Father Najib al-Amil, in his 70s, has been a priest in the Lebanese Christian town of Rmeish for about 35 years.
“I was here during the war. Two or three wars if you want to count them,” he says, cigarette in hand, standing in the church car park. He references the previous Israeli invasions and the occupation which ended in 2000, the 2006 war and the latest conflict, which saw a ceasefire agreed in late November. “We were in the middle.”
He is not exaggerating. The border between Israel and Lebanon curves around Rmeish: it is about 2km away to the south, west and east. Most of the populations of the towns and villages around Rmeish have a majority of Shia Muslims.
It is easy to tell Rmeish is Christian: there are prominent crucifixes and statues of the Virgin Mary, while the shelves of a supermarket are lined with varieties of alcohol.
One yellow flag of militant group and political party Hizbullah was visible, flying from the window of a car driving through Rmeish, but this was unusual compared with many towns and villages around, where Hizbullah flags and the green and red flag of its ally, the Amal Movement, are ubiquitous.
Unlike much of southern Lebanon, Rmeish escaped the latest war relatively unscathed. “Nobody got hurt but there was some damage to buildings and the glass,” says Amil.
Only 25 per cent of the roughly 6,000 residents left during the war – largely families with children – some locals said (other reported figures have been higher). Al-Amil says there were about 1,000 Syrian refugees living and working there beforehand, about half of whom left.
The latest conflict started on October 8th, 2023, when Hizbullah fired rockets into the disputed, Israeli-controlled Shebaa Farms “in solidarity” with Hamas.
The war in Lebanon escalated drastically last September, when Israel launched an intense aerial campaign across much of the country, followed by a ground invasion.
More than a million people were displaced, according to Lebanese authorities, and close to 4,000 killed in Lebanon during the 14 months of fighting – dozens more have been killed since the ceasefire came into force in late November. About 130 people were killed on the Israeli side, and more than 46,000 displaced.
Even during the war, life in Rmeish had a semblance of normality, al-Amil says, but “when it turned 5pm everybody just went home”.
Residents would come to the church for counselling, he remembers, while humanitarian and civil society organisations helped them get food and other supplies. “People trust me, they respect me. If I’d left the town they would have left with me,” says al-Amil. But the war “created a lot of frustration, we weren’t safe”.
Khalil Hajj, a former mukhtar, or elected official, recalls constant noise from attacks going in both directions.
The 76-year-old also stayed in Rmeish throughout the war. His sons left, “as they have small children”, but his wife remained.
People were worried about what could happen otherwise. “We will not leave our land because this is our land,” Hajj says. “We will not do like the Palestinians. They left and until now haven’t gone back.” Lebanon, like other surrounding countries, is home to huge numbers of Palestinians displaced over the last century: in February 2025, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (Unrwa) reported that there were about 222,000 Palestinians residing in Lebanon.
Al-Amil explains that, when the conflict began, locals communicated with Hizbullah to say its militants should not fire or operate from populated parts of Rmeish. Hizbullah complied, he says, though local media reported that a fight broke out last March when Hizbullah members tried to install a rocket launcher in Rmeish – charges Hizbullah denied.
Hajj believes their decisions protected the town. “We ordered [Hizbullah] not to come to our village, we said it would destroy our houses because we want to live in peace.”
During their previous invasion and occupation of southern Lebanon, which ended in 2000, Israel allied with right-wing Lebanese Christian militias. Some Lebanese Christians still express more positive feelings towards Israel than Hizbullah, which draws the majority of its support from Shia Muslims.
But al-Amil is definite: “Israel is our enemy,” he says. “They’re enemies because they are invading Lebanese territory. Israel started the war a long time ago.”
He says he feels sad seeing the destruction around them. Rmeish has always had an “open economy” with the neighbouring villages and towns. “They are our friends.”
When asked who he blames for the war, he responds: “Ask America and Iran, they have the answers. The Christians here and Hizbullah, the Lebanese people, they are dominoes to foreign interests.”
For peace to be realised, “you need to brainwash all the presidents in the world,” al-Amil says. “The people should go back to their religion and if they do they’ll find that war is against their belief. They’re the non-believers.”
