558 dead. That was the official number given by Firass Abiad, the Minister of Health for the Lebanese government on the morning of September 24, 2024. 558 people were killed by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) in a single day as it ramped up its bombing campaign across Lebanon. More have been killed since—at least 51 at the time of writing on September 25. This tactic of de-escalation via escalation is a new entry in this past year’s vacuous euphemisms conjured up by Israel and its allies to obscure the facts and confuse anyone who questions or describes Israel’s military operations in Gaza since October 7 for what they are: a systematic campaign of ethnic cleansing and mass expulsion.
First, some perspective: 1,191 people were killed during the 2006 Israeli war on Lebanon, which lasted 34 days. On September 23, Israel killed half as many in a single day. 558 fatalities is misleading, however: we still do not know the number of people buried under the rubble whom emergency personnel have not yet reached.
That day, citizens fled their homes as Israeli fighter jets targeted civilian infrastructure in the country’s south and east under the pretense of countering Hezbollah’s rocket launchers and military facilities. In a clear indication of shifting toward an all-out war on Lebanon—a break from 11-months of tit-for-tat melee with Hezbollah—Israel targeted residential buildings, like the one in which a UNHCR employee and her son were killed, local businesses like a charcoal company’s warehouse, farmland in the Beqaa, as well as public infrastructure such as a government hospital in Bint Jbeil, several public hospitals in the Beqaa and 16 ambulances and fire engines, resulting in the deaths of four paramedics. According to the UN, more than 90,500 people have been displaced this past week, bringing the number of displaced since October 8 to over 200,000.
As dozens of thousands crammed what little they could into cars, vans, and trucks, and began to flee, the large numbers of displaced people clogged up the nation’s road network
Lebanese social media platforms were filled with posts from people asking for the whereabouts of family members and friends who they lost track of in the panicked flight from southern Lebanon. The internet shut down in the south, cutting off communication. As dozens of thousands crammed what little they could into cars, vans, and trucks, and began to flee, the large numbers of displaced people clogged up the nation’s road network, and paralyzed the highways linking the south to the coast and up to Beirut. People ran out of gas in the gridlock as the drive from Tyre to Sidon, which usually takes 30 minutes, lasted over 4 hours. Some people who left southern villages only got to Beirut after 12 hours or more on the road, tired, starved, and scared.
What was glaringly missing in the midst of this onslaught, however, was the Lebanese government, during one of the country’s bloodiest and darkest days since the civil war that took place between 1975 and 1990. No Lebanese governmental agency could be seen managing or facilitating the evacuation, nor did the country’s security agencies issue guidance or deploy troops to manage the road and help people escape. The Lebanese government, headed by interim Prime Minister Najib Mikati, diddled and flustered at the massive catastrophe unfolding across the country.
The war on Lebanon has been going on for at least a year now. Since October 8, Hezbollah and Israel have traded fire, increasing the threat of escalation. The situation grew worse from month to month, slowly at first like a frog marinating in increasingly boiling water for a while only to realize their dire situation when it was too late. Hezbollah did not back down from its firing on northern Israel as its general secretary promised that an end of hostilities would only come when a ceasefire in Gaza is signed. The IDF countered with ever more expansive bombing campaigns targeting Hezbollah commanders in Beirut’s suburbs and enacting a scorched earth campaign on southern Lebanon in hopes of pushing back Hezbollah forces to the north of the Litani river. Israel officials have been itching to create a buffer zone in South Lebanon to add more distance with northern Israeli towns.
The Lebanese government had nearly a year to draw up contingency plans to prepare for the worst
The Lebanese government had nearly a year to draw up contingency plans to prepare for the worst. This includes the possibility of preparing enough shelters for hundreds of thousands of people, to stock up on medical supplies, and to shore up the telecom and internet networks in the country. What has the Lebanese government been doing exactly for this past year besides launching cliched touristic campaigns and circumventing international investigations into the money laundering schemes of its former central banker?
