Residents of southern Lebanon, including Em Saeid and her family, are facing forced evacuations amid threats from Israel. Panic ensued as families rushed to escape, with many struggling to find safety.
Key points
Israel issued a forced evacuation threat for southern Lebanon
Residents experienced panic and chaos during the evacuation
Em Saeid's family faced a lengthy escape to Tyre's port
The family planned to stay with a friend in Beirut
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Tyre, Lebanon – On March 4, Em Saeid was at her home near the el-Buss roundabout in Tyre when Israel issued a forced evacuation threat for the entirety of southern Lebanon.
She moved frantically, trying to gather her things and wake sleeping relatives, when locals started firing their guns in the air to warn people to evacuate.
Along with her husband, Yasser, her daughter, Samiha, and Samiha’s four-year-old daughter, she got in their Mercedes and headed towards Tyre’s port, which they thought would be safe from Israeli attacks.
Em Saied described scenes of panic on the road. “Some women left their homes with their heads uncovered; other people were not entirely dressed. Old people were making their way on foot,” she said.
A car ride that usually lasts just a few minutes ended up taking the family three hours. Once at the port, Yasser told his wife the family should head north to the capital, Beirut, and stay with a friend, as they had done when Israel escalated its attacks in September 2024, during what in Lebanon is called the “66-day intensification“.
“When we arrived in Beirut, I was still in my pyjamas,” Samiha said on Sunday, now back in her home in Tyre with her family.
‘Bombardment can feel easier’ than displacement
On March 2, Israel intensified its war on Lebanon for the second time in less than two years, unleashing havoc on large swaths of the country.
Earlier that night, Hezbollah responded to almost 15 months of unanswered Israeli attacks for the first time, firing rockets across the border after Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed on the first day of the US-Israel war on Iran on February 28.
In the coming days, Israel would issue evacuation demands for about 14 percent of Lebanon. Among the areas Israel declared unsafe to their attacks were the entirety of southern Lebanon, a few villages in the eastern Bekaa Valley, and the entirety of Beirut’s southern suburbs. Soon, 1.2 million people, or more than 20 percent of Lebanon’s population, were displaced.
Global rights group Human Rights Watch has said that Israel’s displacement of civilians in Lebanon is a “possible war crime”, with experts stressing that “war is not a licence to expel people from their land”.
When the forced evacuation threats came in, southern residents of Lebanon had a decision to make. They had to calculate the risks of potentially being killed in Israeli attacks against the struggles of relying on the goodwill of others, or paying extortionate fees for temporary housing.
Q&A
What prompted the forced evacuations in southern Lebanon?
Israel issued a forced evacuation threat for the entirety of southern Lebanon, prompting residents to flee.
How did families react to the evacuation threat in Tyre, Lebanon?
Families reacted with panic, with some leaving their homes in disarray and others rushing to gather their belongings.
What was the experience of Em Saeid's family during the evacuation?
Em Saeid's family faced a chaotic three-hour car ride to Tyre's port, trying to escape the threat of Israeli attacks.
Where did Em Saeid's family decide to go after leaving Tyre?
After reaching the port, Em Saeid's family decided to head north to Beirut to stay with a friend.
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Some fled; others stayed.
Aya and her family decided decided to stay put in the municipality of al-Abbassieh, about 8km (5 miles) away from Tyre.
The recent graduate from the Islamic University in Tyre, who was displaced during the previous intensification in 2024, said she did not want to go through the indignity of being overcharged or disrespected by landlords again.
“Staying under bombardment can feel easier to cope with than the trauma of displacement itself,” she told Al Jazeera by message.
Many southerners say they are particularly connected to their land. Part of that may be down to the various Israeli invasions over the years, as well as Israel’s two-decade occupation of southern Lebanon, which ended in 2000.
The severing of the region from the rest of the country became a real possibility again when Israel bombed Lebanon’s bridges to the south.
“The most important reason [we chose to stay] is the fear … that people would be stranded outside the south for a long time, even after the war ends,” Aya said.
“And there is a reason that may sound simple but it is very real, [which is] our emotional attachment to our homes, to the south, and to Tyre in general. It is not easy to leave a place that feels like home.”
Many displaced people are put in vulnerable positions, where they have to decide between safety and financial expenses, such as renting an apartment. According to the World Bank, displaced populations “experience higher rates of multidimensional poverty”.
After arriving in Beirut early last month, Yasser and Em Saied only stayed for a day or so before deciding to return home to Tyre. But once back, they were disturbed by the constant sounds of war: the whoosh of jets, buzz of drones, and ground-shaking explosions. They went back to Beirut the next day.
A few weeks later, on April 8, a ceasefire between Iran and the US was announced. There was a disagreement, however, over Lebanon’s fate: Iran and Pakistan, the negotiator between Tehran and Washington, said it was included in the deal; Israel and the US said it was not.
‘They committed massacres’
Early that day, Yasser and Em Saied packed their car and took off for Tyre. Their host in Beirut tried to convince them to stay an extra day, just to see if the ceasefire would hold, but the family was adamant it wanted to return home.
They arrived in Tyre at about noon that day. Three hours later, Israel unleashed more than 100 attacks in less than 10 minutes, many in densely populated neighbourhoods in central Beirut, including in the same area where Yasser and Em Saied had been staying.
Later in the early evening, Israel destroyed another building in central Beirut. It was the bloodiest day in Lebanon since September 2024, with more than 350 people killed and more than 1,000 wounded.
On April 16, a ceasefire in Lebanon finally took effect after 46 days of Israeli bombardment and a ground invasion in the country’s south.
But Israel was bombing southern Lebanon until the final minutes. In Tyre on Sunday, people debated whether the final strike came at 11:59pm or midnight on the dot.
Fifteen minutes after midnight that evening, Yasser sent Al Jazeera a video of dark grey smoke billowing out of the site of an air attack. Another 15 minutes later, he sent a voice note. His voice was slightly shaken as he described “massacres in Tyre”.
“They destroyed buildings; they destroyed neighbourhoods all around us,” he said, naming the streets the Israelis had hit near his home. “It’s all destroyed,” he said. “At the last minute, they committed massacres, and there are now many, many wounded people.”
On Sunday, as Israel said its army had been ordered to use “full force” against “threats” in Lebanon despite the ceasefire, Yasser stood on the balcony of his home.
He pointed off into the distance, a little more than 100 metres (about 110 yards) away. “Over there, they took down five buildings,” he said. Then he turned and pointed in the opposite direction. “And over there, they took down another.”
By April 17, six weeks of Israeli attacks had killed nearly 2,300 people in Lebanon.
