A Maronite Christian priest named Father Pierre al-Rahi was reportedly killed by an Israeli strike in southern Lebanon on Monday, highlighting the danger to Christian communities caught in the crossfire between the Iran-backed terrorists of Hezbollah and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
Hezbollah brought Lebanon into the Iran war last week by launching rocket attacks against Israel. The IDF responded by issuing evacuation orders for civilians in a vast swath of Lebanese territory as it prepared for a massive air and ground operation against Hezbollah. The evacuation orders covered over 250,000 people, or about eight percent of Lebanon’s population.
Many Lebanese Christians refused to evacuate, unwilling to surrender their homes and land to a war they said they were not part of. Some hoped that staying put would keep Hezbollah from reclaiming strategic positions it needed to launch more rockets at Israel.
“I am from Alma al-Shaab, from the beloved south that has nothing to do with the Iranians or their militias. I call on the president of the republic and the prime minister to declare my town, Alma al-Shaab, a zone free of any security or military activity by Hezbollah,” a resident of southern Lebanon named Charbel Sayyah said on social media.
Sayyah called on the Lebanese Army to do its duty and protect the villages who refused to evacuate, putting his finger on a fault line in Lebanese politics as the military has been reluctant to confront Hezbollah despite growing displeasure with the group in Beirut.
“If you do not want to provide direct protection, at least give us what allows us to stand firm, support, supplies, ammunition, any form of assistance. How are we supposed to face this?” he asked.
“All the villagers have decided to stay. If we leave, we will never be able to return. We’ve seen what happened to the Palestinians in 1948,” a resident of the majority-Christian border town of Rmeish said last week.
As the National Catholic Reporter observed on Monday, “Hezbollah militants have been known to hide in Christian and other villages in the south.”
There were reports over the weekend of armed Hezbollah militants in the area around Qlayaa, a Maronite Christian village with a population of about 8,000 located a few miles from the border with Israel.
Fr. al-Rahi and some other parish priests refused to evacuate Qlayaa despite IDF orders.
“We are forced to stay despite the danger, when we defend our land, and we do so peacefully. None of us carries weapons. All of us carry peace and goodness and love,” he said in a televised interview with France24 on Sunday.
On Monday, an Israeli tank reportedly fired into Qlayaa, striking a residential building. Fr. al-Rahi was wounded along with several other civilians and later died from his injuries.
The mayor of Qlayaa, Hanna Daher, said the house was packed with civilians. Many of them tried to flee the building after the first tank shell hit, only to be injured by a second shell.
“We are peaceful people and we don’t harm anyone. Our village is safe. All we ask is to be able to stay in our homes in peace,” Daher said.
“We don’t know if there’s a plan to force us to leave our lands, but we will stay here and not leave,” he insisted.
Christian Lebanese Forces party leader Samir Geagea said, “Elements of Hezbollah infiltrated the town,” prompting the Israeli strike that killed Fr. al-Rahi.
“Residents have repeatedly asked the Lebanese army not to allow illegal armed elements to enter their villages. Yet, to date, the army has failed in this mission, and the tragedy in Qlayaa today is the most blatant proof of this,” Geagea said.
Pope Leo XIV mourned the death of al-Rahi in a statement on Monday, expressing his “deep sorrow for all the victims of the recent bombings in the Middle East,” including children and “those who were helping them, such as Father Pierre al-Rahi.”
The Vatican said the pope is “following the events with concern, and prays for a swift end to all hostilities.”
French Catholic charity L’Oeuvre d’Orient (“The Work of the Orient”) condemned “in the strongest terms” the strike that killed Fr. al-Rahi, along with all other “acts of war” that “aim to destabilize all of Lebanon and kill innocent civilians.”
“The death of a priest who refused to abandon his parish is a further escalation of senseless violence,” the charity said.
“L’Oeuvre d’Orient also denounces the risk of annexation and the disappearance of villages south of the Litani River, particularly historic Christian villages,” the statement added.
On Tuesday, Lebanese Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi asked the Vatican to intervene on behalf of Christian villagers in southern Lebanon.
“I asked the Holy See to intervene and mediate to help preserve the Christian presence in those villages, whose residents have always supported the Lebanese state and its official military institutions, and have never departed from this commitment,” he said.
Raggi said the Vatican is “making all the necessary diplomatic contacts to halt the escalation in Lebanon, and to prevent the displacement of citizens from their lands.”
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