From the terrace of Ali’s brother’s house in Meiss Ej Jabal, the plains of Galilee in Israel could be seen. This Lebanese Shia, who asks to remain anonymous, was born next to the unofficial border that Israeli troops crossed on October 1, when they launched their ground offensive in Lebanon 18 years after the last time their Lebanese enemy, Hezbollah, forced them to retreat after a brief and disastrous 34-day war. In Beirut, Ali, who is about 70 years old, shows photos of the house, a beautiful building nestled in land crisscrossed by olive trees and vineyards. None of it exists anymore: another satellite photo of the property shows a wasteland. The Israeli army, he says, blew it up.

Ali’s village is now empty. Its inhabitants have fled, like those of the other villages near the border, a three-kilometer strip that Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant has dubbed “the first belt” of the southern offensive against the Shia party-militia. In that area, massive bombardments, the expulsion of the population, and the contamination of fields with white phosphorus — as denounced by Amnesty International — point to a scorched-earth strategy. Its aim, Ali believes, is to make “the region uninhabitable.” Hezbollah would thus be deprived of what Israel considers to be its social base in the region: the Shia community that lives along the border between the two countries.

Poster Comment:

Israeli soldiers are only good at killing unarmed women and children.