Lebanon refugees trapped between bombs and poverty

NABATIYEH, Lebanon, July 30: Zahra Mohammed lost a child to measles in 1982 because she could not reach a doctor during the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

Now she fears she is close to losing another son.

''He does not talk to anyone, and when he does he only says he wants to kill himself. His nerves have broken down,'' she said of her 22-year-old son Ali.

''The other day he said he was going to throw himself off the roof but I stopped him,'' 50-year-old Zahra said in the southern town of Nabatiyeh, as she lit another cigarette outside a hospital where several Shi'ite Muslim families have taken refuge from Israel's 19-day-old offensive against Hizbollah guerrillas.

Zahra traces her smoking habit to the day two of her nephews died in an air strike during Israel's ''Grapes of Wrath'' assault on Lebanon in 1996. Life is still dealing her a tough hand.

Her husband died of cancer last year, forcing her to take a job at a tanning yard for 0 a month, well below the minimum wage. She has been out of work since the war erupted after Hizbollah seized two Israeli soldiers in a raid on July 12.

''Israel thinks only Hizbollah members and supporters have stayed in the south but this is wrong,'' she said. ''We stayed because of our misery and poverty. We cannot afford to escape.'' Heavy bombardment has punched holes in roads across southern Lebanon, turning the normally smooth 45-minute drive from Nabatiyeh to the capital Beirut into a risky, tortuous ride.

Israeli jets have bombed Nabatiyeh, a Hizbollah stronghold where the Shi'ite guerrilla group's yellow flags flutter in the streets, more than 10 times, killing 16 people, including at least four associated with Hizbollah, security sources said.

The war has cost the lives of at least 475 people in Lebanon, mostly civilians, and 51 Israelis.

MAKESHIFT SHELTER Israeli air strikes on targets nearby have shattered the windows of Nabatiyeh hospital, where refugees like Abdel-Majeed Hodroj, his wife and five daughters sleep on mattresses in the basement that has turned into a bomb shelter. Hodroj, 50, came to the hospital after an air strike caused cracks in the building where he lives.

''The children were terrified so we came here,'' he said, sitting by his 2-year-old daughter Zeinab who stared aimlessly at the ceiling with a pacifier in her mouth. ''We have no more milk for her, and no more diapers or any kind of baby food.'' The corridor where they sat smelled of the courgettes his wife was cooking over an electric heater.

Hizbollah, whose attacks helped end Israel's 22-year occupation of south Lebanon in 2000, enjoys strong support among Shi'ites who dominate the south and are Lebanon's largest sect at more than 30 percent of the population.

At the hospital, as at many centres for the displaced across Lebanon, many people hastened to praise Hizbollah, unprompted.

''We do not care about the bombings. We will sacrifice our houses, families and children for the resistance,'' said Nayyef Ghandour, 60, a civil servant staying in Nabatiyeh with his wife and one of his 11 children. The others have fled to safer parts of Lebanon or to neighbouring Syria.

Zahra Mohammed, however, said many of the displaced were unhappy with Hizbollah but kept their criticism to themselves. ''People are tired of wars, but they are afraid to complain,'' she said. ''They have sealed their mouths.''

REUTERS