While North is recovering from the fights, farmers bring war fields back to life

Margaliot -the 43 -year -old Hezi Mena, 43, examined the gnarled, gray branches and lifted his hands desperately, whereby he went between the ranks of mere kiwi trees on his family farm in Margaliot.

Spring was in the air, but there was no sense here that nature celebrated a comeback. Instead of flowers and green, Menas 10-Dunam-Hain (2.5 hectares) had the feeling of a neighborhood in ruins. He bent down to examine a jaitor -chewed irrigation line, and then pointed to burned metal waste from a fallen Hisbollah rocket.

A year and a half ago, the country was full of life, and large, fuzz -covered kiwis grew on healthy branches with wide green leaves.

But months of attacks from the nearby border, the Menks Grove, together with other farms in the north, had destroyed the rocket country, which was equally abandoned by humans and bees.

Since a ceasefire came into force on November 27 with the HISBOLLAH terrorist group of Lebanon, farmers have started to return, confronted the damage with the discouraging task and rebuilt the once fitting landscape. At the same time, there are fears that the difficult ceasefire will not be kept – two days after Israel’s Margaliot had visited, two rockets from the South Lebanonic country ended up in a nearby field.

Mena’s orchard, which his parents planted in the 1970s, is less than a kilometer from the hills that mark the border between Israel and Lebanon.

HEZE MENA, left, and his mother Aleegria plants a new Kiwi tree together after the war on March 3, 2025 (with friendly approval/Hashomer Hacadash)

When he examined the branches of a tree, he wondered loudly whether it was “done” or whether there was a chance that he could be brought back to life.

He noticed a lonely flower on a branch. He stopped and grabbed it.

“This is the first bloom I’ve seen here so far,” said the farmer. “That gives me hope.”

On October 8, 2023, the armed forces led by the Hisbollah shoot in solidarity with the Hamas and the war that the Allied terrorist group in the Gaza had triggered with its invasion of the south the day before. For almost a year, rockets, rockets and armed drones bombed for almost a year, with the worst of them, like Margaliot, the worst of them.

On November 5, 2024, a cow wanders near Wracks on a Moshav near the border with Lebanon. (David Cohen/Flash90)

Immediately after the attacks began, Mena, his wife, two daughters and his mother Aleegria joined the approximately 60,000 other inhabitants from 32 municipalities in northern Israel to evacuate the area.

It would take over a year before they could return. When Mena came back after the ceasefire, he found his orchard “in ruins”, he recalled. Very well -groomed rows of healthy trees were turned into dry bromine fights, which were covered with rotting fruits and dead vines that wildly over weed grass snakes.

The farmer was ready to “give up and close the gate of the orchard” until a group of volunteers from Hashomer Hahadash appeared, a non -profit agricultural organization that started an initiative to support the northern farmers in the renovation of their fields and groves.

Hashomer Hahadash Volunteers begin to work after the war on March 3, 2025 to restore the Hzi Mena fruit gardens (with friendly approval/Hashomer hahadash)

The volunteers worked with Mena for 11 days and helped plant 110 new Kiwi seedlings to replace some of the trees died during the war.

“They gave me the energy to continue working,” he said, “but it’s still a disaster. I have to start again from the front.”

Sums in the air

About 32 kilometers south of Kibbuz Ayelet Hashahar, the third generation beehower, Telem Galili, checked a dozen beehive, which was donated by the start-up beeeeeele Company Primal Bee in collaboration with Hashomer Hahadash.

The new beehives were only a small addition to the approximately 75 million bees, which are distributed in colonies from around 50,000 to around 1,500 beehives.

The bee was founded in 1921 by Galili’s grandmother ITKA and has been running in times of peace and war, including the last round of fighting with the Hisbollah, for over a century.

The third generation’s beekeeper, Telem Galili, uses smoke to calm the bees, while on March 26, 2025 he inspects Primal Bee and Hashomer Hacadash.

