Stench of Death Hangs Over South Lebanon Villages
BINT JBEIL, Lebanon (Reuters) – “Four bodies inside this house”, reads the notice scrawled with charcoal on the remains of a house in the southern Lebanese village of Aynata.
In the neighbouring town of Bint Jbeil, the stench of death rises from the ruins of the once-bustling market street.
One village along in Aitaroun, tearful residents clutch white sheets and what belongings they can salvage, begging journalists and rescue workers alike for a ride out of “hell”.
“We have been living in hell and fear for 21 days, without power or water and we felt real hunger. We even ate stale and mouldy bread to keep going,” sobbed Zeinab Baalbaki, who said a number of her relatives have been killed in Israeli air raids.
“The children felt the worst pain because we could not find milk. Is it their fault, these people who had their homes brought down on their heads?”
After 21 days of Israeli air strikes, rescue workers have used a partial 48-hour respite to aerial bombardment to visit Lebanese border villages that have seen the worst of the violence and been largely cut off from the world.
There, they have found ruined buildings and largely deserted streets. Where residents have been stranded, some are now hungry or wounded and desperately waiting for a chance to get out.
The Lebanese government says dozens of bodies have yet to be recovered from beneath the rubble or from cars hit by Israeli missiles. The government has so far put the war’s death toll at 750, including unrecovered bodies.