Written for PeaceReporter by
Jihad Samhat
 

On the 31st of July I partook on a journey that will stick in my mind for life. It all started that morning the following day after the Qana massacre. It was the first day of the “48-hour cessation of air strikes” (which wasn’t really the case). A few journalists asked if I would join them on a road trip through the war-torn south; final destination Bint Jbeil and back. An area of the south I know very well due to the amount of Israeli Landmines we cleared from those areas over the past several years, during the UN MACC clearance project.

Although I grew up in the states, this area also has significant value to me due to it being on the way to my father’s village Ainata. With my mini DV and digital camera in hand we departed Tyre early that morning and began a journey which under normal circumstances would take 40 minutes. On the way up through the rolling hills of south Lebanon, I had a very eerie feeling from the start which grew the further south we got. All I saw was destruction left and right. When we reached the area of Al Hosh we began to see vehicle after vehicle draped with white sheets passing us on the way north. A heavy constant stream of people trying to escape the 20 days of constant shelling. This is when I realized the risk we were taking; people were leaving the places we were trying to get to.We had just passed the village of Qana where the previous days’ massacre occurred before reaching a big bomb crater in the middle of the road at the entrance of the village of Sidiqin. It was impossible to pass, and so we had to back track to Qana and find a different route. After trying a few detours which also proved impassable, we stopped a vehicle to ask for directions. The driver of the vehicle turned out to be a distant cousin (and friend) Ali, from my father’s village of Ainata. I had recently heard from other relatives that Ali’s brother Musa and his family (wife and children) were killed in their home (in Ainata) a result of Israeli shelling. I immediately hugged him and gave him my condolences about his loss. He looked extremely distraught and very thin (usually a very heavy set guy). I asked him “what are you doing?” and “where are you going?”, his answer was I’m going back to get people. I asked him to be careful and he then chuckled and said “careful from what? I’m already dead!”… He then speeds away and we quickly followed, taking us through a detour which was a twisty dirt track through the valley. Finally reaching the village of Aetat, this was a total ghost town. On the  way up the hill towards Jouwaya we found an open petrol station which was quite unusual, due to all the ones we saw before being bombed out. We took this opportunity to fill our gas tank, and had a chance to interview some families trying to flee.

 

Continuing up the rolling hills, we reached an area before Tibnin called  Sultaniya and saw a family of seven walking and waving at us. We stopped to see about them. One of the younger girls immediately started screaming and crying and telling us “Go take photos in Bint Jbeil, Go see what they have done to us!”. We tried calming her and her family down who were all very traumatized and angry. They told us they have been walking from 5am that morning out of Bint Jbeil to where they were now standing at about 11am. I then understood their pain. A family of seven (an old couple in there 80’s, two younger ladies and three children, one of which was a toddler) getting as far as 15km after some 6 hours of walking. They complained that they were in a living hell for 20 days and took this opportunity to escape. They had neither food nor water and had dozens of miles to go before reaching safety. We all pitched in and gave them some money hoping this would help them get far, and continued on.We then reached Tibnin were we found hundreds of people congregating in front of the hospital, most of them arriving from the nearby villages of Ainata, Aytarun, Ain Ibil, Marun Alras, Yarun, Bayt Yahun, Kounin, and Bint Jbiel. All trying to find some means of transportation to get them out. We stopped to interview some of these refugees and heard that buses sponsored by Amal were on there way to pick them up. We then carried on, on our last leg of our journey through some of the most  devastated areas before reaching the Salah Ghandour hospital which was at the entrance of Bint Jbeil and Ainata. We found the hospital completely abandoned with only one doctor inside.

 

We continued at my request part way into Ainata so I could check on some of  my family. Reaching the house of a family member, I entered the front gates shouting Abu Adeeb! Amena! There was no answer to my calls and I found the house was heavily shelled. As I was walking back to the front gate to where our vehicle was, I saw a familiar face who said that they had left earlier that day for Beirut. A sense of relief fell over me knowing they where on there way to some sort of safety. We didn’t continue into the village because of the roads being impassable and so we turned around back towards the hospital and into Bint Jbeil. We reached the main road which crosses through the town and into the souk, where we had to stop due to the extreme amount of debris in the road. The scene is indescribable with only words, another Falluja Iraq or Jenin Palistine or maybe worse. Total destruction, not one building was left untouched, many of them were completely leveled, and others severely damaged or only had a few walls standing. We were the first to arrive and then more journalists started showing up behind us. We parked our vehicles and began to walk through the town and main souk. It seemed like there was nobody there except us (myself and about 20 other journalists).

 

There was a very creepy silence as we made our way through the streets only hearing the sounds of occasional thuds and crackling in the distance (from other areas where fighting was still taking place) and the sounds of the debris we were walking over. I noticed the marks on the ground I was very familiar with; they were the marks of spent cluster bombs. So I told everyone to be careful where they walk in the case there still and probably might be live ones left. Half way up the street we saw the first signs of life, an old couple carrying bags and walking away from the center of town. We stopped to interview them and they told us they had been under ground and hadn’t seen the sun for twenty days. That they were surviving on some lolly pops (one a day), cause that’s all they had left to eat, and that they wanted to get to Beirut. Continuing our way up the street we saw a very distressed lady asking for  help. She said there were four of them stuck in a shelter, one of which was an old lady unable to walk. She said they have been without food or water and under shelling for 20 days, and that they ended up drinking unsanitary  water which also ran out. She showed us where they were and we carried this 90+ year old very brittle old lady out using a blanket as a stretcher. Took her down to where our vehicle was and found that a couple of ambulances had just arrived to bring back civilians. We told him that there seems to be more, and to call for more medical vehicles to come and get everyone left.We went back up the road only to find out there were still more old people who needed help.Back and forth, and back and forth, the story just repeated itself carrying old people on our backs to the supposed safety of ambulances who would deliver them well away from this destroyed area. This continued for many hours until we felt there was no one left. I never felt sadder than this anytime in my life, and kept asking myself on our way back to Tyre “why does the world let this go on.?”

 

Even after the images the night before of the Qana massacre, and the outcry for an immediate and long-lasting ceasefire the Israeli PM Ehud Olmert asked Ms. Condy Rice for another 12-14 days to finish the job. For God sake! Hasn’t enough innocent blood been shed? Hasn’t enough lives been destroyed? Doesn’t he realize that this same aggressive, arrogant, tried, and failed foreign policy doesn’t work here? That he is creating more hatred towards him and his people.I think its time the U.S. and Israel wake up! Your foreign policy doesn’t work! If it did there would have been peace along time ago! You cannot bring Lebanon to its knees! The more you murder and kill the innocent, the more you will be pitching people united against you! You are the ones who are fostering and brewing hatred, because everyone here has lost someone or something as a result of your barbaric aggressions. Stop this madness! And really think about what you’re trying to accomplish! It can’t be done with force! It could never be done with force! You have tried again and again, and you have failed again and again!

 

So try something new...It’s called reasoning and diplomacy, it’s called reaching out and respect for others. It’s called being fair and not greedy! I believe that’s all it will take and only what will work to finally reach an everlasting peace.