'Bombed day and night': A Lebanese hospital on the front line of Israel's war

In the Beqaa Valley, on the eastern front line of Israel's war on Lebanon, wounded patients lie in agony in the rooms of a hospital where an exhausted staff has been tending to the victims of indiscriminate and relentless attacks for weeks on end.

The Abdallah hospital in the city of Rayak faces a particularly precarious situation. Its location in the Beqaa Valley, a landlocked strip of land between Mount Lebanon and the Anti-Lebanon Mountains, has been the target of daily Israeli strikes since mid-September.

On the main roads, rare vehicles can sometimes be seen speeding along. The few neighbouring villages are deserted, emptied of their residents by the constant roar of bombs.

According to the latest figures released by the Lebanese ministry of health, 2,255 people have been killed and more than 10,524 wounded by Israeli bombings since 8 October 2023. At least 1,645 people have been killed since Israel escalated attacks on Lebanon on 1 September.

If the Lebanese medical system is currently coping, it could quickly reach saturation point, especially since the staff, already exhausted by the sheer number of wounded, are forced to practice war medicine within an already fragile healthcare system.

Read more: 'Bombed day and night': A Lebanese hospital on the front line of Israel's war