“We ask ourselves until when? But, above all, why?” The voice of Father Toni Elias, Maronite parish priest of Rmeich, in southern Lebanon, comes through with difficulty, interrupted several times by the weak internet signal after some telecommunications exchanges were blown up. “What worries us,” he adds later the bloodiest night since the civil war (1975-1990), “it’s the people who have left their villages. The streets are very crowded even this morning, the fuel has run out, and, in fact, there is not even a safe place to go.”
Israel struck during the night with a rain of missiles that caused 500 deaths and over 1,600 wounded. “We are not afraid of being bombed directly because Israel knows that in our village, entirely Christian, there are no weapons and no militiamen, but the ricocheting bullets also arrive here. We thank God that so far we have not had any injuries, but only a few broken windows, a few holes in the walls, a few destroyed cars”. Many have started to leave, «90 percent of the population of the South and the Bekaa Valley has set out to go elsewhere. Many were stuck on the highways due to the large crowds. Those who left were mostly families who have sick people at home, because it is no longer possible to get treatment here, and those who have somewhere else to go. But how long will this situation be bearable? Leaving means leaving your home, your job. To live how?asks the parish priest. Meanwhile, schools are closing: «We had made a plan to try to reopen them this year, despite the war. Our kids, between covid and what’s happening now, are always at home and don’t learn anything. It is not possible to use the internet because the network does not work and then they need to socialize, to be in the open air, not locked in a room. We had many projects with the Catholic schools, but after tonight everything is interrupted”. Many are finding refuge in the classrooms, “especially in those near Beirut. Others in the churches of Byblos. In any case what we observe is that there is no safe place to move. Even by leaving the South you cannot save yourself because Israel strikes everywhere everywhere knows, or thinks he knows, that there are members of Hezbollah».
Think of the civilians, Father Elias. Unanswered questions: «Those who have left the villages, what will they do? Those who are unemployed, what will they do? Those who are homeless, what will they do? Those who have no place to sleep, what will they do?“. Above all: “How long will these conflicts last? The situation is getting worse day by day and there is no way out in sight. And I wonder if there is a just cause somewhere for this war or not. I don’t like to get into politics, but I note that it is true that there is an armed party that is bothering Israel, but who allowed it to be there? And Who benefits from the attacks on both sides? Why do we have to be constantly threatened? The civilian population has nothing to do with it? and, if it is true that there are rights and wrongs on both sides, the only thing that can really help is dialoguebut in this situation it doesn’t exist. We are under a hail of missiles from both sides. Each of these costs billions of dollars. Couldn’t they really have been used differently, to build something?
Father Elias never stops believing in the power of words and prayer. «Saint Paul said that the cross, for those who do not believe, is madness. For us believers, however, it is the strength of God, the power of God. We cling to that and we continue to encourage people to have faith despite the dramatic situation”. It will be difficult for medicines, flour, diesel to arrive here again. “But, despite everything, we always preach and teach people to have faith in the Lord, that God will not leave us in tribulation. We invite not only our fellow citizens to pray, but also all Christians in the world. Always, not only in times of crisis, prayer is the first thing. And then we ask Caritas and the Red Cross to distribute mattresses because they certainly won’t be enough for all the displaced people who are in schools and parishes. This is the first urgent thing to do. And then we need to think about the future and how the people who have remained in the south, practically isolated, will be able to live, and those who have left, leaving everything behind. For a while, the money put aside will be enough, but then? We will need everything also because the State has not made a security plan and is showing itself absent. The burden is on the Church, on the bishop, the parish priests, the individual municipalities.”
He again invokes the power of diplomacy which «is the only sensible thing to put into play. We do not know when this war will end, but we hope and pray that this time, at the end of the conflict, there may be a true and lasting resurrection.”