The bells ring and songs boom from worshippers marking Easter Sunday at St Georges Church in Qlayaa, southern Lebanon – just a few kilometres away from the front line where Hezbollah and Israel are fighting.
But the sound of Israeli fighter jets flying overhead slices through the sound of Easter Sunday bells when they lull, as explosions from nearby Israeli air strikes rattle the ground.
Church-goers arrive in their Sunday best to mark the resurrection of Christ in the deepest reaches of southern Lebanon. Children flock to the courtyard under the whistle of warplanes, dispensing chocolates to worshippers.
“I've lived 45 years liked this. All the time, war, war war,” said Daniel Nicolas, as the children handed out chocolate and eggs in the wide church courtyard, while thuds and booms ring around from nearby. “My grandfather lived like this, my father lived like this, I lived like this and now my son lives like this.”
Qlayaa, a Christian population centre perched on top of the rolling southern Lebanese hills that the invading Israeli army is trying to capture as part of a so-called “security zone”, is one of the few remaining populated villages in southern Lebanon.
The Christian villages are, in turn, a last bastion of southern Lebanon's population, with people from surrounding Shiite areas forcibly displaced by the Israeli army.
Qlayaa's lush greenery stands in start contrast to the violence surrounding it.
While comparatively spared from the fighting surrounding it in the neighbouring villages, it has not been completely unscathed.
A photo of Father Pierre Rahi, a beloved priest who hailed from the town, hangs on the front of the church. He was killed in an Israeli attack on Qlayaa last month, destroying any sense of safety for a village traditionally hostile to Hezbollah.
“He sacrificed for us,” says the mayor Hanna Daher. “We live in great pain because we don't know what the future holds for us but we are going to stay here until our last breath.”
Entering the church at the back of a procession, Father Pierre's successor, Antonio, smiles when asked how it felt to be celebrating Easter under the cloak of war: “In God we trust”.
Qlayaa stands isolated, with most roads leading into it recently bombed by the Israeli army and resupply lines of basic goods severely hampered. The few roads in and out that are still passable are intensely dangerous.
Normally Easter Sunday is a day full of family, celebration and food. But for the residents of Qlayaa it is marked by other emotions; fear, isolation and the very real threat of being cut off from the rest of Lebanon as the Israelis advance on their town.
“We need a humanitarian corridor. no one is able to guarantee us the safety of the road. Anytime we could die,” said Deeb, another worshipper.
Deeb says his wife has been running out of diabetes medication. The food supply was OK, he said, but medication was running low. The tension was rife. Residents know the Lebanese army may be forced to withdraw – as it has done in some other southern Lebanese villages due to the security situation – leaving Qlayaa to deal with effects of an Israeli occupation on its own.
“Nobody cared about us. Only Jesus,” said Mr Nicolas, who says he used to be physics teacher but is now takes on a number of odd jobs, said the economic situation in Qlayaa was dire and unemployment surging because of the situation.
“People need money, work, medicine, petrol for the car. Where is the medicine?”
A Vatican-led humanitarian convoy carrying about 40 tonnes basic supplies and medicine from the Papal embassy had been supposed to visit the Christian village of Debel on the south-west border region of Lebanon – but was cancelled for security reasons.
UN peacekeeping force Unifil also told The National that the Israeli army could not guarantee our safety on one of the few roads still open to Qlayaa.
Many in Qlayaa say they are stuck and surrounded by a war they did not choose between two sides neither supports.
But the sentiment to stay in their land is one held by the residents of the village. They say they are acutely aware that the invading Israeli army was seeking to come and occupy the region.
“If there are people without a land, it's not a homeland any more. And if there's a homeland without a people it's also not a nation,” said Shahin Hana Shahin who remembers life under Israel occupation. “If we leave it means there will be no Lebanon left to go back to.”
