AITOU, Lebanon – The scene of the massacre in northern Lebanon showed heartbreaking fragments of daily family life.

A dead baby in a wrecked pickup truck; a child’s severed arm buried in nearby rubble; toddler clothes and books shredded; flies swarmed as officials collected body parts, some of which were too small for body bags and ended up in clear ziplock bags.

According to local officials, the overwhelming stench of rotting flesh mixed with concrete dust was pervasive at the site where 23 people, including two children, were killed.

This was the aftermath of an airstrike Monday on the Lebanese Christian village of Aitou, which Israel said targeted a position of Hezbollah, the Lebanese militant group.

Until then, this area of ​​hilly olive groves and winding roads overlooking the sea had been a relative refuge, an area that seemed far removed from the war that dominated Beirut and the south of the country.

Last week the area was “calm; everything was quiet,” Illy Edwan told NBC News as he surveyed the wreckage of his villa, which was reduced to rubble in the blast, its insulation and interior structure torn to pieces, and an adjacent vehicle twisted open like a burnt pretzel.

“My house used to have three floors, but look at today,” he added.

Surrounding houses had glass and twisted metal spread across their patios. Some nearby olive trees, laden with fruit in advance of the coming harvest, were also destroyed; their green leaves were covered in gray soot from the explosion.

Hezbollah is normally not present here. But Edwan, who was not home at the time of the bombing, said an official from the group had visited homes to donate money to displaced people, some of whom had fled southern Lebanon to escape the Israeli invasion, and to had asked their concerns. .

The Israeli military said in a statement that it had struck “a target of the terrorist organization Hezbollah in northern Lebanon,” and that reports of civilian casualties were “under assessment” and “under investigation.”

Jeremy Laurence, spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, called for “a prompt, independent and thorough investigation” and said on Tuesday that his organization had “real concerns” about the strike regarding the “laws and principles of war” ”. of distinction, proportion and proportionality.”

Since October 8, 2023, the day after Hamas launched its terror attacks on Israel in which officials say 1,200 people were killed and about 240 taken hostage, Hezbollah has been firing rockets and other projectiles into northern Israel in solidarity with the Palestinians. militant group. The Israeli offensive in Gaza has since killed more than 42,000 people, according to health officials in the enclave.

And for months, as the pair traded tit-for-tat attacks, more than 60,000 people were driven from their homes in Israel’s north, according to government figures – and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli ministers cited this as the reason for launching an action. military campaign in southern Lebanon last month.

More than 2,300 people, including 127 children, have been killed and an estimated 1.2 million have been displaced since the October 7 attack in Lebanon, according to Lebanese officials. A large number of them left their homes after Israel began its widespread bombing on September 17, when pagers belonging to Hezbollah members exploded across the country.

Since then, the Lebanese have faced “the worst humanitarian crisis in decades,” the UN humanitarian agency said in a statement on Tuesday.

Lebanese are “fleeing with almost nothing,” said Rema Jamous Imseis, director of the UN Middle East refugee agency, adding that they are “being forced out, they are sleeping under the sky trying to find their way.” towards safety and support.”

Some choose an unlikely route.

The port of Tripoli, 16 kilometers from Aitou, is not known for its beauty, let alone its accommodation for civilian passengers. The grimy industrial center is accompanied by the thump of heavy machinery and creaking 40-foot containers being unloaded from ships that dock here.

Yet hundreds of people are now turning to the city as one of the few ways to escape their homeland. Since September 20, this previously passenger-less terminal has launched seven ships to the southern Turkish port of Mersin, with each ship carrying up to 300 passengers and paying $350 per person.

“People are afraid, so they leave the airports and come to us, to the ships here,” said Mohamed Youssef, 57, a ship owner. “Everyone is exhausted and the situation is very complicated,” he added. “So those who can afford it travel. They travel however they can. If they cannot, they will stay in Lebanon.”

It is a varied exodus, as evidenced by the dusty vehicles from the nineties next to shiny Range Rovers and Porsches. While some smiled as they completed their bureaucratic stamping work, for others the reality of their upcoming journey began to sink in.

Nermin Khair, 28, said she had no plans to return with her daughter, Sandy, 3, temporarily leaving behind her husband, who said he will try to join her in a month.

“It’s my country, but it makes us tired,” she said. “We left everything behind: we left our dreams, we left our things, we left everything here – my sisters, my brothers, everyone here.”

Her husband, Bashar Hanouf, 33, held his daughter’s hand as she and her mother walked down the gangway to the waiting ship. It’s up to him to figure out how and when he’ll see them again.

“I hate Lebanon. Every year we have a new situation,” he said. The family, he added, “is looking for a better life for my wife, my daughter. We must.”

Matt Bradley and Ziad Jaber reported from Aitou and Alexander Smith from London.