Lebanese Heritage Activist Documents Deliberate Destruction of 700-Year-Old Villages in Southern Lebanon

Biladi, a Lebanese NGO founded by former journalist Joanne Bajjaly, has been documenting the destruction of traditional villages up to 700 years old in southern Lebanon following the two-month 2024 war between Israel and Hezbollah. Bajjaly describes the damage as deliberate and methodical rather than incidental, with roads, homes, graveyards, mosques, churches, shrines, and natural landmarks systematically obliterated to prevent communities from reconnecting with their history. Visual evidence from the region shows massive rubble fields and heavily damaged historic structures, consistent with Bajjaly's account. Biladi's work is twofold: physically relocating antiquities from at-risk areas and creating archives of lost heritage to inform reconstruction planning and community memory. Blue Shield International, a parallel organization led by Professor Peter Stone, works with NATO and other militaries to embed cultural property protection into military training and no-strike lists. Archaeologist Ania Kotarba notes that modern tools such as drone footage, 3D modelling, and AI now allow rapid documentation, but warns that adequate funding remains a barrier and that long-term preservation ultimately depends on government commitment. Experts stress that while reconstruction is possible — pointing to Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq as precedents — the loss of heritage is immediate and irreversible in ways that take decades, if not generations, to address.