Occupation From Above: Life Beneath Israeli Drone Warfare in Southern Lebanon

After Lebanon and Israel signed a cessation of hostilities agreement in November 2024, the Israeli military unleashed a new form of occupation on the people of the South, one administered not by ground soldiers but by a fleet of drones. The surveillance is nearly constant, marked by the buzz of unmanned aircraft propellers that fades in and out at all hours of the day.

Some of the drones are dispatched from the seven illegal military posts that the Israeli military established on the Lebanese side of the Blue Line, the United Nations-designated boundary demarcating Lebanon from occupied Palestine. These military points — located in Labbouneh, Jabal Blat, Jal al-Deir, the Markaba-Houla road, Mahafir Hill, Hamames Hill, and near the Kfar Kila border wall — remain firmly in place, with no plans for removal.

The aim of Israel’s tactics is clear: to exert control over southerners’ movement, to block efforts toward reconstruction, and to sow terror among supporters of the resistance. The occupation carries out daily assassinations against members of Hezbollah while they’re in transit, with little regard for civilians that may be caught in the crossfire. In recent months, unmanned Israeli aircraft have directly targeted homes mid-construction, farmers tending to their fields, shepherds leading their animals, and depots containing reconstruction equipment. Daily acts as simple as repairing a roof or harvesting an olive grove carry the risk of sudden death.

The Lebanese Ministry of Public Health reports that since the ceasefire, Israeli attacks have killed more than 335 people and injured 973 others. These numbers include at least 13 children, according to UNICEF. 

Israel aims to exert control over southerners’ movement, to block efforts toward reconstruction, and to sow terror among supporters of the resistance.

The Public Source spoke with residents across the South, some who have returned and others who remain displaced, to understand the experience of life under drone occupation. Their stories describe fear and exhaustion, as well as determination to remain close to their land and people. In Kfarshouba, Israeli gunfire rakes the hillsides. In Blida, the memory of a bloody incursion lingers. In Beit Lif, families rebuild cautiously, bags packed, ready to flee at a moment’s notice. In a lonely Beirut apartment, a father longs for his family and their destroyed home in Houla.

Meanwhile, Lebanese politicians pay lip service to reconstruction efforts and debate the speed at which the army should disarm Hezbollah. Recently, a Lebanese civilian took part in a ceasefire meeting with the Israelis in Naqoura — a step toward normalization. But as the stories of southerners attest, there can be no reconciliation with an expansionist, genocidal regime and no stability under a sky full of drones.

Ⅰ. Blida

On November 18, Hisham Hassan was getting a trim at the barber shop in Blida when he spotted three Israeli drones cutting across the sky. He felt a familiar chill. As he stepped outside, his phone rang. It was his friend Haitham el-Masri.

“Can I come over to your house now to fix the internet?” el-Masri asked.

“My wife’s home, so feel free,” Hassan replied. El-Masri was a long-time friend and his partner in the neighborhood’s small internet business; he handled the technical work while Hassan collected subscription fees.

El-Masri soon pulled up to Hassan’s house. He went inside, finished the job, and got back into his car. Two minutes later, an Israeli drone struck the vehicle, killing el-Masri instantly.

Hassan, who was minutes away from his home at the time, heard the blast and felt its aftershock rattle through the street. Heart pounding, he mounted his motorcycle and rushed toward his house. He arrived at a nightmare scene. Flames engulfed the car, and the body inside it was blackened and unrecognizable. He helped his neighbors douse the fire and pull the corpse to the side of the road. As they worked, Hassan was still unaware of the identity of the targeted individual. 

“You don’t know who was killed?” his neighbor asked in disbelief. “It’s your friend, Haitham el-Masri!”

Hassan felt the world tilt. He had been the last to speak with el-Masri, and his own home was the last place where his friend had been alive. But the shock soon faded, replaced by the grim acknowledgement of the village’s new reality. Sudden, violent loss had become commonplace for Hassan and other residents living in villages along the border with occupied Palestine.

