Suddenly there are other cars on the road besides mine – the clearest sign that northern Israel is coming back to life, that people are starting to return home. It's happening at our place too. After more than 430 days, and for the first time since the war began, my wife and children returned to visit the home they left the day after the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre.
My wife had been there once a few days earlier, but this was our first family visit. All of us together again at home, under the protection of the ceasefire, and for one moment it felt almost normal. The children rummaged through the ruins looking for treasures, remnants of our previous life. My wife and I traded fragments of memories.
Despite all the destruction around us and though our lives are far from being normal, for a moment I forgot we were evacuees. I forgot we all experienced life-altering trauma. I forgot that in this very house I nearly died. Normal life seemed momentarily within reach. But that moment passed.
The north is indeed coming back to life during the ceasefire, and people are returning home. But after everything that happened here, neither our homes nor the entire northern region will ever be the same. We're determined to return, but we also know the long journey home is just beginning. Other returning residents know this too. They encounter their past there, trying to process their future.
In the first days of the ceasefire, we still heard sporadic artillery fire, sometimes machine guns. Now several weeks in, the cannons are silent, giving us time to think. The IDF and Defense Ministry rushed to remove all signs of military presence. They dismantled positions, moved fortifications to hidden spots, and relocated forces to community outskirts. They want to project normalcy alongside security.
But you can't erase what scarred this area for 14 months. You see it when you leave the main roads – tree stumps and burn marks tell the story, and tank tracks in the asphalt always point north. The constant presence of our civilian emergency teams, the occasional buzzing of surveillance drones overhead, or the white contrail of Air Force planes heading north – all remind us there's still an enemy across the border. They're beaten and wounded, but still full of hatred.
The grove is still stubbornly green
Driving up to our house, I debated whether to show the children where the mortar shell fell, and where the Burkan rocket hit. Since they weren't here when it happened, I wondered if I should spare them the details.
Then I realized how ridiculous that thought was, given that our house – our fortress – took two direct hits. None of us broke down crying during the visit, but you could see everyone was a bit shell-shocked. My youngest couldn't decide if she wanted to see the "broken house" or not. She stayed in the playground, probably the first child to play there since everything changed, while the older ones went to face reality up close.
It feels strange standing exposed on our damaged balcony, looking out at an equally damaged Lebanon. From which house exactly did they try to kill us? Was it the reddish apartment building with windows blown out by tank fire, or the gray house whose floors collapsed in a precise airstrike? Maybe it was from the grove, still stubbornly green despite the military's best efforts? I'll never know.
Our homes took hits; their neighborhoods disappeared. According to geo-analyst Ben Tzion Macales, across southern Lebanon's frontline, IDF operations destroyed about 6,000 buildings – around 34% of the border villages' homes. The villages facing us weren't spared. Ayta ash Shab lost 36% of its buildings, Ramyeh lost 67%, and Marwahin lost 99% of its buildings. I feel no pity for them. From Marwahin, they launched one missile at me; from Ramyeh, another. The other rockets, mortars, missiles, and Burkans also came from these villages and their surroundings. These villages themselves were massive weapons depots and staging areas for organizing the raid on our homes. A missile for a missile, a house for a house.
We finish our visit to the house and gather what's important to take home – to our temporary home, that is. The dolls we salvaged hang on the lines to dry, along with shoes and dresses. Everything that leaves the house goes straight into the wash – that's the rule now. It turns out you can wash away 14 months of neglect with a gentle cycle – ninety minutes at 600 RPM. Our old washing machine, a secondhand gift from someone who helped furnish our temporary home, barely handles the load.
Fabrics can be cleaned of dust and soot, but I haven't found a way to clean damaged books. My collection, scattered by the missile blast, was gathered by soldiers who stayed in our house just before the ceasefire. They're all damaged. I'll need to sort them into two piles: books I've already read, and books I'll never read. Does anyone have a copy of 'God: A Biography' they can lend me? I promise to protect it from missiles.
Under the ceasefire, which will likely become a truce, northern roads are already getting clogged with construction supply trucks, and you can spot residents back in their communities. But there's an unwritten rule: the closer you live to the border, the shorter your time at home.
Those living right on the border fence make only brief visits – checking damage, grabbing some clothes, then leaving. A bit further back, residents allow themselves a coffee break, maybe tend to their yards, water their withering trees, and pull some weeds. Only in communities well away from the border can you see any real signs of normal life returning.
Standing taller
Another feature of the ceasefire is visits from insurance assessors and engineers. They saved the worst-hit houses for last. No one wanted to risk the assessors' lives, but this delay in bureaucracy just let the damage spread. My neighbor's house lost its tile roof to two anti-tank missiles. With no roof, rain now seeps down to the ground floor. Even houses that weren't directly hit show signs of mold, mice damage, and visits from wildlife.
The additional coverage – something most Israelis don't know about (why would they? They think it won't happen to them) – allows for higher compensation beyond the state's basic war damage insurance. Despite living so close to the border, few people opted for this extra protection.
"You're in a tight race for first place with so-and-so's house,' confides the friendly Tax Authority engineer – who had served his reserve duty right here with us just months ago. It's a dubious competition, I'll admit: which house suffered the worst structural damage requiring the most rebuilding? But the prize money is significant: consultation with another engineer, lab tests for suspicious structural elements, and wall demolition. Well, so-and-so has the edge on us – his house took three missiles, ours only two. Not exactly a fair fight.
One assessor, born in Ethiopia, fills out his forms and then hugs me. He admits it's hard for him to see our house so destroyed and broken, but says my smile helps him cope. I've gotten used to it, I tell him, inviting him to make coffee and help himself to whatever's in the fridge. One look at what used to be our kitchen tells him he'll leave our house hungry and thirsty.
Finally, my wife and I invite the assessors and engineers to come back for a visit after everything's fixed. "I'd pay a million shekels to live with a view like this," the chief assessor tells me, pointing to the green orchards and hills spread out before our balcony. But in the end, he too returns to his safer place far from the border, not before promising to return to see everything restored.
Yes, the wheel of rehabilitation has started turning. Eventually, we'll manage to fix everything, even our sense of security. I know that even after this is all over, I'd need to learn again how to walk into my house in broad daylight, instead of sneaking in under cover of darkness.
Surprisingly, it's starting to happen. During my first visits, I still entered the house with apprehension, hunched over, trying not to be exposed. These were habits burned into me by Hezbollah's anti-tank units.
But I'm starting to stand taller now. Especially after our house became a pilgrimage site for visitors like Ministers and government officials, I too have begun walking through it like it's a home rather than a military position. Habit will become second nature, I know, and eventually, we might even forget what happened – at least until we find another piece of shrapnel hiding in the grass, or when a new crack appears, echoing the hits the walls took, and the trauma.
