STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
We'll listen to life in a war zone. The war zone is Lebanon - in particular, its southern border region, which Israel is bombing and moving troops into. As in any war, there's a lot of confusion about just whose forces control what. And that state of confusion is where many people live, and where NPR's Eyder Peralta has been visiting. Hey there, Eyder.
EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Hey, Steve.
INSKEEP: Let's begin with a look at the map. It's the Lebanese border with Israel. United Nations peacekeepers are supposed to occupy positions between Israel and the forces of its target, Hezbollah. What's happening right now?
PERALTA: Yeah. I mean, the U.N. says that Israeli troops attacked one of their positions directly. They say that they used a tank to destroy a gate, and that later, Israeli troops fired what were apparently smoke bombs. The U.N. says Israel has also fired at their positions on other occasions. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he regrets the incidents, but that the way to prevent them in the future is to, quote, "move the U.N. troops out." The U.N. says that they're not leaving, because this is their job - to keep the peace in this volatile region. And the south is the front line right now in Lebanon. Israel has been relentlessly bombing it, bombing what it says are Hezbollah targets. They have also ordered the evacuation of a vast number of villages there. I just came back from there, and I want to play a bit of my reporting for you. And a warning - you'll hear the sounds of explosions.
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
PERALTA: The war never leaves you here in Marjeyoun. Even at night, in your bed, you can clearly hear what's happening.
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
PERALTA: Hezbollah rockets take off over the mountains, trying to hit Israeli positions. Then Israeli drones show up.
(SOUNDBITE OF DRONES FLYING)
PERALTA: And then you hear the roar of a jet, and...
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
PERALTA: Those booms you feel in your bones. The energy from the strike you feel on your skin. Most of this town is desolate. The roads are empty. The stores are closed.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOG BARKING)
PERALTA: During the day, we walk. We meet the people who stayed - a tailor, a farmer, a housewife. And Nabih Lahoud, the principal of the Marjeyoun National College, a grade school here.
NABIH LAHOUD: Feel free, habibi. Feel free.
PERALTA: This is your house, he says, as he welcomes us into his grand sitting room. But as he settles down into his couch, you can tell he's mourning. His students have gone to school just one day this year.
LAHOUD: I'm 71 years old. I haven't seen a good day through all my life. All is in war.
PERALTA: Lebanon has been through three wars with Israel, plus a civil war. The country emerged from the pandemic and crashed into an economic crisis. And now it is at war again. Lahoud remembers, in the '80s, students would watch rockets crash into a hill from across the school.
LAHOUD: I don't know why these people who are running Lebanon don't feel that there is people around. They don't feel that there are people. They are looking for bankrupting us. They have stolen us.
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
LAHOUD: These are rockets...
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
LAHOUD: ...From Hezbollah...
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
LAHOUD: ...Three. You might hear one...
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
LAHOUD: ...Four. Count them. Last time - some days ago, I counted 46. Forty-six after each other.
PERALTA: He shakes his head. This is no way to live.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Speaking Arabic).
PERALTA: We moved from the principal's house to the town of Qlayaa, just down the street. Here the Maronite Christian church told everyone to stay, to guard their homes. So in a hall at St. George's Church, women and children make care packages for the older people who have also stayed.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Speaking Arabic).
PERALTA: Enaia Hasbany runs her hands over her face. Every day, she says, she thinks about her decision to stay. Every day, she says, the missiles feel like they're getting closer.
ENAIA HASBANY: You can say we're now in, like, kind of a cage.
PERALTA: The main road out was destroyed by an airstrike. Israel has struck cars and ambulances on these roads. Two weeks ago, Israel fired just outside the main hospital. All the doctors, nurses and pharmacists fled. Hasbany worries about her elderly parents.
HASBANY: We have no doctors. And if you got injured, high blood pressure, nobody can help you.
PERALTA: She says she actually packed her bags, but her parents refused to leave.
HASBANY: Because they know deep inside that if we left, we're not coming back.
PERALTA: It's how everyone here feels. Older people feel like they'll die before this war ends, where they feel like if they leave their homes, Hezbollah fighters will move in, and Israel will bomb them. Right now, she says, no one - not the Lebanese government, not Hezbollah, not Israel - is giving them any indication of where this war is going.
HASBANY: We feel that we're left. Yeah?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: Yes.
HASBANY: Yani, we are our support system. That's it.
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
HASBANY: Nobody else.
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
PERALTA: In the sky above us, we see a plume of smoke. Hasbany steels herself.
HASBANY: And we...
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
HASBANY: You can check it up there.
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
HASBANY: We hear the bombing, and we keep on doing what we were doing. Just - we're cooking, we keep on cooking. Halas. That's it.
(SOUNDBITE OF CHURCH BELLS)
PERALTA: And life does go on. People work in their gardens. Friends sit on stoops. And just as the sun goes down, the church bells toll for mass. Father Pierre al-Rai is just outside the doors, and just like so many in this town, I go to him for answers.
(SOUNDBITE OF CHURCH BELLS)
PERALTA: Do people ask you, you know, why does God allow this?
PIERRE AL-RAI: Hello, hello.
PERALTA: (Laughter).
AL-RAI: All of us - there is something very bad inside us. Even if you are born in - like in the image of God, who is the source of goodness.
PERALTA: This war, he says, was birthed by the gruesome nature of humans. But his faith gives him hope that one day, the goodness of God will prevail.
AL-RAI: If we don't have hope, we will be now in another place.
(LAUGHTER)
PERALTA: I see. So hope is what keeps you here?
AL-RAI: Yeah, of course. Of course. We stay here. Our weapon, you know - it's the hope. I believe that it's stronger than all the weapons.
UNIDENTIFIED CONGREGATION: (Singing in non-English language).
PERALTA: A few faithful file into the church. And every once in a while, the airstrikes shake the wooden doors. "Oh, good-hearted virgin, you who gives us a helpful hand," they sing. "You are our only resort, and in you lies our hope."
UNIDENTIFIED CONGREGATION: (Singing in non-English language).
INSKEEP: Eyder, thanks so much.
PERALTA: Thank you, Steve.
UNIDENTIFIED CONGREGATION: (Singing in non-English language). Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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