The spread of the war to Lebanon threatens to tear society apart. The views on Hezbollah on the one hand and the Lebanese government on the other could hardly be more different. A visit to southern Lebanon.
On March 1, 2026, in response to the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Iran, Hezbollah rockets were fired at Haifa. Since then, the Lebanese Ministry of Health has confirmed the deaths of 72 people and the forced displacement of more than 80,000. Just hours before the militia entered the war, we met a Shiite family from southern Lebanon.
"Badna nem !!! Badna nem – We want to sleep!!!" Abbas shouts, laughing heartily. It is a bitter inside joke among them. Here, they make light of the constant buzzing of Israeli drones in the night sky that robs the family of its sleep. We are in Jbaa, a Shiite village in the Nabatieh district. The fact that Abbas is hosting us for Iftar in his apartment is because his old house is now just a pile of rubble. Only one of the many consequences of the last war with Israel. The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have not stopped violating the existing ceasefire since then, bombing homes and shops. The airstrikes are always justified by claims that Hezbollah members use these locations as meeting points.
Despite the trauma, support for the militia remains strong in this family. "Today we made a yellow lentil soup, the colors of the Party of God, which is why it tastes better," jokes Abbas's eldest son, before adding more seriously: "I am ready, I want to fight." Yet, around the stove, opinions are divided. The youngest son pleads: "No! No involvement, I don't want a war."
Nevertheless, the war is the center of conversation today. The family debates the ongoing conflict between the US/Israel and Iran, the Hezbollah militia's longtime ally. On the Lebanese side, Hezbollah's position for now remains: "No involvement planned for the moment." But at 10 PM, a detonation tears through the night. Above our heads, Iranian rockets fly toward Jerusalem. Later that night, Abbas sent us a short message: "Iran has confirmed the Ayatollah's death, we are leaving Jbaa."
The Morning After: The War No Longer Knows Red Lines
The family's flight was only the prelude to an unprecedented crisis. In the early hours of March 2, Hezbollah officially entered the war, firing drones at an air defense installation south of Haifa. The group explicitly stated the operation was revenge for Khamenei. Israel reacted with massive severity, immediately mobilizing around 100,000 reservists to its northern border.
The Israeli military launched an unprecedented air offensive that went far beyond mere retaliation. The strategy aims at the systematic destruction of the militia's command and information structures. In the southern suburbs of Beirut, the buildings of the Hezbollah-affiliated Al-Manar broadcaster were leveled to the ground, and the militia's intelligence chief, Hussein Makled, was targeted and killed. Moreover, by systematically assassinating high-ranking Iranian Quds Force officers in Lebanon and Tehran, including Reza Khazaei and Davoud Ali-Zadeh, Israel precisely severed the command and logistics chain between Hezbollah and its Iranian patron.
On March 3, the IDF escalated operations. Under the code name "Roaring Lion," Israel launched an official ground offensive in southern Lebanon. Tank units crossed the Blue Line, advancing into areas like Kfar Kila and beginning to establish a buffer zone on Lebanese territory. Pressure on the population is mounting, and evacuation orders are multiplying. On Wednesday, March 4, the Israeli army ordered residents "south of the Litani River" to leave the area immediately. This region includes the city of Tyre with its 40,000 inhabitants. Populations in southern Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley, and the southern suburbs of Beirut are being forced to flee. In total, over 300,000 people are now displaced.
Simultaneously, Israel expanded its evacuation orders in a way that stripped the civilian population of its last shred of hope: for the first time, an evacuation order was also issued for the coastal city of Sidon (Saida), historically considered a safe haven.
In places like Jezzine, a Christian town east of Sidon, fleeing people lined the streets and slept in their cars due to a lack of available housing. Where accommodations still existed, prices exploded: a 169% increase was recorded for furnished rental apartments. Annual rents also rose drastically, often accompanied by demands for several months' rent in advance. The capital, Beirut, is completely overwhelmed, housing displaced families in improvised makeshift camps. Dozens of municipal schools have been repurposed. Due to a lack of space, dozens of families are forced to sleep on the streets or in their cars.
In their absolute desperation, many Lebanese families see no other way out than to leave the country entirely and flee to war-torn Syria. On March 2 alone, authorities processed around 11,000 travelers at the Jdeidet Yabous border crossing. However, this escape route is also strictly regulated. Syrian authorities require Lebanese citizens to comply with strict bureaucratic conditions, such as holding valid Syrian residency documents or obtaining prior approval from the Syrian Interior Ministry. According to reports, Lebanese travelers have already been turned away at the border. NGOs like Raj3een lament the situation: "The only aid comes from private donations, political parties like Hezbollah or Amal, and humanitarian organizations. The state does nothing, the population is left to fend for itself."
A Historic Betrayal? The State and the Army Crack Down
The political isolation of the Shiites culminated on the afternoon of March 2 in a historic event. The Lebanese cabinet issued an absolute ban on all military activities by Hezbollah. This consensus was only politically possible because the government framed the ban not as an anti-terror measure, but as a defense of constitutional state sovereignty. This diplomatic finesse allowed Shiite ministers and even Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri to approve the resolution without officially betraying the "resistance" as such.
But the reality on the battlefield proved the politicians wrong. Hezbollah ignored the ban, declared "open war," and fired kamikaze drones at Israeli military bases like Ramat David. The militia's calculation is clear: it wants to prove that the state has absolutely no control over it on the battlefield.
The Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) find themselves in an impossible dilemma. At the southern border, they hastily evacuated their forward posts to avoid getting caught in the Israeli crossfire. At the same time, further inland, they executed the cabinet decision for the first time, arresting twelve armed Hezbollah members at a checkpoint. To many Shiites, this arrest felt like the ultimate betrayal: their own state turning against them while enemy troops invade the country.
An Unprecedented Social Divide
Unlike in past conflicts, national unity in Lebanon is crumbling massively this time. The rift manifests physically in the geography: in some Christian-majority municipalities in the Metn district, residents and authorities blocked access for displaced people until their identities were strictly verified, out of fear of taking in Hezbollah members.
This rejection of the militia echoes through society and social media. Public figures, such as the famous Lebanese singer Elissa, have labeled Hezbollah the "terrorist party par excellence." Within the Sunni community, the prevailing discourse is that Hezbollah has dragged Lebanon into a devastating war without any state mandate. Sunni commentator Ahmad al-Ayoubi, in an editorial for the Nida al-Watan newspaper, specifically accused the government of protecting a party that is destroying the state from within.
"We didn't want this war, Hezbollah plunged us back into it, we are tired," explained a resident of the Achrafieh neighbourhood in Beirut. A general feeling of betrayal and injustice is taking hold of parts of the population. The displaced Shiite population often has a different perspective. "They are the only ones who have always protected us, militarily and financially; we will support them to the end," explains Fahra, a Franco-Lebanese woman originally from the south. Even in the refugee camps, loyalty remains: "The war didn't start 5 days ago, we are bombed every day on our land. The resistance is fighting for our dignity."
In a country already weakened by years of economic and political crises, this new war is redrawing the fault lines. Between support for "the resistance," anger at Hezbollah, and the feeling of being abandoned by the state, Lebanon appears more divided than ever. And while debates continue in the living rooms of Beirut and on television panels, a different reality imposes itself in the South: that of a population fleeing war once again. Abbas's family, like thousands of others, does not know when they will be able to return to their village.
