BBCThe sounds of war echo at night in the Achrafieh neighborhood of eastern Beirut.
Residents could hear Israeli airstrikes hitting the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, known as Dahieh. Some people could even see the explosions light up the sky from their balconies.
However, the street was quiet.
Uniformed volunteers are patrolling the predominantly Christian neighborhood holding walkie-talkies to coordinate activities.
The neighborhood watch was established several years ago after the financial crisis that hit Lebanon to reassure residents worried about crime. But with recent developments, the mission has changed.
“We are concerned about the displaced people who are coming to Beirut in large numbers and they have a lot of needs and it is very complicated,” said Nadim Gemayel, who founded the organization behind the neighborhood watch. ”.
Communities across Lebanon have rallied to help house and feed hundreds of thousands of families displaced when Israel escalated its air campaign against Hezbollah last month before launching a ground invasion. into the south.
However, the flow of people from predominantly Shia Muslim areas where the Iran-backed group has a strong presence – Dahieh, southern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley in the east – to places with a Muslim majority Sunnis and Christians also risk exacerbating sectarian divisions in a country where memories of the 1975-1990 civil war remain vivid.
Recent Israeli attacks on those areas have only increased tensions between residents and the displaced.
A strike on October 14 in the northern town of Aitou, which left 23 displaced people dead, shocked the Christian community.
Although the arrival of wealthy Shia families from the south and Dahieh has caused rents to skyrocket and increased landlords’ incomes, many are now concerned that they may be members of Hezbollah and targeted. Israel’s potential targets.
Some building management companies have sent forms to residents asking them to provide detailed information about their identities, the number of family members staying in the apartment and the vehicles they are using.
In some areas, leaflets were distributed asking members of Hezbollah to leave, while individuals known to be affiliated with the group were asked to leave.
“There is a sense of fear,” Gemayel said. “Some residents are suspicious about who is coming to their area. A lot of people are very afraid that some Hezbollah members live in a building where they are being watched by Israel and could be the target”.
“This is why we are trying to monitor what is happening and trying to control this with the military and security forces to ensure the safety of refugees and citizens at the same time. ”
While residents may feel reassured by neighborhood surveillance, some worry that such an initiative has echoes of the civil war, when sectarian militias controlled different areas of Beirut.
The civil war lasted 15 years and left nearly 150,000 people dead, pitting sectarian-aligned militias in Lebanon against each other.
It began as a conflict between Christian and Palestinian militias, which were allied with Muslim militias. Then there was a conflict between Christian and Muslim militias. Foreign powers were also drawn in, with the Syrian army moving in and Israel invading twice.
The main Christian militia, the Lebanese Forces, was led by Nadim Gemayel’s father, Bashir, until he was assassinated in Achrafieh in 1982 after being elected president of the country.
All militias were supposed to be disarmed after the 1989 Taif Agreement that ended the civil war, but Hezbollah was exempt because it was fighting Israeli forces occupying southern Lebanon.
When Israeli forces finally withdrew in 2000, Hezbollah resisted pressure to give up its weapons and continued to carry out cross-border attacks into Israel. They fought a month-long war in 2006 that left much of Beirut’s south and southern suburbs in ruins.
Gemayel has long called on Hezbollah to give up its weapons. After Israel escalated its air campaign, he said the group was “reaping what it has sown over the past 20 years” – but also warned that the Lebanese people would “pay a heavy price for destruction and devastation.” break”.
ReutersIn the Hamra mixed-use neighborhood in west Beirut, the scene is completely different.
Unlike the majority-Christian Beirut area, many schools in Hamra have been turned into shelters for displaced families.
Members of the Syrian National Socialist Party, a Hezbollah ally with a presence in Hamra, hastily opened empty buildings, including several newly built apartment complexes, to house displaced families. relocate.
The move has caused tension between the owners of some of the buildings and the displaced families who broke into them. The landlord expressed concern that the new arrivals would eventually refuse to leave the free accommodation.
In a six-storey 1960s-style building in central Hamra, a designer who wishes to remain anonymous has placed his studio on the top floor. She said some families had broken into the building and were squatting in empty apartments.
“At first, we had 20 people. Now, we have 100 people living in the building,” she told me.
“I sympathize with them and don’t want women and children to stay on the streets. I won’t ask them to leave until the government finds a solution, but this is not sustainable.”
She also worries about the potential social impact on the area.
The new arrivals all belong to the Shia community and follow strict religious rules, with the women wearing a chador, a type of cloak that covers everything but their faces.
“I have no problem with any religion, but they should also accept my atheist lifestyle,” she said.
The mood is indeed changing in Hamra, which is home to many cultures and beliefs.
Thousands of people are said to have moved there.
It’s difficult to drive or even walk through the neighborhood because of the number of cars and motorbikes causing traffic jams.
Nightlife has also changed, with partygoers and bar-goers replaced by fast-food queues and shisha cafes.
Outside the shelters, men and women sat on the sidewalks, smoked shisha and watched news on cell phones or even TVs late into the night – something residents have complained about.
But more and more building owners are evicting people from their properties.
Fatima al-Haj Yousef, who arrived with her husband and three children from the Bekaa Valley, is worried about where to go next. She’s been in this building for the past three weeks.
“We were happy to sign documents confirming that when the war ended we would leave, but they sent the police to force us to leave,” she said. Fatima is mainly worried about her three and a half year old child. daughter has cancer and needs medication.
“I just need to be in a safe and clean place for my daughter. The schools are packed and everyone smokes indoors.”
Fatima did not feel there were any sectarian tensions against her as a Shia, but another man in the building with his five children had a different view.
“If they had accepted to pay the rent, we would have been able to pay the rent. But [the landlord] didn’t accept… She wanted us to go. It’s not just about the building. That’s something else. I think, and this is my opinion, she wants to kill [Shia] Muslims here.”
This view is echoed by Daniel, a social worker for Hezbollah who is helping to find alternative housing for the families.
“They think resistance is weakened after the death of Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, but we are all Nasrallah,” he said, referring to the Hezbollah leader killed by Israel in Dahieh last month.
He believes the building is being cleared because the residents are displaced families, mainly Shia, and supporters of what he describes as a “resistance movement” – or Hezbollah.
Many here believe that Israel will not stop until Hezbollah is completely disarmed.
“Either all of Lebanon will be destroyed by Israel and it will be a disaster, or they will [Hezbollah] surrender and give up their weapons, and we build a Lebanese state based on the Taif agreement and everyone has equal rights and obligations,” Nadim Gemayel said.
