BEIRUT – Residents of the central Beirut area hit by a deadly Israeli airstrike were still in shock on Friday amid the dust, rubble and broken glass, fearing that if their previously untargeted neighbourhood had been struck, nowhere in Lebanon was safe.
Israel’s stepped-up campaign in Lebanon has heavily targeted the majority Shi’ite Muslim areas of the south, the southern suburbs of Beirut and the Bekaa Valley in the east where its foe Hezbollah has strongholds.
However, two strikes late on Thursday hit al-Basta al-Fouqa, a mixed Beirut district of apartment blocks that had filled over the past two weeks with people fleeing their homes in areas pounded by Israeli strikes.
“God alone knows what the next target will be. It is terrifying. In the north, it’s scary. In the south, it’s scary. In the east, it’s scary. In the west, it’s scary. Where do we go?” 51-year-old Hoda Adly said.
She was performing Islam’s evening prayer at home on Thursday when a fireball erupted in the next building, raising a cloud of dust around her and plunging everything into chaos.
The following day, the road was strewn with glass and rubble as well as clothes, bags and other detritus of a normal day that had turned to disaster. People searched the debris for their possessions, their faces etched with shock.
Cars were piled on top of each other, twisted and crushed by the intensity of the explosion and many residents wore facemasks against the dust still hanging thick in the air.
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