Michael Safi travels to southern Lebanon where Hezbollah is trading strikes with Israeli forces and one misstep could result in all-out conflict

Travelling through a village called Kafr Kila in the mountains of southern Lebanon, all Michael Safi could see was destroyed buildings. Twisted wires and rubble littered the landscape and a solitary yellow Hezbollah flag fluttered in the rubble.

It is dangerous territory, patrolled by the UN’s peacekeeping force. Airstrikes from Israeli forces happen every few days and are met with volleys of Hezbollah rockets across the border. Ever since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, Hezbollah has stepped up its own conflict with Israel. The tit-for-tat attacks are calculated – with neither side wanting to fully escalate. But there is a growing tension and a fear that one misstep could result in all-out war. As Safi tours the country, he finds a population weary of war but also resilient and defiant.

As a terrorist attack, a harsh response and an ensuing invasion strike familiar chords, analysts look for lessons from the war of 42 years ago

It started with a terrorist attack, which triggered massive military retaliation, the siege of a city, the deaths of thousands of civilians and devastation and global outrage. If the military operation was a success in tactical terms, it led to strategic failures that scarred the nation and the region for decades to come.

Sounds familiar? Forty-two years later, as a new conflict looms on Israel’s northern borders, historians, analysts and veterans of Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon are looking to that now-distant war for lessons and warnings.