Documentary
The "Security Belt" was officially established in 1985, when Israel occupied 40 kilometers deep inside Lebanese territory, including 171 villages, i.e. occupying 12% of the Lebanese Republic's area, starting from Ras Al-Naqoura in southern Lebanon to the Jezzine district. The South Lebanon Army, led by Saad Haddad, took control under a quasi-civilian administration, with the permanent presence of Israeli forces.
These areas suffered from deadly isolation from the rest of the country, and a feeling of confinement within narrow and suffocating horizons. The borders of the Security Belt were marked by barbed wire spread on the sides of the four crossing gates. Also, surveillance points, which monitor all movements, are scattered across the borders. Minefields were deployed in areas that are difficult to control, and permits for non-residents to enter the area are issued at the crossing points, guarded by the South Lebanese Army soldiers. These permits are only issued to a few. Usually, those who have relatives still living in the area are usually allowed to enter, despite the constant risk of detention, and, in a significant number of cases, arrest and imprisonment in Khiam Prison.
Tell us a family story of struggle, spanning from before the liberation to the 2023-2024 war, reminding them of their old suffering under occupation as residents of the town of Markaba within the border strip of the occupying entity.
On October 7, 2024, a resistance movement in the Gaza Strip, southern occupied Palestine, launched the Operation Aqsa Flood against the Israeli enemy inside the settlements. The Israeli enemy exploited this reality and, under the pretext of retaliation, declared war on Gaza to punish the resistance and recover the kidnapped, but the reality was the opposite, as it tells of genocide in Gaza. Hezbollah, the Islamic resistance in Lebanon, decided to open a support front in southern Lebanon on the northern border of the Israeli enemy.
Based on this, the Israeli enemy began, on October 8th, to launch attacks along the 120-kilometer (75-mile) border with Lebanon, in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Since then, the Israeli enemy has targeted Lebanon nearly 4,000 times until March 26, 2024. Hezbollah announces that it will continue its military operations against Israel until the Israeli enemy stops its aggression against Gaza. Israeli officials responded by pledging to expel Hezbollah from the southern region of Lebanon, even by force if necessary. This war in southern Lebanon has led to the displacement of more than 90,000 people, according to the International Organization for Migration. These 90,000 individuals are from the villages located on the border strip that was occupied by the Israeli army and the South Lebanon Army (the Lebanese proxy militia) in 1978 until it was liberated in 2000.
Amid the events in this region in 2023-2024, aimed at preserving the belonging of the new generation, the history of the occupied southern border strip is being documented and archived. As Dr. Ali Krayem, a lecturer and sociological researcher, recounts, "An enemy invaded a neighboring land geographically close to our country, and this occupation from day one has been attacking the peaceful and peace-loving people." Part of its expansionist project is to control our country. The issue is not only related to occupied Palestine, but it is a geographical expansion project, and the colonial and expansionist goals of the enemy are inherent in its existence.
Based on all of this and the history of this enemy's occupation of the southern occupied border strip and its consistent efforts, Dr. Ali Krayem supports the idea of archiving to document this history: "Here comes the issue of the archive that must be retold about the history of this Zionist enemy and its crimes against our communities, and how its expansionist project served, to consecrate for the younger generations the truth of the occupier and its occupation of our land in southern Lebanon, and its commission of massacres and the displacement of residents from their homes. Archiving this history is necessary in the battle of awareness and memory to preserve perseverance."
He adds that this archiving strengthens the sense of belonging, and this sense of belonging signifies its social meaning, the attachment to roots, and the readiness of humans to defend and adhere to them in various circumstances and in the face of different challenges they experience.
In addition, Professor Amani Ramal, involved in oral archiving and the owner of the "Documentation" project aimed at anchoring the memory of resistance in the national archive, points out that "Lebanese homes contain thousands of documented materials that may go unnoticed, but in reality, they depict the political, cultural, media, and advertising dimensions of the resistance in Lebanon, and people's interaction with the pivotal events in the history of the war with the Israeli enemy."
Therefore, building the archive of the resilient community through collecting and preserving its documents that portray the nature of the societal movement that founded and supported the resistance in southern Lebanon since 1948, leads to defining the young generation's national and patriotic memory and motivating them to participate in its construction.
Based on all of this, we can conclude that archiving and documentation are the focus of interest for the new generation, especially when presented to them in the media format they prefer.