Mass Expulsion in Lebanon as Israel Expands War: “We Don’t Know Where to Go”
BEIRUT, LEBANON—Mustafa Arout was forced to flee his home in Mais al-Jabal, a town in southern Lebanon, before dawn on Tuesday as the Israeli military issued mass displacement orders to dozens of communities in the area and launched a wave of heavy airstrikes.
The 78-year-old mukhtar—an Arabic term for a local leader—had hoped for the roads to clear before evacuating with his family, but instead they found themselves inching through traffic in the darkness as thousands of others fled the area in a mass exodus. Arout and his family headed north with no clear destination, the sounds of bombing echoing from the hills in the near distance.
“We don’t know where to go,” Arout told Drop Site in a phone interview while still on the road. His voice shook as he spoke. They reached Saida after a grueling 12-hour drive that would normally take two hours.
