'Everything can be rebuilt': Beirut's Dahieh suburb springs back to life within a day

Residents determined to return home despite uncertainty over durability of ceasefire

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Residents of Beirut’s southern suburbs wasted no time returning to their homes after a US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah was implemented at 4am on Wednesday. By 5am, the once-ravaged and desolate southern part of the capital was already bustling with people.

Within hours, Dahieh was choked with traffic reminiscent of its notorious prewar congestion. Jubilant Hezbollah security personnel fired bursts of celebratory gunfire into the air as residents streamed back into the area driving lorries loaded with mattresses, water tanks, and gas canisters and determined to rebuild their lives amid the devastation.

Corner shops reopened to supply returning families with essentials, while a food truck franchise reclaimed its usual spot beneath a bridge, ready for customers. Tractors rumbled through the streets, clearing concrete from the roads, as residents swept shattered glass and rubble from their balconies. Meanwhile, municipal workers scrambled to restore electricity, necessary for breathing life back into Dahieh.

Jawad, a local cafe owner in the Kafaat neighbourhood, had reopened his street cafe for the first time in two months. Residents milled around his shop, sharing war stories as he served espressos.

Jawad busied himself at the espresso machine as residents and neighbours filled him in on their lives. He was glad his house was still standing, he told a neighbour. All he needed to re-establish a relatively normal life was for electricity to return. His neighbour had not been so lucky: his home had been reduced to rubble.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realise your house was gone,” Jawad said, handing him a coffee. The neighbour nodded impassively. “Not even the furniture is intact. But it’s worth it. For the resistance and for Sayyed,” a reference to the late leader of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah.

In death, Hezbollah’s enigmatic and iconic late leader has become a symbol of the group’s unyielding resistance politics. The group still has considerable support in the wake of a destructive Israeli war in Lebanon that has also attempted to weaken Hezbollah’s support base.

The Lebanese group went to considerable lengths to construct an image of victory as residents returned to Dahieh on Wednesday morning. They arranged a media tour for journalists, allowing them to glimpse the destruction for the first time in two months, as parades of supporters waving Hezbollah flags drove around the suburb and distributed victory sweets.

In contrast to Hezbollah’s joviality, some families wept as they drove into Dahieh for the first time in two months – showing a mix of grief at what they’d lost and relief that their displacement was finally over. The National attended Hezbollah's media tour but eventually peeled away from the festivities to survey the extent of the destruction in the suburb and to speak with residents unhindered.

Hassan Nabulsi, the manager of a residential compound, returned to the Kafaat neighbourhood in the early dawn hours to survey the damage. His home on the first floor of a six-storey building was obliterated in Israeli raids two days earlier, although he hadn’t lived in the suburb since late September.

Hassan Nabulsi stands in front of the building in Dahieh that was once his home. Matt Kynaston for The National

“We [our home] almost made it out of the war unscathed,” he told The National as he picked through the destruction. With a detached expression, he grabbed the twisted metal of what was once a windowsill and threw it aside. “But there’s nothing salvageable left. It's all destroyed.”

Mr Nabulsi was prepared; he knew his home was due to be bombed due to the Israeli eviction orders issued two days ago, which included his building. But he didn’t understand the extent of the destruction until he could safely return to see it close up.

Still, the annihilation of his home – where he has lived for nearly 20 years – is minor compared with what could have been: “Better the buildings than the people. We’re upset about the people who were killed. But everything else can be replaced.”

It remains uncertain whether the newly announced ceasefire – which is set to last at least 60 days – will hold. Mr Nabulsi voiced doubts, saying: “It’ll become apparent in the next week or so.”

Israel’s war in Lebanon has claimed over 3,000 lives in just two months, following the vast escalation of its operations against Hezbollah. The campaign has inflicted widespread destruction across the country, leaving entire villages demolished and large areas of the southern suburbs destroyed.

Most residents of the southern suburbs told The National they’d left their homes following Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah's leader Hassan Nasrallah on September 27. The massive air strike that killed Mr Nasrallah reverberated through the capital, sowing fear and signalling a sharp escalation.

Over the following weeks, Israel intensified its campaign, using explosives-laden pagers and walkie-talkies to kill and injure Hezbollah personnel and conducting high-profile assassinations. The crisis reached a peak in October with a ground invasion of southern Lebanon, supported by relentless aerial bombardment across the country. Dahieh steadily emptied as its residents fled the near-daily air onslaught.

Residents return to Dahieh, southern Beirut after Israel and Hezbollah agreed to a ceasefire. Matt Kynaston for The National

The conflict displaced an estimated 1.2 million people, according to Lebanese government figures. Families fled from the south, the Bekaa Valley, and Beirut’s southern suburbs. Once a bustling and densely populated district, Dahieh became a ghost town virtually overnight, its streets eerily dark and silent to those who dared to speed past it on the motorway.

Residents told The National that the destruction in the southern suburbs far exceeded the devastation left by the July 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel, a conflict that raged for 33 days. “The destruction this time is more widespread. Reconstruction will take at least double the time it did back then,” Mr Nabulsi predicted.

Despite the challenges, he remained resolute. “In the meantime, we’ll rent a house here until our home is rebuilt. We’re not going anywhere,” he declared.

A woman near Jawad’s cafe, who declined to share her name, watched with her family as a fire burned inside the remains of a building that once stood in front of her own. “The Israelis had marked off our building and said it was a target. But thank God only some of the residences were destroyed,” she said. “We’re the lucky ones. Our house is still standing. We made it.”