By Maya Gebeily, Emilie Madi and Mohamed Azakir
WEST ZAWTAR, Lebanon Oct 8 (Reuters) – Dodging the broken glass carpeting her home in southern Lebanon, Mariam al-Yaghi exited onto her upper balcony and pointed. A few hundred metres away was a sight the 67-year-old had grown accustomed to: military vehicles moving through the adjacent Lebanese village, still occupied by Israeli troops.
At night, Israeli soldiers patrol so close to Yaghi’s home in West Zawtar that she can hear their voices. By day, she is often trailed by a small Israeli surveillance drone as she toils in her garden. Booms echo throughout the morning as Israel’s military destroys homes in the surrounding occupied towns with controlled detonations and bulldozers.
“We hear them all the time from that house over there with the tile roof. We hear their voices yelling, the tanks when they move this way and that way. We hear all of that. They’re very close to us, but we’re sitting here and we’re not scared. Never,” Yaghi told Reuters.
Israeli troops withdrew from West Zawtar in July, the first test of a US-backed “pilot zone” plan for Israel to withdraw gradually from southern Lebanon, in exchange for the disarmament of the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah.
But two months on, no further “pilot zones” have been agreed and residents of West Zawtar say their village is no blueprint.
In response to questions from Reuters, the Israeli military said work to remove the threat of Hezbollah’s weapons had not been completed. Drones were used to identify threats, and restrictions on movement of local villagers were intended to protect troops.
A US State Department spokesperson said the pilot zone process was “the only viable path” to security for both Lebanon and Israel. The zone would expand after the Lebanese army carried out clearance operations in the initial zone, and Hezbollah’s disarmament “is an integral part of this process.”
FRONT-ROW SEAT TO DESTRUCTION
Beginning seven months ago, more than a million Lebanese fled their homes when Israel launched air strikes and a ground invasion in parallel with the war in Iran, after the armed group Hezbollah fired into Israel in solidarity with Tehran.
Ending the Lebanon conflict has been an Iranian condition for any peace deal, prompting Washington to press for an accord. But despite months of US-brokered talks between Lebanon and Israel and a ceasefire agreed in June, Israel’s military has continued deadly strikes. Its troops still occupy a self-declared security zone that includes dozens of Lebanese villages, many of which the Israelis have demolished.
Residents of West Zawtar say their return home in July was bittersweet: they were happy to be back, but found homes in ruins and Israeli troops uncomfortably close.
A tank shell had crashed into the upper floor of Yaghi’s home and all the windows had been blown out. Another had pierced her water tank’s roof, turning the water inside blood-red. Repairs will be costly, so Yaghi has delayed them for now.
“We’ve put up cardboard and stuff like that because there’s no glass. My other son too, all the glass and everything is gone. But here we are… until they get the hell out of here,” she said, gesturing towards the Israeli troops in the adjacent village.
Few of Yaghi’s neighbours have returned so far, as their homes had been pulverized. Tank tracks ran through her garden, where olive trees she had nurtured for decades lay uprooted. With the harvest beginning, Yaghi was excited to pick whatever remained.
People whose groves lie near Israeli troop positions said they were requesting access to their trees through a US-led coordination mechanism between the Lebanese and Israeli militaries.
Some mocked the absurdity of asking Washington for permission to pick olives. Others feared approval would come too late for the harvest.
Just down the road from West Zawtar lies its twin village, East Zawtar, still occupied by Israeli troops who have been systematically demolishing it. Displaced East Zawtar residents came to West Zawtar, where they sat on white plastic chairs in the main square with a front-row view of their home town across a small valley of olive groves and farmland.
One man told Reuters he had seen lights on in his own house over the last three weeks, and expected Israeli troops were laying explosives to detonate it.
“You try not to be upset, because it’s happened to so many people. But all it takes is one memory from the house, and you break down,” he said.
ISRAELI TROOPS GONE, BUT KEEPING WATCH
West Zawtar’s mayor, Abed Ezzedine, told Reuters the “pilot zone” programme had not worked, primarily because public services including electricity and running water were still largely unavailable.
“In principle, I can tell you that no, it’s not successful. Based on what we were promised: that West Zawtar as a pilot zone would be a model town,” Ezzedine said.
Some 70 families had returned, mostly living in corners of their homes that had not been damaged. For many, it was a better option than paying rent elsewhere or living in a displacement shelter.
The Lebanese state’s Council for the South has delivered 16 prefabricated houses to families whose homes were uninhabitable. But most of the pre-fab dwellings are still unoccupied, with no access to electricity or water.
State workers are beginning to extend electrical lines, but have had to run them further to a new station, as the village’s old connection ran through East Zawtar.
“In a little bit, the drone might fly over people in the town square. It’s not leaving anyone alone,” Ezzedine said.
Sure enough, a few moments later, a small surveillance drone flew over Ezzedine and a team of Reuters reporters, gradually dropping altitude until it was just a few meters overhead.
It hovered for a few minutes, before flying towards the occupied neighbouring village.
(Writing by Maya GebeilyEditing by Peter Graff)
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