“You look around, and you don’t see anyone anymore,” Hassan told The Public Source over a phone call. “The close friends I grew up with… All gone, killed by Israel.”

“You look around, and you don’t see anyone anymore. The close friends I grew up with… All gone, killed by Israel.” —Hisham Hassan, Blida resident 

These days, Hassan hustles to work whatever odd jobs he can find to support his wife and two children. He tends gardens, helps in the fields, and posts his village’s news on Facebook and WhatsApp whenever possible. With Israeli drones still regularly circling overhead, he makes sure to say goodbye to his children every morning before leaving the house.

“I never know when it will be my turn,” he said.

Working in Blida has become a dangerous gamble. Just a few kilometers away, at an Israeli military outpost in al-Bayyad, occupation forces continuously surveil Lebanese residents. They can choose to strike any movement they consider “suspicious” — such as gathering in groups or moving machinery.

On the night of October 30, the people of Blida awoke to a barrage of gunfire and shouting in a foreign accent. Hassan glanced at his watch. It was 12:45 a.m.

“You animal! Stop there! Come here! Get out!” Hassan heard a strange voice shouting. The sounds were coming from the direction of the municipality building just minutes away. He ran out into his garden to try to see what was happening. The sky was filled with drones.

“I called a Lebanese army intelligence officer I know,” Hassan recalled. “I said, if I’m not wrong, the Israelis are inside the village.”

Ten minutes later, a Lebanese army patrol arrived. Residents like Hassan were already out in the street.

“The army vehicle stopped in front of the municipality and then started reversing,” he said. “When I asked why, a soldier told me that the Israelis were inside the village, and they needed to wait for backup. There were only three soldiers on that first patrol.”

When the second fleet of soldiers arrived, the Lebanese army entered the municipal building, but the Israelis had already slipped away on ATVs they had used to enter the village. As the soldiers surveyed the damage, Hassan’s phone rang. An intelligence officer asked for the name of his great-uncle, Ibrahim Salameh, before delivering the news: the Israelis had shot him dead.

Hours later, the Israeli military released a statement claiming that its troops had entered Blida, encountered an “immediate threat,” and fired in response. The raid, they claimed, targeted “Hezbollah infrastructure.” In reality, the municipal building contained little more than a stack of aid boxes, as documented in televised footage.

The next morning, the village began mourning Ibrahim Salameh, an unarmed man with no political ties who had been sleeping in the municipal building where he worked after his home was destroyed by Israeli bombing. He had returned to Blida to support his family. His eldest son had just graduated from dental school.

“Who do you grieve and cry about? There are too many,” Hassan said. “The wound is too big. Words are not enough.”

Ⅱ. Kfarshouba 

Tucked in the hills between the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan Heights and the occupied Chebaa Farms lies the mountainous village of Kfarshouba. Its lush green slopes descend toward the border with occupied Palestine; the peak of Syria’s Jabal al-Sheikh rises in the near distance. The scenery is striking, but Kfarshouba’s location makes it vulnerable. Israeli forces occupy the high ground while the village sits below, exposed. From two military posts on the surrounding peaks, called Ruweisat al-Alam and Ruweisat Samma’a, Israeli forces surveil and harass residents with drones and sporadic gunfire.

Kfarshouba is a Sunni-majority village, and like its neighboring villages in the Arkoub region, such as Chebaa, it has long favored the Future Movement. 

“The village had maybe 10 households who supported Hezbollah, and they have since disappeared. No one knows where they are,” Jalal Abdallah, the mukhtar of Kfarshouba, told The Public Source.

“The village had maybe 10 households who supported Hezbollah, and they have since disappeared. No one knows where they are,” Jalal Abdallah —Kfarshouba mukhtar

But political leanings have not spared the village from the occupation’s crimes. Israeli gunfire rakes the hills day and night. On the bad days, Abdallah said, shots ring out every few hours. Many nights, the gunfire is so intense, it seems as if it could pierce the bedroom walls, and parents stay up to calm their terrified children. 

