QASMIYE, Lebanon The wounded men moved slowly across the hot patch of cratered earth. Some limped. One used crutches. Two carried their own colostomy intravenous bags. The secret war of shadow militia fighters being waged against the Israeli Army from the mountains of southern Lebanon came into sharp focus Tuesday near a gnarled tree trunk that serves as the only remaining crossing over the Litani River, | “Hezbollah fighters, their faces exhausted and drawn, shuffled gingerly toward the crossing, leaving, at least for now, the front lines of a war that has won them broad support among local people here and has frustrated the Israeli military for weeks...” |
which divides northern Lebanon from the war in the south. Hezbollah fighters, their faces exhausted and drawn, shuffled gingerly toward the crossing, leaving, at least for now, the front lines of a war that has won them broad support among local people here and has frustrated the Israeli military for weeks. "I don't know a thing," said Yusef Rafaai, a local emergency worker helping the men. "I know they're Lebanese. More than that I don't know."
| "I know nothing! No-thing! Tell them, Hogan!" |
The river and its crossings - all makeshift since the Israelis blew up the last bridge a few days ago - have pushed even the most secret activities into the open, offering an unusual view of this ordinarily hidden guerrilla war. Besides the fighters, bread, canned tuna, sardines and processed cheese - donations from Iran - were being carried across, with help from local Lebanese who support Hezbollah.
The movement showed that the Israeli bombing, which had gouged huge craters out of the area around the river, had not broken supply lines. Despite the bombardments, Hezbollah continues to operate in some areas in open view of Israeli drones, which whine overhead in the brilliant afternoon sky. Shortly after 1:30 p.m., in a large, open dirt field cut with giant craters from Israeli bombs, five ghostly fighters became ordinary, wounded men.
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