JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
Again to Lebanon where Israeli airstrikes targeting the militant group Hezbollah have intensified this week. Monday's death toll alone was over 500 people. That's the highest daily count since the 1982 invasion of Lebanon. Israel and Hezbollah have been fighting across the Lebanese-Israeli border since the Gaza war began. Hezbollah took a small group of journalists today to the Bekaa Valley, where Israel has been attacking. NPR's Jane Arraf was with them and joins us now from Beirut. Hey, Jane.
JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: Hi there.
SUMMERS: So Jane, Israel struck that region again today. Tell us what you saw.
ARRAF: We were taken to hospitals where the wounded were brought from strikes yesterday and today. And one hospital had received 100 wounded in 24 hours. Now, Hezbollah has bases in the Bekaa, and support for them there is very strong. There were airstrikes in the area while we were there, including a forested area that was still burning. The sites themselves had clearly been hit from the air. The buildings had totally collapsed, and there was only twisted metal and concrete rubble. We didn't get a lot of details about what had happened there, but at the hospitals, we met relatives of the wounded.
SUMMERS: What did you hear from those people?
ARRAF: Well, the patients that we saw in two hospitals in the Baalbek area were civilians. Hospitals treat everyone, fighters and civilians, without asking who they are. And quite a few of those wounded were children. In one room, there was a 7-year-old boy and his 8-year-old brother bandaged and clearly in pain.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: (Chanting in Arabic).
ARRAF: The boys, though, were chanting support for Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader - prompted by their father a little, but for all of that, quite enthusiastically. We tried to ask the younger boy about his soccer T-shirt, but he kept coming back to the chants.
SUMMERS: You know, I've got to say, Jane, it's striking to me hearing that young boy chanting in support of Hezbollah's leader - doesn't sound like something one would typically hear.
ARRAF: No, it's something one would hear for the cameras. And that might've been staged, but the children's injuries certainly weren't. Even on a guided press tour, as well, there are things you can't stage. We were allowed to talk to other patients alone. And that's where we met a shop owner who had just come from burying his two sons, plus his brother and a cousin - all killed in airstrikes yesterday. He was visiting his daughter, who was severely wounded. He said his boys, almost 15 and almost 20, were sitting under a tree and then took cover in a building nearby, thinking they'd be safe, and the airstrike hit the building. He said there was no Hezbollah presence nearby. And then he said this.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Through interpreter) Before, we were not with Hezbollah. Now we are. After this, I want to beg the fighters to accept me to go and fight Israel. Every honorable Lebanese will say this. I lost the most valuable thing to me. What more can I lose - my life?
ARRAF: Lebanon, of course, is not just Hezbollah. But the Iran-backed group, since 1982, has repelled Israeli invasions - of course, at a huge cost. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has tried to persuade the Lebanese people that Hezbollah is placing them in danger. But really, the more civilians who are killed here, particularly children, the more Hezbollah gains support in a lot of places.
SUMMERS: Jane, how is the Lebanese government responding to these attacks?
ARRAF: It's really quite fragile, the Lebanese state - long-running economic crisis, large - no fully functioning government, in fact, and a large number of Syrian refugees, it says, are overwhelming the country. In one of the hospitals, we met an 18-year-old Syrian looking after his uncle, who was seriously wounded and moaning in pain. They had been living in and working in a car wash, which was hit. They came fleeing the war in Syria a decade ago, but instead of safety, war found them here.
SUMMERS: NPR's Jane Arraf. Thank you.
ARRAF: Thank you.
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