Lebanon | Dahieh, Hezbollah stronghold at the rhythm of war

In the southern suburbs of Beirut, the predominantly Shiite district, stronghold of Hezbollah, tension has risen a notch since the assassination of Hamas number 2 in the heart of the district.

Place Achoura is a surreal scene that awaits unwary spectators. In the heart of the Haret Hreik district, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, at the start of a rainy evening, a group of actors are rehearsing their latest play. The border revisits the battle of Boukamal, the famous victory of the Syrian loyalist forces of Bashar al-Assad with the support of Hezbollah against the Islamic State group in 2017. In an immense space, divided between four tents, four groups of spectators, to whom we having previously distributed a Palestinian scarf, attend scenes different from the main plot, played simultaneously, before coming together for the epilogue.

“One of the main challenges was that the noise of the shots and explosions that took place on certain sets did not disturb the groups of spectators who were watching other scenes at the same time,” explains Aya Baghdadi, young actress. of the room, circulating from stage to stage in this labyrinthine space. The directors have pulled out all the stops: here, a military hospital has been set up, in another room it is actually a battlefield which has been recreated with military vehicles, barbed wire, sandbags and dummy mortars. On the menu, love, heroism and testosterone.

While the south of the country is at open war with its Israeli neighbor, and a bombing a few weeks earlier killed Hamas number 2, Saleh al-Arouri, in the heart of the neighborhood, the situation has something of absurd.

“There is a front in South Lebanon, we consider that this play is our front line. We fight war our way. We have our own people fighting to protect us at the border, it’s a way of paying tribute to their fight, without weapons,” explains Aya Baghdadi, who studies at the Lebanese University.

In this piece all about the glory of Hezbollah and designed as a tribute to Iranian commander Kassem Soleimani, architect of the Boukamal victory and killed in 2020 by an American strike, the press is welcome. This is far from being acquired in normal times.

Hezbollah “on its teeth”

” Who are you ? Where are you from ? Who gave you permission to ask questions? »

At the exit of a cafe in Dahiya, in which the last speech of the leader of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, is broadcast, a member of the party of God, out of nowhere, intervenes with confidence before making a few phone calls and carry out an identity check. Journalists are not welcome in Dahiya at this time. “It’s clear that Hezbollah is on edge, especially since the attack on January 2,” confides a local journalist who lives in the neighborhood. The fact that Israel was able to reach Hamas number 2 in the middle of a district controlled by Hezbollah raises questions about the presence of spies within Dahiya itself. »

In the neighborhood, this first attack outside of South Lebanon since the start of the war, on October 7, revives some ghosts. In 2006, during the last clash with Israel, the Hebrew neighbor launched a large-scale air attack on the Shiite neighborhood, causing significant destruction. In all, 182 buildings had been reduced to dust and 192 affected to varying degrees.

The attack on the neighborhood even gave rise to an unofficial doctrine in the ranks of the Israeli army: the “Dahiya doctrine”, which theorizes the use of disproportionate force with the aim of deterring the enemy from launching future attacks. attacks.

Ali, 30, has lived in the neighborhood most of his life. In 2006, when the bombings began, he found refuge with an uncle in another region of Beirut. “Even from his home, we could hear the bombings,” remembers the young man, a consultant in the health sector. When the fighting began in South Lebanon, the day after October 7, he mechanically went around to his friends in the supposedly safe neighborhoods of Beirut, to see if they could welcome him if the situation got worse. “In the end, we stayed. After all, it was not the interests of Lebanon or Hezbollah that were affected, but those of Hamas,” Ali puts into perspective.

“After listening to Nasrallah’s various speeches, people are no longer really afraid of a large-scale war. What is happening in South Lebanon is more of a game of chess…” adds Ali, who does not carry the party of God in his heart and who even ran against them, in his native village of South Lebanon, during the 2019 legislative elections. “For me, they are losing momentum. They have lost the support of educated circles and are focusing their discourse on people from the working classes, who continue to follow them blindly. »

Like Lebanon, Dahiya is a constellation of sometimes contradictory opinions that coexist. There we find people ready to die as martyrs for the party of God, moderate supporters, and fervent opponents who see in this militia, more powerful than the army, one of the explanations for Lebanon’s inability to function. as a sovereign state.

The party is still obstructing the investigation into the Beirut port explosion as well as the assassination of the intellectual and great opponent of Hezbollah Lokman Slim, whose bullet-riddled body was found on the side of a road in South Lebanon, February 4, 2021.

Farah sides with the opponents of God’s party, even though she sees them as the only defense against Israel. When the clashes began in South Lebanon, this veiled young woman, who supports the Palestinian cause, was initially disappointed: “I expected more involvement from Hezbollah, commensurate with what is happening in Gaza. But after a few days, I realized that the risk of spiraling was too dangerous for Lebanon,” she explains.

“This is a war to save Lebanon, not just the Palestinians. All wars in the region have consequences here, in one way or another. With the war in Gaza, our future here is at stake. One more time. »