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06593 November 14, 2006
Unexploded bombs: The hidden fallout from conflict in Lebanon
by Toya Richards Hill ACT International
HOULA, Lebanon * For two hours, Mahmoud Yacoub sat disoriented in a field, waiting for help to come.
The 36-year-old farmer had taken his herd of goats out at about 4 o'clock in the afternoon when he stepped on something that exploded. Bleeding and in pain, he made his way to a small shrub, where he sat and waited for rescue.
At first he thought it would come immediately, but no one showed up. So for two hours, Yacoub said he felt he was going to die.
Villagers heard the explosion and went to the site, only to find dead goats. Yacoub was missing, but his neighbors were too scared to venture off in search of him, fearful of more deadly cluster bomb blasts.
Eventually it was Yacoub's sister who located him, drawn to him by his whispers. He survived what many who encounter cluster bombs don't, but two months later an infected foot is still not healed.
Yacoub, who lives with his blind father and elderly mother, is representative of the scores of Lebanese who have been injured and are still at risk of injury from the thousands of cluster bombs that now litter the country.
The unexploded bombs, mainly in southern Lebanon, are the result of the 34-day conflict during July and August between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah. The fighting began after Israel launched an offensive against Lebanon following the capture of two of its soldiers by Hezbollah, and ended though a United Nations-brokered cease-fire.
Scattered in the rubble of fallen homes, in areas where children play, and in the fields where farmers make their living from olive and citrus trees, the bombs lie silently waiting.
More than one million cluster bombs and more than 100,000 unexploded ordnance are currently on the ground in Lebanon, said Christina Bennike, head of mission for Danish ACT International member DanChurchAid (DCA).
With a growing number of staff on the ground in Lebanon, DCA plans to engage in all facets of humanitarian mine action (HMA) - mine removal, mine-risk education and mine-victim assistance.
The goal is "to ensure a safe environment," Bennike said.
And that's precisely what the Lebanese people who are most impacted by the conflict want more than anything.
"We have lost a lot of homes * . We have lost a lot of youth," said Haniah Kourane, a resident of the village of Yatar.
"The most important issue is to take out the cluster bombs and then to re-build the houses," the married mother of four said.
Like Houla, Yatar was also heavily affected by the conflict. Municipal officials estimate that about 900 homes were totally destroyed or damaged, leaving families to double- and triple-up in homes left standing. Some families have moved out of the village altogether.
During the conflict, the greatest needs here and elsewhere were basics like food, water and personal hygiene items. And now, as winter approaches, villagers most need cold-weather supplies, such as heaters and blankets.
Various relief organizations have scrambled to answer the call, including the Middle East Council of Churches' Inter-Church Network for Development and Relief in Lebanon (ICNDR), International Orthodox Christian Charities, Norwegian Church Aid, Christian Aid and Church of Sweden, all members of the global alliance Action by Churches Together (ACT) International.
Beginning this week, DCA, working in collaboration with ICNDR and with funding from the European Commission, will start distributing heaters and fuel supplies for three months to 3,000 families in southern Lebanon. The distribution will also include blankets and diapers.
Yet DCA's most difficult work will come as it tries to help rid Lebanon of mines and cluster bombs over the next year - the fallout from the conflict that is much harder to spot.
DCA will engage in battle-area clearance to remove the bombs, and then explode them in a controlled environment. "Most of these cluster bombs you can't take apart; you have to detonate them," Bennike said.
The overall task is huge, and is also being handled by the United Nations Mine Action Coordination Center and the National Demining Office of the Lebanese Armed Forces.
"HMA (humanitarian mine action) is not easy," Bennike said. Yet "we identified a need for humanitarian support here."
Toya Richards Hill is a reporter for the Presbyterian News Service who has been seconded to the ACT team working in Beirut, Lebanon, by PNS and Presbyterian Disaster Assistance of the Presbyterian Church (USA), a member of Action by Churches Together (ACT) International. Presbyterian Disaster Assistance is sending $50,000 to DanChurchAid for the de-mining effort.
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