Peace elusive on “Israel”-Lebanon border

“ “Israel’s” war with Lebanon ended a year ago, but peace has not yet begun.
      When “Israel” abandoned its military occupation of south Lebanon last May 24, then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak spoke of the Jewish state and its northern neighbor extending hands of peace. That now seems a vain hope.

      "When we decided to pull out from Lebanon, we expected to be finished . . . there," said “Israeli” army spokesman Olivier Rafowicz, speaking inside a fortified army post at the Fatma Gate, a former border crossing. "But we have to keep a good eye on our northern border."
      “Israeli” soldiers next to him train their machine guns and binoculars across the frontier, to where tattered Hizbullah flags flap in the wind.
      The Hizbullah guerrilla group, which led the Lebanese resistance to the 22-year occupation, controls the border area in southern Lebanon and shootings are common.
      “Israel” is still counting its dead and missing — three “Israeli” soldiers have been killed along the northern border since the withdrawal, and three have been kidnapped.
      Thousands of refugees, former soldiers in “Israel’s” proxy south Lebanese militia and families, are still in “Israel”.
      “Israel’s” northern residents keep bomb shelters stocked up. Hizbullah has fired mortars and anti-tank missiles from Lebanon into “Israel”, while “Israeli” forces have fired at Hizbullah from helicopters and tanks.
      Despite the U.N. stamp of approval, Hizbullah does not recognize “Israel’s” withdrawal as complete, saying “Israeli” troops are still occupying a border area it says is Lebanese and calls Shibaa Farms. “Israel” calls it the Har Dov area.
      In April, after one of its soldiers was killed, “Israel” launched an air raid in Lebanon, killing three Syrian soldiers.
      Yossi Peled, a former “Israeli” army commander in Lebanon, mulls the options as he sits with a Lebanese refugee family in northern “Israel” one year after the withdrawal.
      "We need to pray for peace and believe that one day it will happen," he says. "But this is an unpredictable area."
      The withdrawal from Lebanon left the border at the doorsteps of Menara, a hilltop collective where “Israeli” children go to school in armored buses and sandbags line the road.
      The United Nations redrew the border about 16 feet closer to the kibbutz gate. "Our gate is the border," says kibbutz secretary Dan Ilan. "That's the problem. We can see them. They can see us."
      U.N. observers patrol nearby as Ilan considers the future. "Everything can change in an hour or less," he says.
      Ilan said that after the withdrawal, residents had to grow used to the sound of birds and wind in the trees, in place of regular bombing and helicopters.
      For now, he jokes about how they will change the street light bulbs only on the “Israeli” side of the road.
      "It's the typical absurdity of a new border," he says.
      Another border oddity is the village of Ghajar, a virtual roadmap of “Israel’s” political history.
      After the withdrawal, the United Nations put half the village in Lebanon and half in “Israel”. To complicate matters, the residents are of Syrian descent and ended up in “Israel” only after it captured the Golan Heights in the 1967 war.
      "When they said they were going to divide the village, we strongly protested," said Ghajar schoolteacher Adel Shamali.
      “Israeli” tanks entered the village recently and fired heavy machineguns at Hizbollah guerrillas. Shamali took photographs of the operation showing schoolchildren screaming.
      In the end, the United Nations did not erect a fence through Ghajar, but there is an invisible line which “Israeli” soldiers do not cross.
      Shamali said the Lebanese do not try to enter the village either. "That's because we are all Arab. The Lebanese respect that this village is really meant to be Syrian."
      For years “Israel” justified its presence in southern Lebanon by arguing it was vital to prevent attacks on its northern border.
      After the withdrawal, up to 6,500 former soldiers of “Israel’s” proxy South Lebanon Army (SLA) and families surged into “Israel”, fearing reprisals. Some have since emigrated elsewhere. Of those who have returned to Lebanon, some have ended up in jail.
      But Peled, who works for the “Israeli” government on the refugee issue, said up to 4,000 Lebanese refugees were still in “Israel”. Their Arabic-speaking children learn Hebrew in special schools so they can be absorbed into the “Israeli” system.
      "They prefer to be in the north because it reminds them of their country," he said.
      In the northern “Israeli” town of Metulla, the border fence twists along the road next to a picnic ground. One day recently, hundreds of “Israeli” schoolchildren gathered there with sacks of food to share a meal with a group of Lebanese children.
      One of the refugee children was Laya Nahra. She and her friends burst into tears when they saw Lebanon just across the fence. They borrowed binoculars from soldiers and peered into their former villages.
      "A year ago we left our nation, our people," said the girl, fighting tears. "We can't return until the yellow (Hizbollah) flag turns to the red, white and green (Lebanese) flag."

Reuters, 22-5-2001.