Countering the government’s absent and ultimately slow response, it was regular people who stepped up to take care of their fellow countrymen just like they did after the port explosion of August 4, 2020. There was a flood of requests for shelter for those displaced, gas and food for those stuck in traffic, and cars and transportation for those left behind. People from north to south picked up the slack where the Lebanese government was failing. People opened their doors and empty apartments for those displaced and local rest stops and restaurants on the highways distributed food and water for those stuck in traffic. Others asked for donations to be made to the Lebanese Red Cross and the civil defense agency whose volunteers hailed from across the country to transport the wounded to local hospitals. Lebanese goodwill and sense of national unity were the only silver lining in a week filled with horror.
What will happen if this Israeli bombardment persists and displaces more people? What will happen when people’s goodwill begins to dry up? The past five years of a severe economic crisis has frayed a lot of the civil and national bonds. Price gouging over food, medicine, gas, and apartments was already at an all-time high before the massacre. There have already been some rumblings that displaced people are being asked to pay exorbitant rental prices for three and six months in advance to secure a place. These sorts of practices were rife at the height of the currency collapse in 2021 and 2022 when privatized informal markets sprang up for every consumable. War is a great time for monopolists and profiteers who prey on people’s insecurities and desperation.
If a year of killing and bombing in Gaza has taught us one thing, it is that Israel is not restrained by any western government or modicum of international law
If a year of killing and bombing in Gaza has taught us one thing, it is that Israel is not restrained by any western government or modicum of international law. Israel stretched the limits of rules of war over the past year in Gaza by striking hospitals, displaced persons camps, aid workers, and first responders. That script was played out exactly the same across Lebanon this week where civilians were the target of the bombing campaign. Paramedics, aid workers, journalists, teachers, kids, the elderly, and regular folk made up the majority of the 558 killed on Monday. Israeli officials notified people via text message and calls that they should evacuate their homes while the bombs fell on their heads; something the Israeli military has done many times in Gaza this past year. What has been happening in Gaza for over 350 days happened in Lebanon without real protest from the international community and supposed keepers of international law.
In the meantime, the piecemeal emergency response the Lebanese government undertook these last few days needs to be revamped and expanded. Nothing short of a national response akin to the early mobilization around COVID-19 is needed. There are so far around 283 shelters that are hosting 40,000 people—but more are needed. The government needs to open up every public school and space within a safe distance from Israeli bombs for displaced people. Its security agencies need to mobilize to facilitate the movement of people from potential danger zones toward shelters. Its heads of state and diplomatic officials need to make urgent calls for aid from international organizations, something akin to the mobilization around the August 4 port explosion. They need to urgently ask the World Health Organization, Food and Agriculture Organization, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and friendly donor states to provide large quantities of food supplies, medicine, cots, emergency aid kits, new ambulances, fuel, and medical personnel to assist in the management of this week’s massacre and to ensure that Lebanon is prepared for the next one.
Statements of concerns, alarm, and shock are of no use to Lebanon or Gaza. Real action and real pressure on Israel to sign a ceasefire and push for a diplomatic path is the only way to go.
Lastly, it has been made clear, since the first Israeli bombs fell on Gaza almost a year ago, that western governments, namely the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany, have no material or realistic qualms over the continued military onslaught enacted by Israel. An investigation published on September 24 showed how Secretary of State Antony Blinken quashed the findings of his own department on Israel’s starvation policy in Gaza in order to keep the flow of arms going. The same Antony Blinken who has been expressing his worries about the expansion of the war into Lebanon and stating he was working to prevent it. The structures of impunity that permit Israel to operate as it does in Gaza and Lebanon remain impervious and robust.
Statements of concerns, alarm, and shock are of no use to Lebanon or Gaza. Real action and real pressure on Israel to sign a ceasefire and push for a diplomatic path is the only way to go. The majority of those residing in the countries that have influence over Israel oppose both Israel’s actions and their country’s enabling of it. The protests must continue, the resignations have to increase, people need to keep on challenging the status quo. International aid organizations have to double both their diplomatic and humanitarian efforts to end the slaughter, send more aid, more aid workers, and use every bit of leverage they have to stem the tide of the violence. We are already 11 months too late ending these wars, and anything short of these actions is even more a waste of time.
Zeead Yaghi is a Nonresident Fellow at TIMEP focusing on governance, politics, and economy in Lebanon. He is also the institute’s second Mohamed Aboelgheit Fellow.