Abdallah’s own home sits near a UNIFIL post, but that has offered no protection. Like the rest of Kfarshouba’s residents, he has learned to read the patterns of gunfire to get through the night. When Israeli forces at Ruweisat al-Alam shoot toward the houses, the bullets sound as if they are only a few hundred meters away from him. Shots from Ruweisat Samma’a sound further away, but the neighborhoods on the southern rim of the village bear the full force of the fire.

After 5 p.m., when the winter sun dims, no one dares step outside, Abdallah said. The risk of being hit is too great, and material losses have already begun to accumulate: cars, solar panels, water tanks, walls, doors — all destroyed, with no compensation from the Lebanese state. Residents are forced to pay repeatedly for repairs just to keep living in their ancestral village. 

These days, Abdallah goes through his daily routine with extreme caution. He keeps a backpack stocked with emergency supplies at the ready, and often runs through the multiple evacuation plans he has mapped out in his head. One includes an apartment he rented in Saida, a burdensome expense, but one he considers himself privileged to afford. 

“I even taught my 13-year-old son how to drive in case something happens to me,” Abdallah said. “I sat him down behind the wheel and told him that if we’re ever together and the Israelis shoot at me, you leave me behind and don’t look back.”

In addition to his work as the village mukhtar, Abdallah is employed with the South Lebanon Water Establishment, where he is responsible for maintaining and fixing Kfarshouba’s water infrastructure. These days, the work is risky: water tanks and pipes are often located on the outskirts of the village, closer to the southern border.

“Each time I go there, I utter the shahada,” he said, referring to the Muslim declaration of faith recited when death is near. Israeli drones frequently follow him as he does his repairs, and he avoids bringing anyone else with him, unwilling to bear responsibility for another person’s life. These trips are not a matter of choice, Abdallah said. If he doesn’t go out, the village would not have water. He tries to keep his phone visible at all times, believing that it might make him appear less suspicious.

“They might think that fighters don't have phones for security reasons,” he said. When drones follow him home, he lingers outside the house, smoking cigarettes to pass the time, hoping that the Israeli operator loses interest and leaves his family alone.

Ⅲ. Beit Lif

Twenty-five-year-old Riyasa Ismail cannot imagine a life outside Beit Lif. In December 2023, when she and her family were displaced to the village of Tebnine, she could only think of returning home. She missed her friends and neighbors, the quiet mornings, her balcony’s view of the South’s rolling hills, and the late afternoon coffee breaks in the soft glow of sunset. 

During her displacement, Ismail opened a small gift shop to fill her time and help support her family. She sold mugs, socks, handbags, notebooks, and scarfs. On January 26, 2025, Ismail and her family joined dozens of other villagers returning to Beit Lif. Restaurants, clothing stores, cafes, and salons soon reopened. Residents with damaged homes quickly began repairs. Ismail took her shop online, delivering the items she sold to customers across the South.

“We were just starting to recover,” Ismail told The Public Source.

The renewed sense of stability was short-lived. On the evening of November 19, while she was at home with her family, Ismail’s phone lit up with messages from the village WhatsApp group. Israeli army spokesperson Avichay Adraee had posted a map claiming that Hezbollah was rebuilding military infrastructure inside Beit Lif, including “headquarters and weapons depots” allegedly hidden in civilian homes.

The village was immediately overcome with panic. According to Ismail, many of the houses marked on the map had already been destroyed by Israel. Nonetheless, mere months after moving back home, the residents of Beit Lif found themselves weighing the prospect of another displacement.

“I started crying while packing, not out of fear but from thinking about how this was the 20th time I’ve packed a bag in two years,” Ismail recalled.

“I started crying while packing, not out of fear but from thinking about how this was the 20th time I’ve packed a bag in two years.” Riyasa Ismail —Beit Lif resident

The Lebanese army arrived quickly, accompanied by UNIFIL. Some residents with very young children had already fled the village, but many others remained and gathered in the village center.

“The army reassured us that this was not a warning of an imminent strike,” Ismail said. Sixteen military vehicles along with UNIFIL patrolled the village roads throughout the night, but the army stopped short of inspecting individual homes — a step Israel has repeatedly pressured the Lebanese government to take.