Although the Kibbutz was attacked several times during the war, it was far enough from the border that it was not evacuated, which made it possible to still provide Galili to farmers in the north.

“Even in the risk of rocket attacks, we loaded beehives on trucks at night to bring them to farmers to pollinate their avocado and orchards,” said Galili.

Without the bees, the pollen between the flowering flowers, there would be no new fruits on the trees.

Stocking trees near the Libanon border on February 4, 2025 (Michael Giladi/Flash90)

Asaf Shachar, the chief bee hike at Primal Bee, said the fights were very “stressful” for the bees.

“The war led the ecosystem in the north through chaos,” said Shachar, who scored Galili in Kibbutz to inspect some of the beehives that were donated to replace beehives that were burned or damaged in the fights.

He found that the insects were an integral part of the habitat and support the cultivation, but also increased natural resources such as clover and at the same time distributed wild plants and grasses to cover the country.

“Bees are crucial pollinators for around 30% of food supply around the world,” said Shachar. “There will be a lot more deserts without bees.”

Asaf Shachar, left, from Urbia

An original beehive is larger than a traditional wooden beehive that resembles a file cabinet. The temperature of the beehive is made of thick styrofoam and is regulated to 35 ° Celsius (95 ° Fahrenheit), the optimal warmth for queens for laying eggs.

As thousands of bees swarmed, inspected Galili and Shachar the beehives and honeycombs without protective equipment.

“If you don’t disturb the bees, don’t bother them,” said Galili.

There to the end

The western Galilee of Moshav was around 2.5 kilometers from the Lebanese border and was even Menachem among the communities that were evacuated during the war. But Moti Salhov had dug up and defiantly rejected the military’s command.

“The only way I am evacuated is in my coffin,” said the 64-year-old.

Salhov had lived his country in an officially closed military zone for over a year, although he was the Hisbollah tank defense missiles in the terrorist group near the border in the HISBOLLAH tormentary missile.

Moti Salhov offers a mature passion fruit that was selected on March 25, 2025 in baraks berries from the vine. (Diana Bletter/Times Israels)

On March 2, the command of the home front allowed the residents to return to their houses.

However, an active emergency team still protects Moshav’s entrance gate, and the area is still closed to visitors.

Salhov said that some residents will wait until the end of the school year, while others may never return, and he does not.

“If I had young children and found a good job elsewhere, I would stay away,” he said.

The view of the South Libanon of Barak’s berry farm in even Menachem, Western Galilee, on March 23, 2025 (Diana Bletter/Times Israels)

But Salhov is bound to the country. He grew up with the Moshav and spent his whole life there and worked as a farmer. He grown peaches, nectarines and pears, but 10 years ago he and his eldest son Barak got in berries instead.

The farmer went around the 17 Dunams (four acres) from Barak’s berry -sackerland and showed raspberries, blackberries and blueberries with pink flowers and ripening berries, together with a series of passion fruit.

During the summer, the volunteers with rockets and rockets still joined daily threats to the Kibbutz to help him harvest the fruits.

An Israeli tank near the Lebanon border on November 27, 2024 (Ayal Margolin/Flash90)

“People came from Jerusalem to help,” he said. “It warmed my heart. They all told me that they could help me if I was here if I was here to work.”

The sirens started all the time, but the sole bombing house nearby, a temporary building at the gate of the farm, needed “at least 90 seconds” to have a full minute longer than the time that was assigned by the command of the home front in order to achieve security before the impact.

“There was no chance that we would arrive there in time, so we were on the floor,” Salhov recalled. “Splitter fell everywhere.”

Workers choose and sort Kiwis in Kibbutz Malkiya near the border with Lebanon, October 31, 2024. (Ayal Margolin/Flash90)

At the beginning of April it was over 120 days since last time a siren was beaten on the Moshav, but Salhov has no illusions about the future.

“We can’t afford to be naive,” he said.

The berry builder turned to look at the nearby border that attracted itself directly above his shoulder.

“We have to be realistic,” he said. “As long as Israel is here, they will never accept us and there will always be war.”