Nabatieh (Lebanon)Lebanese civil defense teams continued rescue efforts into the afternoon as the storm intensified, turning the ground into mud. Five bodies have already been recovered and are in the hospital morgue for DNA testing because they were completely mutilated. Neighbors, still reeling from the deadly attack, were gossiping at the scene.
On Wednesday night, an Israeli drone fired several missiles that struck the home of Hussein Barjawi, a grocery store owner in the southern Lebanese town of Nabatieh, killing him and seven other members of his family. In the midst of the tragedy, a miracle occurred and rescuers were able to pull the only survivor of the family alive from under the rubble: Hussein Al-Saghir.
The bombing destroyed the house and turned it into a mountain of rubble that had to be removed by bulldozers to open the road. Although the area was cordoned off, a crowd of people came and went from the site. Among the attendees was Mahmoud Kamel Al-Barjawi, Hussein's cousin. He still couldn't believe what happened.
“I left my cousin’s house at 9:15 p.m., we had dinner with the family and a few hours later, they died. My niece and her children live with them. It is a tragedy,” he exclaimed in a broken voice. “We thought the Nazis were German, but it seems the Nazis are now Israeli. Even today they still talk about the Holocaust and genocide against the Jews, while committing massacres in Gaza and Lebanon. “Women and children died, and there were no fighters in that house,” Mahmoud said.
Samira Sabah is a neighbor of the neighborhood. Get to know the Omar family. “They have always lived here. Hussein had a shop. He and his wife worked there to earn a living and take care of the family. “They have young children,” Samira explains before adding: “Why did they attack them? Why here in Nabatieh? “I am afraid for my children, afraid of war.”
Shelter for displaced people
Nabatieh also became the second municipality with the largest number of displaced families in southern Lebanon, four months after border clashes between Hezbollah and Israel that forced more than 87,000 civilians to flee their homes. In the past two days, Israel has intensified its attacks, hitting deeper and more urban areas, raising fears among residents that hostilities will spread to Lebanon.
Israeli warplanes launched a wave of attacks in the Nabatieh and Tair areas, more than twenty kilometers away from the military separation zone along the border. Three other civilians, a mother and her two children, were killed on Wednesday when a missile hit their house in the town of Al-Sawana. This is the largest escalation since the start of border clashes between Israel and the Lebanese militia on October 8.
The Israeli attacks came in response to the firing of a barrage of rockets from southern Lebanon at the Safad General Barracks, fifteen kilometers from the border. In the attack, for which Hezbollah has not yet claimed responsibility, an Israeli soldier was killed and seven others were wounded. The escalation in border tensions comes after a recent speech by Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, who warned on Tuesday that he would not stop attacks on Israel's northern front while the offensive in the Gaza Strip continues.
The deadly air strike in the center of Nabatieh was a warning to Hezbollah. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant said on Wednesday that the army has intensified its attacks against the militia “to a level of 1 out of 10,” warning that the current escalation is only a small part of what they can do. He threatened, saying: “We can attack to a depth of fifty kilometers, reaching Beirut or any other place.”
In recent days, Israel has carried out a series of selective attacks against Hezbollah and Hamas members with surgical precision against vehicles carrying military commandos from these two groups, which have approached to within 35 kilometers of the Lebanese capital.
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