s attacks, but also by concerns that the group would attempt a raid similar to Hamas’s, which killed an estimated 1,200 people.

About 75,000 people have been displaced in southern Lebanon, according to the United Nations.

One resident who has remained, Najib al-Amil, is a 72-year-old priest in Rmeish, a Maronite Christian town near the Israeli border, where schools and shops are closed, the streets are empty and the only remaining medical facility is a improvised field hospital. He is determined to care for his flock of parishioners, no matter how dwindling it may be.

Mr al-Amil said he and others were trying to avoid areas of intense conflict, noting that the Lebanese government, unlike the Israeli government, had not made provision for bomb shelters.

“Whatever the plans of the great leaders, we have nothing in our hands and we cannot change anything,” he said. “We depend on God.”

Euan district And Hwaida Saad reported from Beirut, Lebanon, Roni Caryn Rabin from Tel Aviv and Michael Levenson From New York. Hiba Yazbek contributed reported from Jerusalem and Ameera Harouda from Doha, Qatar.