CHEBAA, Lebanon (AP) — With ceasefire negotiations wavering in Gaza and no clear way out of the conflict on the Lebanon-Israel border, the daily exchanges of attacks between Hezbollah and Israeli forces set fires that devastated forests and farmland on both sides of the front line.
The fires – exacerbated by supply shortages and security concerns – have consumed thousands of hectares of land in southern Lebanon and northern Israel, becoming one of the most visible signs of the escalating conflict.
There is an increasingly real possibility of a full-scale war – one that would catastrophic consequences for people on both sides of the border. Some fear that fires sparked by a larger conflict could also cause irreversible damage to the land.
Charred remains in Lebanon
In Israel, images of fires sparked by Hezbollah rockets sparked public outrage and led Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, to declare last month that “the time has come for all of Lebanon to burn.” .
Much of it was already burning.
The fires in Lebanon began in late April – before the usual fire season – and devastated the mostly rural areas along the border.
The Sunni town of Chebaa, situated in the mountains in far southeast Lebanon, has little Hezbollah presence and has not been the target of attacks as frequently as other border villages. But the sounds of bombing still resonate regularly, and in the mountains above, the once oak-clad ridges are charred and bare.
In a cherry orchard on the outskirts of the city, pieces of fruit hang between brown leaves after a fire caused by an Israeli attack devastated the place. Firefighters and local men – some using their shirts to put out the flames – prevented the fire from reaching homes and the nearby UN peacekeeping center.
“The grass will come back next year, but the trees are gone,” said Moussa Saab, whose family owns the orchard. “We will have to get seedlings and plant them, and it will take five or seven years before we can start harvesting.”
Saab refuses to go out with his wife and 8-year-old daughter. They cannot afford to live anywhere else and fear they will not be able to return, as their parents did when they left the disputed area of Chebaa Farms – captured from Syria by Israel in 1967 and claimed by Lebanon.
Burn scars in Israel
The slopes of Mount Meron, Israel’s second highest mountain and home to an air base, have long been covered in native oaks, a dense forest that provides shelter to wild pigs, gazelles and rare species of flowers and fauna.
Now the green slopes are interrupted by three new burn scars – the largest measuring a few hundred square meters – the remains of a Hezbollah explosive drone shot down a few weeks ago. Park rangers fear the devastation is just beginning.
“The damage this year is dozens of times worse than this year,” said Shai Koren of the Israel Nature and Parks Authority’s northern district.
Looking at the slopes of Meron, Koren said he doesn’t expect this forest to survive the summer: “You can take a before and after photo.”
Numbers and weapons
Since the start of the war, the Israeli military has recorded 5,450 launches towards northern Israel. According to the Israeli think tank Alma Research and Education Center, most of the early launches were short-range anti-tank missiles, but Hezbollah’s use of drones has increased.
In Lebanon, authorities and human rights groups accuse Israel of shooting white phosphorus incendiary projectiles in residential areas, in addition to regular artillery shelling and airstrikes.
The Israeli military says it uses white phosphorus only as a smoke screen, and not to target populated areas. But even in open areas, projectiles can start fires that spread quickly.
The border clashes began on October 8, the day after the Hamas-led incursion into southern Israel that killed around 1,200 people and triggered the war in Gaza. There, more than 37,000 people were killed, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.
Hezbollah has begun firing rockets into northern Israel to open what it calls a “support front” for Hamas, to withdraw Israeli forces from Gaza.
Israel responded and attacks spread across the border region. In northern Israel, 16 soldiers and 11 civilians were killed. In Lebanon, more than 450 people – mostly combatants, but also more than 80 civilians and non-combatants – were killed.
The exchanges have intensified since the beginning of May, when Israel launched its incursion into the city of Rafah, in southern Gaza. This coincided with the start of the hot, dry bushfire season.
Since May, Hezbollah attacks have resulted in 8,700 hectares (about 21,500 acres) burning in northern Israel, according to the Israel Nature and Parks Authority.
Eli Mor of the Israel Fire and Rescue Department said drones, which are much more precise than rockets, often “come one after the other, the first with a camera and the second fires.”
“Every launch is a real threat,” Mor added.
In southern Lebanon, about 4,000 hectares (10,000 acres) were burned due to Israeli attacks, said George Mitri of Balamand University’s Land and Natural Resources program. In the previous two years, he said, the total area burned annually in Lebanon was 500 to 600 hectares (1,200 to 1,500 acres).
Fire response
Safety concerns make it difficult to respond in the crucial first hours of a fire. Firefighting planes are largely anchored in the fear of being shot down. On the ground, firefighters are often unable to move without army escort.
“If we lose half an hour or an hour, it could take another day or two to control the fire,” said Mohammad Saadeh, head of the Chebaa civil defense station. The station responded to 27 fires in three weeks last month — about the same number as in a normal year.
Across the border, Moran Arinovsky was a chef and is now deputy commander of the emergency squad at Kibbutz Manara. With about 10 other people, he has fought more than 20 fires in the past two months.
Mor, from the Israel Fire and Rescue Department, said firefighters often need to triage.
“Sometimes we have to give up open areas that don’t put people or cities in danger,” Mor said.
The border areas are largely depopulated. The Israeli government evacuated a 4-kilometer strip at the start of the war, leaving only soldiers and emergency personnel. In Lebanon there is no formal evacuation order, but large areas have become practically uninhabitable.
Some 95,000 people in Lebanon and 60,000 people in Israel have been displaced for nine months.
Kibbutz Sde Nehemia has not been evacuated, and Efrat Eldan Schechter said some days she watches helplessly as clouds of smoke rise closer to home.
“There is a psychological impact, the knowledge and feeling that we are alone,” she said, because firefighters are unable to access certain areas.
Israel’s cowboys, who raise beef cattle in the Golan Heights, often band together to fight fires when firefighters cannot arrive quickly.
Schechter noted that news images of flames tearing up hillsides have focused more attention on the conflict in his backyard, rather than just the war in Gaza. “It was only when the fires started that we would be in the headlines in Israel,” she said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that as fighting in Gaza eases, Israel will send more troops to its northern border. This could open a new front and increase the risk of more destructive fires.
Koren says natural forest fires are a normal part of the forest life cycle and can promote ecodiversity, but not fires resulting from conflict. “When fires happen repeatedly, that’s what creates the damage,” he said.
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Lidman reported from northern Israel.
