Lebanon charity picks up pieces after Israeli bombing

Near gaping holes where walls used to be, workers at a center for women and children in south Beirut assess the damage after a nearby Israeli strike devastated their facility.

It's "going to take us a lot to have our center running again," said Zeina Mohanna from Lebanese charity Amel Association International, lamenting the space had ended up as "collateral damage."

She said she was "astonished" at the extent of the destruction after the strike hit the building across the street in south Beirut's impoverished Hay al-Sellom neighborhood.

In late September, the Israeli army began heavily bombing Beirut's southern suburbs, normally a bustling, densely populated urban area where Hezbollah has strong support.

Amel, founded during Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war, has been literally picking up the pieces at several of its centers since a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah began last week, after more than a year of hostilities.

The Israeli army frequently issued evacuation warnings before the strikes, which it said targeted "Hezbollah facilities and interests".

In Amel's center, where illustrations for children decorate brightly colored walls, parts of the ceiling have been blown off and jagged chunks of glass sit precariously in window frames.

The words "Dream big" and cut-outs of clouds and butterflies were near the entrance where a woman was mopping up water from a broken pipe, as the sound of glass tinkered on the debris-covered street below.

- Al-Qard al-Hassan -

Mohanna said 13 of Amel's 40 centers, which provide social, health and other services nationwide, were damaged in the conflict.

The Hay al-Sellom center, a Amel health facility nearby and a space for migrant workers in south Beirut's Shiyyah district were impacted when Israeli strikes targeted branches of al-Qard al-Hassan, she said.

A Hezbollah-linked financial firm sanctioned by Washington, al-Qard al-Hassan is a lifeline for many in Lebanon's Shiite Muslim community as well as other Lebanese amid the country's years-long economic crisis.

The Israeli army says al-Qard al-Hassan "directly funds Hezbollah's terror activities," and warned on October 20 that the military would soon attack the firm's "infrastructure."

It later said it hit nearly 30 targets related to the firm, and conducted further raids the following month.

Sokna El Hawli, who runs the Hay al-Sellom center, said around 100 children and 40 women used to go there daily.

"The night I heard there was a strike near the center... I cried and didn't sleep until morning," said Hawli, fighting back fresh tears.

"The people of this area really need this center," said Hawli, herself displaced by the war from her home in the neighborhood.

- 'Shattered' -

The United Nations condemned the October strikes targeting al-Qard al-Hassan, saying they caused "extensive damage" to civilian property and infrastructure, while Amnesty International said they should be "investigated as a war crime."

Mohanna said the Hay al-Sellom center was home to safe spaces for women victims of gender-based violence and programs for children including one connected to United Nations agency UNICEF.

The U.N. agency told AFP that "the re-establishment of safe spaces for children in their community is vital."

Mohanna said Amel had officially communicated all its centers' locations to the U.N. -- "to try to protect" them, she added with chagrin.

A few kilometers (miles) away in south Beirut's Shiyyah, people were checking Amel's space for migrant workers, heavily damaged in a strike that flattened another al-Qard al-Hassan branch a couple of doors down.

Internal walls were blown apart, broken glass lay everywhere, and the explosion had thrown a neighbor's old-fashioned couch onto the center's debris-strewn balcony.

"You feel shattered... We spend most of our time here... this is our home," said Amel worker Nour Khazaal, as photos of happier days sat among the mess.

Khazaal, who fled her Shiyyah house with her one-year-old baby, expressed optimism Amel's facility would bounce back.

"I hope the center will be not only like before, (but) 10 times, 100 times better," she said.