QLAYAA, Lebanon — The bells rang, their peals obscuring the excitement of the Israeli drone overhead because the casket of Father Pierre al-Rahi arrived on the parish he had served.
Solely days earlier than, Al-Rahi had stood within the very churchyard the place the gang assembled Wednesday for his funeral. He had introduced that the individuals of Qlayaa would ignore Israel’s evacuation orders for southern Lebanon and stay.
“He gave us energy to remain rooted right here. He saved repeating, ‘We’re staying,’” mentioned Eveline Farah, a 67-year-old resident.
And he had lived as much as his phrase, Farah added. So when an Israeli tank shell struck a home within the village on Monday, Al-Rahi and others rushed to assist the aged couple residing there.
A Lebanese soldier stands subsequent to a poster of the village’s priest, Father Pierre al-Rahi, throughout his funeral on the Christian Lebanese border village of Qlayaa on March 11, 2026.
(Rabih Daher / AFP/Getty Photos)
That was when the second shell struck, wounding Al-Rahi and 5 others. He bled to loss of life later that day, bringing dwelling to Qlayaa, one of many few Christian-majority areas in Lebanon’s south, the most recent battle between Israel and the Islamic militants of Hezbollah. It’s a warfare nobody right here needs.
“Nobody in Qlayaa is preventing. There’s no Hezbollah right here. They need to combat, allow them to. It has nothing to do with us,” mentioned Najla Farah, 39, a distant relative of Eveline Farah.
Because the funeral procession approached the churchyard, a gaggle of girls tossed rose petals and rice. Others surged in the direction of the casket, dancing, clapping, ululating; all by means of tears.
“Stand up, Father Pierre. Stand up!” shouted one aged girl as she stood within the pallbearers’ path, her screams turning her voice hoarse as she partially collapsed within the arms of a medic.
“You’re not somebody to be carried!” she mentioned. “Nobody can carry you!”
Greater than every week into escalated hostilities between the Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel, the warfare many Lebanese had hoped to keep away from is intensifying, bringing devastation to communities that previously had largely managed to remain on the sidelines.
Lebanese authorities well being authorities on Wednesday mentioned 634 individuals have been killed within the nation since March 2, together with 47 girls and 91 youngsters, when Hezbollah launched rockets at Israel and spurred an all-out Israeli marketing campaign. About 816,000 individuals have been displaced.
Regardless of the gravity of these numbers, earlier than Al-Rahi’s loss of life, many right here in Qlayaa had settled right into a routine born of lengthy familiarity with battle.
In any case, the roughly 4,000 individuals residing right here had weathered the conflagration in 2024 between Hezbollah and Israel. Though many of the cities and villages round them are underneath de-facto Hezbollah management, Qlayaa — like different Christian, Sunni Muslim and Druze communities dotting the bucolic hills of Lebanon’s south — had taken a resolutely impartial place. These communities prevented Hezbollah fighters from taking positions of their areas and so Israel didn’t goal them.
An Israeli airstrike hits Dahiyeh, in Beirut’s southern suburbs, on March 11, 2026.
(Hassan Ammar / Related Press)
That rhythm remained after a ceasefire took impact in late 2024, which noticed Hezbollah disarm within the south and the Lebanese military take management of the world. In the meantime, Israeli troops nonetheless occupied components of the south, and the Israeli army carried out near-daily strikes that it mentioned have been aimed toward stopping Hezbollah efforts to regroup.
In Qlayaa, lower than three miles from Lebanon’s border with Israel, the sounds of artillery, airstrikes and drones had blended into background noise.
Even after Hezbollah launched what it mentioned was a marketing campaign to avenge the Feb. 28 killing of Iranian Supreme Chief Ali Khamenei, and though Israel issued unprecedented evacuation orders for all of southern Lebanon quickly after, “issues felt regular,” Najla Farah mentioned.
“We even had a marriage on Sunday. It simply appeared much less intense than the final warfare, till what occurred with Father Pierre,” she mentioned.
On Wednesday, Pope Leo XIV paid tribute to Al-Rahi in his weekly handle. He famous the phrase “rahi” means “shepherd” in Arabic, and that Al-Rahi was a “true pastor” who had rushed to assist wounded parishioners “with out hesitation.”
“Could the blood he shed be a seed of peace for beloved Lebanon,” Leo mentioned. “I’m near all of the Lebanese individuals at the moment of grave trial.”
But what solace these phrases gave to Qlayaa parishioners was tempered by the confusion felt over Al-Rahi’s killing.
The Israeli army’s Arabic-language spokesman, Avichay Adraee, mentioned Israeli troops had deployed a drone to “kill a Hezbollah terrorist cell in an a Christian village in south Lebanon,” however didn’t elaborate on the situation.
Residents mentioned the home, close to Qlayaa’s outskirts, was owned by a retired schoolteacher and his spouse, who have been within the kitchen on the time of the assault. The Lebanese military mentioned that the assaults concerned two Merkava tank shells and that there was no Hezbollah presence within the space.
“Why hit the primary time? OK, why hit once more?” mentioned Father Antonius Eid-Farah, the vicar of St. George Parish and aide to Al-Rahi.
Eid-Farah (no relation to Eveline and Najla Farah) echoed what appeared a standard sentiment on the town, that Al-Rai’s loss of life had solely galvanized individuals’s willpower to remain.
The city’s Christians trust of their church, he mentioned. And, moreover, in the event that they left Qlayaa, the place would they go?
“To the streets?” he requested. “How can they supply for his or her households?”
But there was additionally a way of frustration amongst many right here, underscoring rising anger not solely with Hezbollah but in addition the Lebanese authorities for failing to defang the group and cease its skill to wage warfare. When the top of the Lebanese military arrived on the funeral, some in attendance heckled and refused to let the ceremony proceed till he departed.
“Now he comes? Why is he right here fairly than defending us from shells and missiles?” mentioned Chawline Maroun, a 23-year-old scholar whose dwelling within the close by village of Kfar Kila was destroyed within the preventing. She has since moved in with household in Qlayaa.
When, she requested, would the Lebanese army truly combat? “When the warfare is over?” she mentioned.
Maroun mentioned Qlayaa was not solely susceptible to Israeli assaults, but in addition had been hit by what gave the impression to be Hezbollah rockets that had misfired or fallen wanting their targets.
“We, the Lebanese who don’t need this warfare, we’re getting hit from either side right here,” she mentioned.
With Israel thrusting deeper into Lebanon, fears are mounting that Qlayaa will endure the identical destiny as Alma al-Shaab, a Christian village on the border whose remaining residents all evacuated after a villager was killed this week.
Plans for a buffer zone would see Qlayaa fall underneath Israeli management — a repeat of its previous, when the village was managed by the South Lebanon Military, a Christian-led militia Israel armed and funded throughout Israel’s 18-year occupation.
Some would welcome that proposition.
