Israeli warplanes screeched across the sky. From behind the green hills all around came the dull thump of artillery rounds. The little town of Jezzine (population 5,000) was celebrating its liberation from Israel's surrogate militia, the South Lebanon Army (SLA), with some bloodletting.
Two militiamen were killed yesterday by Hizbullah-laid roadside bombs, one in front of SLA headquarters in the town itself, demonstrating to the world media gathered there that it was Hizbullah rather than the SLA who ruled. The SLA promptly sealed Jezzine, allowing no one in or out until an all-clear was declared.
Lebanese flags fluttered from houses and telephone poles in Roum, one of three villages evacuated by the SLA. The militiamen had disappeared by mid-morning, so by mid-afternoon there was a great coming and going of Lebanese visitors, parliamentarians, businessmen and people from the locality who have stayed away since the SLA Commander, Gen Antoine Lahad, carved out the Jezzine salient in 1985 on the pretext of protecting the local Christians, 80 per cent of whom migrated to Beirut and beyond.
"Lebanon has returned to Jezzine, and Jezzine has returned to Lebanon," a businessman from Roum said. "The whole of the south will be liberated soon," observed his companion. But, to be on the safe side, they did not want to be identified by name. Lebanese have learned by many hard lessons that they must not accentuate the positive; very often the negative eliminates them as well as their dreams.
Eager to make a speedy exit, militiamen who remain loyal the SLA are expected to evacuate the entire Jezzine enclave by the end of the week, a militia source said. They have no choice. Hizbullah is planning to harass the SLA until it has completed its withdrawal.
Both Hizbullah and the Lebanese authorities are prepared to grant amnesty to defectors provided they defect before Israel leaves all of Lebanon, perhaps within the year promised by the Israeli Prime Minister-elect, Mr Ehud Barak. Prepared to take their chances with Lebanon rather than stick with Israel, 70 militiamen defected on Monday.
According to Mr Edmund Risk, a former member of parliament representing Jezzine, SLA rank and file choosing to defect sent their families out of the area before the pull-out and gathered in various homes to await the arrival of the Lebanese authorities. They are not only taking their time to arrive and also to decide what to do with this strategic finger of territory reaching deep into the Lebanese heartland from Israel's occupation zone.
The movement of SLA troops and their families into the Israeli-controlled border zone is causing the UN considerable concern because militiamen were commandeering empty houses, alienating the inhabitants of these villages who may determine to take revenge against SLA personnel left behind by the Israelis. To prevent clashes, troops in the Indian peacekeepers' area of operations have increased their patrols.
Determined to demonstrate domination of Lebanon's skies while its surrogates on the ground scuttle for safety, two low-flying Israeli airforce jets broke the sound barrier over Beirut yesterday afternoon, silencing the bustling city and bringing traffic to a brief halt.
Comdt Philip Brennan, the information officer of 85 Irishbatt, told The Irish Times yesterday afternoon that the condition of Pte Ronnie Rushe, seriously wounded in an SLA mortar attack on the Brachit position on Monday, has been "stabilised after surgery". Pte William Kedian was killed in the direct hit on the compound, the 18th Irish soldier to die in action in south Lebanon since 1978.
