– Hezbollah fired rockets at civilians for almost a year. Unprovoked. I have no idea why, says Aharon Gamzo. He, his wife Einat Gamzo and their three children aged 11, 14 and 16 actually live in Kfar Szold, a kibbutz, a small village surrounded by green fields, in the far north of Israel. Now they are sitting in a rental apartment in Holon, a drab town with high-rise apartment blocks outside the city of Tel Aviv. – We could not stay. All the schools closed, the shops closed, the entire civil society in the north has stopped, says Gamzo to news. The family will stay in Holon until the school year is over, next summer. Aharon and Einat Gamzo with their daughter in the kitchen. It is not expected to be able to move home until next year. Photo: Ksenia Novikova / news Believes the war took too long Around 60,000 Israelis have fled the areas in the north on the border with Lebanon. Hezbollah began firing rockets at Israel after the Gaza war began on October 7. Israel has responded with a series of attacks. The Israeli families who were evacuated by the authorities receive NOK 60,000 a month. But the Gamzo family gets nothing. Their house is 300 meters too far south from the border with Lebanon. Still, staying was not an option. Kibbutz Kfar Szold is surrounded by green fields just over 5 kilometers from the border with Lebanon. Photo: Privat At the beginning of October, Israeli ground forces entered Lebanon, and regular airstrikes are carried out. Around 1.2 Lebanese have now been displaced as a result of the war, according to the Lebanese authorities. Over 2,000 people in Lebanon have been killed in hostilities in the past year. Most have been killed in recent weeks, according to the authorities. At the same time, Hezbollah continues to fire rockets at targets in northern Israel. On the night of Sunday, the alarms went off once again in the city of Haifa in northern Israel. Aharon Gamzo believes the warfare that is now happening is inevitable. – We were in the buffer zone. We had to go to a full-scale war with them, there was really no other choice, he says. – Do you think the ground operation in Lebanon should have come earlier? – Yes, I think it has taken too long. – Do you think that Netanyahu and the military have been too slow in dealing with Hezbollah? – Yes. The Gamzo family. Mother Einat, father Aharon and the children aged 11, 14 and 16. They expect to return to Kfar Szold in northern Israel this weekend in connection with Yom Kippur. – Optimistic In the flat where the family now lives, the TV news is on all the time. And yet another message comes in that an Israeli soldier has been killed in southern Lebanon. – It’s a high price to pay, but that’s how it is. The soldiers’ job is to protect us, says Einat Gamzo. Einat Gamzo says that Israel’s escalated war in Lebanon gives her hope. Photo: Ksenia Novikova / NRKE Einat Gamzo says that Israel’s escalated war in Lebanon gives her hope. Photo: Ksenia Novikova / news Both she and her husband say that they really want peace. But this is the first time Gamzo says she has felt optimism. – It is terrible that a war makes me optimistic, but it is the only way we can get home, she says. It is now three weeks since Israel stepped up its attacks against Lebanon, and around two weeks since it entered Lebanon with ground forces. On Sunday, Hezbollah says that fighting is ongoing against Israeli soldiers in the village of Ramya in southern Lebanon. The IDF claims that in the last 24 hours they have attacked more than 200 Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, writes Reuters. Interested in abroad? Listen to the foreign affairs editor’s podcast: Published 14.10.2024, at 10.57
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– Terrible that a war makes me optimistic – news Norway – Overview of news from different parts of the country
