Bracha Rosen comes to feed the stray cats of Kiryat Shmona, a town of over 20,000 residents who have been evacuated from their homes for the last year, on Oct 8.David Blumenfeld/The Globe and Mail
Bracha Rosen dashed through the abandoned streets of Israel’s northernmost city, filling plastic bowls with cat food and water as quickly as she could, as artillery boomed from the direction of the nearby border with Lebanon.
“I’m terrified. When there are sirens, I have to crawl from house to house,” she said Tuesday, panting with panicked exertion. No one else was taking care of the 700 or so abandoned cats in Kiryat Shmona – which has been under an evacuation order since last October – so Ms. Rosen said she feels compelled to return here three or four times a week despite the danger.
“I can’t sleep knowing they don’t have anything to eat or drink,” she said, looking anxiously at the sky. “But I have to hurry.”
Her fears were not misplaced. Hezbollah launched 190 rockets into Israel Tuesday, the highest one-day total since the start of the war.
In Kiryat Shmona, which had a population of a little more than 22,000 before the conflict, the first air-raid sirens screamed just after Ms. Rosen finished her cat-feeding run – and as the sun began to set over the mountains west of the city and the Lebanese villages visible in the distance.
Seconds after the warning was sounded, The Globe and Mail heard a succession of four explosions. Minutes later, there was another round of sirens as Hezbollah launched a second, larger volley of rockets at the empty city. This time there were 21 booms in the sky as Israeli air defences shot down most of the projectiles while the others fell on open terrain outside the city.
“Kiryat Shmona is the most targeted city in the world. We are a symbol, especially for Hezbollah,” said Ariel Frisch, deputy head of security for the city – and one of some 2,000 residents who remain despite the evacuation order. Showing The Globe where a home and a schoolyard had been destroyed by Hezbollah rocket fire in separate attacks over recent months, Mr. Frisch said the Iranian-backed militia continues to fire at the city despite the fact few people live there in order to convince those who fled northern Israel that it is still unsafe for them to return.
“The biggest win for Hezbollah is the evacuation. As long as residents are in fear to come back, they win.”
Ariel Frisch, deputy head of security for the city, stands in the evacuated city of Kiryat Shmona.David Blumenfeld
Israel launched a ground invasion of southern Lebanon on Oct. 1, saying the military operation is necessary to drive Hezbollah’s fighters and weapons away from the border and allow the 60,000 evacuees of northern Israel to return to their homes.
More than 2,000 Lebanese and 65 Israelis have been killed over the past year, including more than 1,100 Lebanese killed since the ground operation began. Hezbollah acknowledges losing 514 fighters over the first year of the fighting – a number the group stopped updating on Oct. 1 – while Israel says 11 of its soldiers have died fighting inside Lebanon.
Hundreds of thousands of residents of southern Lebanon have also been driven from their homes by the fighting. When The Globe visited the Lebanese towns that lie just across the border from Kiryat Shmona – which do not have air-raid sirens or air defence missiles – the scale of the destruction was much greater, even in July, before the start of the ground invasion. The conflict until that point was still a relatively restrained exchange of tit-for-tat cross-border fire.
Israel says Hezbollah puts Lebanese people in danger by embedding its weapons and troops in civilian areas. On the Israeli side of the border, The Globe saw Israeli military jeeps occasionally driving through the streets of Kiryat Shmona. Outside the city, dozens of Israeli tanks and other armoured vehicles could be seen assembled in a field ahead of likely deployment into southern Lebanon.
On Tuesday, the Israeli military looked set to expand its ground operation, deploying a reserve division into Lebanon to join three other regular divisions already fighting inside the country.
Gideon Harari, a retired military intelligence officer who lives in a moshav, an agricultural co-op, just outside Kiryat Shmona, said the Israeli strategy appeared to be to destroy Hezbollah’s military capabilities and force the group back as much as seven kilometres from the border.
“I don’t think the manoeuvre they are doing now is going to reach the Litani River,” Mr. Harari said, referring to the river in southern Lebanon, about 30 kilometres from the border, that Israel has demanded Hezbollah withdraw behind. He said the Sept. 27 assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, as well as a wave of other attacks targeting the group’s senior leadership and communications infrastructure, was changing the strategic situation in the region.
Mr. Harari predicted a three-month conflict that would leave Hezbollah unable to seriously threaten Israel in the short term and, he hoped, convince Iran that “they are wasting money developing a proxy force, instead of developing Iran.”
So far, Hezbollah – like its allies in Tehran and Gaza – is vowing to fight on. Tuesday’s barrage began shortly after deputy leader Naim Qassem gave a defiant speech broadcast on the Hezbollah-run al-Manar television channel. “Attempts to pressure and intimidate us will fail,” Mr. Qassem said. “We are inspired by Nasrallah’s strength, and we are his sons. He left behind a legacy of strong resistance.”
Immediately afterward, the group launched two salvos – more than 100 rockets in total – at the Mediterranean port city of Haifa, Israel’s third-largest city. Another 25 were fired in the direction of Tiberias, on the Sea of Galilee.
The large majority of the rockets were shot out of the sky by Israel’s air defences. At least 12 people were injured in the attacks.
Despite the barrage, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Tuesday that Hezbollah is in chaos after the assassination of Mr. Nasrallah. Mr. Gallant said he believed Mr. Nasrallah’s expected successor, Hashem Safieddine, had also been killed in a massive air strike targeting the southern suburbs of Beirut.
“Hezbollah is an organization without a head,” Mr. Gallant said. “There’s no one to make decisions, no one to act.”
On Monday, Major-General Uri Gordin, the head of Israel’s Northern Command, caused a stir among Israeli evacuees when he suggested that some northern residents might be able to return to their homes as early as the end of the weeklong Jewish holiday of Sukkot, which ends Oct. 23.
Mr. Frisch said he had been inundated with calls from evacuees about Maj.-Gen. Gordin’s remarks. Most of the evacuees, he said, want to see the military continue the operation in Lebanon until Hezbollah is completely defeated – they don’t want to move back home until that happens.
“People are really confused. Are we finished? They are really afraid that someone will say we are finished the war before we are sure of our own safety,” Mr. Frisch said. “I don’t think Hezbollah will be eliminated in two weeks.”
Israel Defense Forces armoured vehicles gather near the northern border of Israel and Lebanon.David Blumenfeld/The Globe and Mail