Located near the southern border, Beit Lif sits beneath an illegal Israeli military position established on the high ridge of Jabal Blat. Since the ceasefire, Ismail said, residents have developed a sort of psychological immunity to the occupation’s everpresent threat. Unless Israeli forces enter or bombard the village directly, most have no intention of leaving. But the fear never dissipates completely. Ismail has learned to live with it — to keep moving. 

“When life takes a downturn, there’s always a way back up,” she told The Public Source over the phone. She was busy packing orders, replying to messages — keeping her small world intact. Her online gift shop has become both a lifeline and a distraction. Deliveries remain difficult, with many companies avoiding Beit Lif and neighboring areas labeled “danger zones.”

“When the Israelis leave Jabal Blat, I will finally open a shop,” she said.

Ⅳ. Beirut

Over the past year of Israeli attacks, southern communities have experienced a creeping sense of alienation and state abandonment. While some families have managed to return to their villages, thousands more remain displaced in cities like Sour, Beirut, and Tripoli, where they struggle with soaring rents and unemployment. Lebanese politicians occasionally tout the importance of reconstruction efforts, but on the ground in the South, residents are rebuilding their destroyed homes and livelihoods on their own.

Five months ago, Houla-born architect Tarek Mazraani formed “The Gathering of the Children of the Southern Border Towns,” a grassroots initiative composed of residents from various border towns and villages across the South. Their goal was straightforward: to assess the needs and concerns of southerners and present them to Lebanese officials to push for real, material support.

“We didn’t focus too much on reconstruction or people’s return,” Mazraani told The Public Source. “We know those issues are tied to regional politics. Right now, we just want people to not die of hunger.”

One of the initiative’s most ambitious proposals is a “returnee card,” a program that would provide displaced southerners with financial support for healthcare, public schooling, rent, and basic living essentials. Mazraani said the Minister of Health had adopted the proposal in principle, but that they now must wait for a response from the Minister of Social Affairs.

Mazraani’s initiative expanded in recent months, drawing support from local politicians. Its appeal rests, in part, on its political independence: the group is unaffiliated with any party and presents itself as a voice for the people of the South. That public sympathy, Mazraani said, angered the Israelis — and ultimately made him a target.

On the evening of October 12, Mazraani was helping his children with their homework in their rented apartment in Nabatieh — Israeli bombing had destroyed his home in Houla — when his phone started buzzing. Friends and relatives were sending videos of a drone broadcasting his name. At first, he thought it was a joke, but minutes later, his neighbors crowded into his living room. The footage was real. A drone was hovering above his area repeating in a flat, robotic voice: 

The drone broadcast the message for hours, traveling from the border region to towns close to Saida. Soon, everyone was talking about him.

“All the neighbors fled their apartments,” he said. “I felt awful. What fault did they have to be scared like that? I’m just a civilian with no ties to any party or politician.”

The next day, Mazraani moved his family into hiding and relocated alone to Beirut. He put his reconstruction efforts in the border region on hold, and no longer travels further south than Saida. Since October, he has barely managed to see his wife and children once a week.

“The kids come crying and leave crying,” he said. Despite the occupation’s threats, he continues to support the initiative from afar as best he can. But money is running out. He hasn’t worked since the drone scare, and he has been paying out-of-pocket for the group’s activities — printing leaflets and organizing small protests, among other day-to-day expenses.

“People think that because displaced people have roofs over their heads, they’re fine,” he said. “But we’ve lost our social bonds and our sense of belonging. Our future is completely uncertain.”

In the village, life moved at a gentler pace, sustained by mutual aid. Neighbors shared what they could, overlooked a late bill, and grew food in their gardens to make ends meet. In cities like Sour, Nabatieh, and Beirut, displaced families are now struggling to adapt to a rhythm that was never their own. Their children are growing up far from the land and the sense of community that shaped their parents’ lives.

“How much can a person endure? God willing, we’ll keep going,” Mazraani said. “We southerners were raised to help whoever is in need. Doing nothing isn’t in our nature.”