Beginning to feel a lot like 2006... southern Beirut braces for war

It incorporates Lebanon's only operational airport and several official state institutions on its western edges. In reality, it is merely a collection of villages and towns belonging to the Baabda District in the Mt. Lebanon Governorate.

The area's rural features have been erased over time by chaotic urban and metropolitan development to accommodate an influx of Shiite workers and day labourers from southern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley since the early 1960s.

This gave the area an almost homogenous demographic and sectarian feel. For the past three decades, it has become the political and security nerve-centre for the Shiite political duality represented by Amal Movement and Hezbollah.

It now hosts Hezbollah's political, security, and media arms, and has long been a trusted refuge for its leaders and personnel. That is why the killing of Shukr in July and of Hamas deputy leader Saleh Al-Arouri there in January has spooked the leadership.

Four tragic decades

As Hezbollah's geographical HQ, Dahiya is used to danger. For almost 40 years, wars and assassinations have rarely seemed unlikely.

The killing of Shukr and Haniyeh sparked threats between Hezbollah and Iran on one side, and Israel on the other. Many Lebanese feel thrust back into the familiar atmosphere of caution and fear of the unknown.

It has prompted them to prepare as much as possible, stockpiling food and medicine, ensuring tighter security from housing to offices, and bracing for violence in the coming days, hoping that the scale of destruction is not devastating.

The normally bustling street-life in Dahiya has felt subdued over the last two days, as residents realise that their daily and social lives may soon be disrupted. Institutions and shops have not yet closed their doors, but many expect to do so imminently.

For now, economic activity is largely limited to daily necessities such as food and drink. People are operating against a backdrop of cross-border fighting between Hezbollah and Israel, trying to assess a moving situation.

For the most part, the Lebanese are making daily judgements based often on snippets, rumours, and leaked information.

In other areas of Lebanon, the scene and the feelings are different, as residents enjoy relative stability, knowing that they are outside the zone of presumed military operations and the target area for Israel's air force.

In southern Beirut, traders' grim faces reflect whispered discussions about the impact of the Israeli strike on Hezbollah's militant structure and the extent of any Hezbollah retaliation. Residents here place a great deal of faith in Hezbollah and its leadership.

Hezbollah's Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah vowed a strong response to Israel, which has both lifted the gloom caused by Shukr's killing, and posed the understandable question: what comes next?

Dahiya families gather to discuss the 'what/how/when' of hostilities, as adults recall the events of 2006, including the lead-up to war, and the extent of the damage on infrastructure and housing, affecting markets and the commercial and industrial sectors.

Moving and stockpiling

So far, there has been no mass exodus from Dahiya. Most who live here were born here, so are reluctant to leave. Besides, even if they did, their options are limited. The southern border region is just as much of a target, and Bekaa is bombed intermittently.

Families do not want to "seek refuge from fire in fire", but leaving for other safe areas in Beirut, Keserwan, and the north is prohibitively expensive for most of these mostly low-income families.

Some have temporarily relocated to Mt. Lebanon and its mountain villages and resorts, until the situation becomes clear, but they face hiked rents, some more than doubling. Advance payment is required, as is a minimum stay of six months.

As the dull thud of war grows louder, Lebanese are dusting off an old and hard-learned skill: stockpiling food, consumables, medicines, and fuel.

State officials have made reassuring noises that the country has enough imported food and raw materials for manufacturing for 2-3 months, but experience tells them to stock up nonetheless.

Most fear a full-scale war that includes the blockade of Lebanon by land, sea, and air. In Israel's efforts to cut off the militia's supplies, everyone else's supplies would be cut off too.  

While flights to Lebanon have been cancelled, Beirut's Rafic Hariri International Airport continues to operate, as do the country's ports. If they stopped, supplies would dry up, including that of diesel, which sustains Lebanese industrial production and private power generation, given the almost-complete lack of state-run electricity.

Emergency planning

Minister of Environment Nasser Yassin, who heads the government's emergency committee, said strategic stockpiles of fuel, medicine, and food are secured if the war expands. There is enough fuel to last about four weeks, he said.

The Lebanese Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association said its factories are fully prepared for war and can operate 24/7 to meet the Lebanese market's needs for essential and chronic medicines, if needed. This includes 100% of hospital needs.

Chronic disease medicines are well-stocked in pharmacies, they said, with companies currently sat on up to six months' supply, but medicines for cancer, for instance, cannot be bought in pharmacies, and hospitals' stocks are far less.

There is an emergency plan in-place for hospitals, coordinated between the government, the Lebanese Army, and the hospital sector, to ensure they are ready for war, with sufficient supplies needed for war casualties.

If Gaza is anything to go by, Israel may target Lebanon's hospitals as a war tactic, in violation of international laws. Still, if it did, Lebanon would be powerless to stop it.

Lebanon's hospitals can accommodate the injured and professionally deal with urgent health cases, says Hospital Association president Suleiman Haroun, but they would be hampered if communications were cut by the Israelis.

While this seems unlikely, a blockade—and the consequent loss of diesel, as happened during the July 2006 aggression—could eventually lead to the lack of power generation across the country. As most Lebanese will tell you, stockpiling energy is more difficult than stockpiling food.

For a war-weary nation already blighted by five years of economic malaise, major hostilities with Israel are the last thing they need. But war seldom comes at convenient times. And the Lebanese know how to hunker down.