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About two weeks ago, as a Unicef convoy returned from delivering much-needed supplies to Tebnin Hospital – the only functioning health facility on the front line in southern Lebanon – an Israeli strike hit roughly 100 metres away as it crossed the Qasmiyeh Bridge linking the south to the rest of the country.
“It was kind of a warning,” Unicef spokesman Christophe Boulierac told The National. “A few hours earlier, the bridge had been hit. A few days later, it was destroyed.”
Soon after a temporary ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel was announced on April 16, Lebanese authorities repaired the bridge. A week later, the Unicef team was able to return to Tebnin to deliver life-saving medicines. “Access is not cut, but it remains a constant challenge,” Mr Boulierac said.
Israel has bombarded most of the crossings across the Litani River, about 30km from Lebanon's southern border with Israel, leaving hospitals in the area at risk of being completely cut off. “This is one of our constant calls: we need to ensure safe and unimpeded humanitarian access,” Mr Boulierac said.
It is a call that has yet to be answered.
Hospitals in southern Lebanon have faced immense challenges since Hezbollah and Israel resumed fighting on March 2: life-threatening supply routes; shrinking supplies, damage from nearby Israeli bombardment; and forced evacuation orders from the Israeli military.
Israeli strikes have so far killed 100 medical staff and wounded 233, forced six hospitals to close, and damaged or destroyed 25 medical centres, according to Lebanese authorities.
This includes the Tebnin hospital. Since the Unicef visited two weeks ago, heavy Israeli strikes in the area have reduced adjacent buildings to rubble. Mr Boulierac said the devastation was "shocking".
The hospital was not targeted directly, but the repeated strikes around it have damaged ceilings, leaving cables hanging dangerously and exposing cracked roof tiles that could fall at any moment.
Windows were shattered, most now hastily covered, and doors were damaged. The security entrance was charred, as was one of the hospital’s vehicles. Two staff members were slightly injured.
The conflict resumed when Hezbollah launched rockets into Israel to avenge the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei when Israel and the US began bombing Iran on February 28, and for Israel’s daily violations of a November 2024 ceasefire. Israel’s disproportionate response has killed 2,294 people in Lebanon.
And despite the tenuous ceasefire – extended by three weeks on Friday after US-hosted talks between Israeli and Lebanese envoys at the White House – the situation in southern Lebanon remains extremely tense, with almost daily air strikes and continuing ground demolitions.
‘Emergency conditions’
In Tebnin, on the edge of the so-called “yellow line” – a belt of dozens of villages under Israeli occupation – the sound of explosions continued to echo during The National’s visit. These were not from air strikes but from controlled detonations as Israeli troops demolish homes and buildings.
Israel has accelerated the destruction of villages in what it calls a “forward defence line”. Very few residents have returned to Tebnin, both because of the security situation and because, for many, there is nothing left to return to. The devastation surrounding the hospital in Tebnin is only a small part of what The National has witnessed on its many trips to the south.
Tebnin Hospital director Mohammad Hamadi said 70 staff members have stayed there full-time during the war, away from their families, sleeping and eating there because going outside was considered too dangerous. He described this as “emergency conditions”.
At times, even food began to run out, along with medical and cleaning supplies, he said. Israeli strikes destroyed the hospital's solar panels, leaving it reliant on diesel deliveries from NGOs to run its generators. “If fuel stops coming for 15 days, we will have to shut down,” he said.
Water is also scarce – the reservoir holds enough for about a week – and the hospital relies on deliveries by the Lebanese army.
Despite the ceasefire, Tebnin hospital is considered to be within the “hot zone”, and patients are moved to safer places as soon as possible.
“Patients do not stay here long because it’s too dangerous. Within 24 to 48 hours, we stabilise them and transfer them out,” Mr Hamadi said.
Since March 2, the hospital has received around 900 wounded patients and about 300 bodies.
The only patient being treated during The National’s visit was Zeinab Faraj, a Lebanese journalist who was severely injured in a triple-tap Israeli attack on Wednesday that killed her friend and colleague, Amal Khalil.
She was on assignment in the town of At Tiri, within the “yellow line” occupied by Israel, just a few kilometres from Tebnin, when they came under Israeli strikes that followed them to a building where they had sought refuge.
The wounded young woman in a hospital bed, Red Cross vehicles waiting outside to take her to safety, the regular sound of explosions and the scenes of destruction all around were all reminders that, while a ceasefire may exist on paper, for many medics in the south, the war has not stopped.
