“I identified him thanks to his fingers”: Suzanne Karkaba, a Lebanese rescuer, never thought she would one day have to search the rubble of a Civil Defense center targeted by an Israeli bombing to find the body of her father Ali.
Also a rescuer, “my father was there. He slept here to be able to go out, warn people” before the Israeli strikes, “recover the bodies and hand them over to their families,” says Ms. Karkaba in her olive green uniform, with tears in her eyes. tired eyes and voice.
Because, for almost two months, Lebanon has been torn apart by the war between Hezbollah and the Israeli army, which daily bombs the strongholds of the pro-Iranian Islamist movement.
“I identified him thanks to his fingers, that’s how I found my father,” continues the young woman who had joined the rescuers in Lebanon following in her father’s footsteps.
She still does not understand why on Thursday evening an Israeli strike targeted, in the locality of Douris at the gates of Baalbeck, the main center of the Lebanese Civil Defense, a government institution, responsible for operations for eastern Lebanon.
Around her, on the site guarded by the army, dozens of people, rescuers and residents, clustered near the rubble looking for victims.
In the middle of the concrete blocks and iron rods, a red Civil Defense truck is gutted. Two excavators, guided by rescuers, try to clear the rubble.
Further away, two men inspect a bag, hoping to identify one of the victims based on its contents. Other rescuers evacuate a body wrapped in a body bag.
“Now it’s my turn to collect pieces of my father’s body to bury him,” says Suzanne Karkaba. “I don’t know who to cry: my father, the head of the center, or my friends of a decade.”
– “We are targets” –
The strike on the center of Douris killed 14 rescue workers, Samir al-Chakiya, a local Civil Defense official, told AFP on Friday, adding that searches were continuing to find at least two other colleagues.
Contacted by AFP about this strike, the Israeli army did not immediately respond.
Hezbollah opened a front against Israel on October 8, 2023 in support of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, constantly shelled by the Israeli army in retaliation for an attack of unprecedented scale by the Palestinian Islamist movement on its soil.
After almost a year of cross-border shooting, the situation degenerated into open war on September 23 and the Israeli army is carrying out a campaign of intense strikes in Lebanon.
With massive bombings targeting localities in the south or east of Lebanon and Hezbollah strongholds on a daily basis, rescuers and medical personnel have not been spared.
More than 150 rescuers, some of whom worked with associations affiliated with Hezbollah or its allies, were killed, according to figures from the Lebanese Ministry of Health.
On Thursday, more than 40 people were killed in Lebanon in Israeli strikes on the east and south of the country, according to the same source.
Among these attacks, two “rescue centers”, including one affiliated with Hezbollah, were targeted within two hours, the ministry lamented in a press release.
Friday, Mahmoud Issa was also in Douris to try to find the bodies of his colleagues among the rubble.
“There are still body parts that we haven’t been able to identify,” he said. “Can it get worse than this, these types of strikes against rescue teams?” he protests.
“We are among the first to mobilize to help, put out fires, save lives, transport the injured,” adds the rescuer.
“But now we are targets.”
Do you have a real estate project in mind? Yakeey & Médias24 help you make it happen!
Related News :