Haifa, June 21: There is no place like home. To Nemra Abbas, that maxim holds true even when “home” exists at the crossfire between the war-torn Lebanese-Israeli borders, where she has chosen to remain in isolation for nearly a century.
The Lebanese woman Octogenarian is the last woman standing in an abandoned village that lies along the Lebanese-Israeli borders, after witnessing and surviving the bombs and gunfire of every war that took place in the ever-seething area.
Her companions are a dog, a rooster and cats which protect the old Beduin woman from snakes and other reptiles that lurk around her lonely home.
” I have been living here for 80 years before Israel even existed. Land is more precious than life and this place is my life. I will never leave it even if they crush my bones ”
Nemra Abbas, Lebanese woman
Despite being worn out by continuous wars over the decades Abbas has held her ground, vehemently refusing to call it quits and move to the neighboring village of Arab al-Aramsha as all her neighbors have done.
“I’ve been living here for 80 years before Israel even existed,” Abbas told AlArabiya. “Land is more precious than life and this place is my life. I will never leave it even if they crush my bones,” Abbas said, vowing to stay with the water cistern in her garden and the worn out gate at the entrance in a border zone that will probably continue to be the site of war.
Leaning on crutches as she moves around her courtyard Abbas blamed her deteriorating health on successive wars. “Fear wore me out and today I can’t walk without crutches,” Abbas, who miraculously was never once injured, explained adding that constant fear has gotten the best of her health.
In the crossfire
A life lived in constant fear and insecurity left Abbas permanently dependent on crutches
“I’ve been through very hard times. We used to run and hide in nearby caves as we had no place else to go,” Abbas recalled. “One of my sons was injured. Gunpowder penetrated his spinal cord and he is crippled till now. My other son also died but not because of the war,” said Abbas who despite witnessing all the wars between Lebanon and Israel, could not remember any dates.
But she remembers incidents that took place during that time, such as one when a bomb hit her house and burnt everything around it.
“There was fire and smoke all around me. Only God’s mercy saved me.”
Abbas was always caught in the crossfire when Lebanon and Israel were at war in 2006 and she remembers when three youth from the neighboring village Arab al-Aramsha were killed.
” I was here in the middle of fear and humiliation. Israel was bombing Lebanon and Lebanon was bombing Israel ”
Abbas, Lebanese woman
“I was here in the middle of fear and humiliation. Israel was bombing Lebanon and Lebanon was bombing Israel,” said Abbas.
A few meters away from Abbas’s house appear a few Lebanese villages whose hustle and bustle can be seen against the background of the border’s barbed wire.
But Abbas said she lives on the fresh smell of the northern breeze coming from Lebanon and the sounds of voices from her homeland.
Born in Beirut, Abbas left the capital and her parents behind when she was 14 after she got married and settled in the border village where she is till now.
“I haven’t seen my family since then. I don’t know if they are dead of alive. A landmine and a fence separate us,” Abbas said and added “I want to see Arabs before I die.”
–Agencies