Line 5 in Kiryat Shmona continues to operate/Eli Ashkenazi
When you reach the northern end of the "Bimat Tel Hai" neighborhood in Kiryat Shmona, a spectacular panoramic picture unfolds before your eyes: the north is now in all its glory - the Hermon is covered with a layer of white snow, the mountains and fields are green, the air is clear, visibility is perfect and you can see almost to the south of the Golan Heights.
"It's a day with excellent visibility, we see the Galilee and the Golan at their best," says Tamir Davidovich, driver of Egged Line 5 in Kiryat Shmona.
At my request, he stops the bus for a moment so that we can look at the view.
After about two minutes, he brings us back to reality: "It's not good that we stand here for too long, in the end we'll be kidnapped by an anti-tank missile.
Hezbollah sees us all the time."
It is hard to digest this contrast between the postcard of the beautiful Galilean landscape and the war on the northern border. Davidovich turns the wheel and begins the route back to the central station in Kiryat Shmona. "Hezbollah knows that if it harms civilians, it starts a war that it will suffer from." He tries to convince himself and me that we are safe.
Tamir goes to his own line in Kiryat Shmona/Eli Ashkenazi
Almost three months have passed since it was decided to evacuate the residents of the northern city.
In one day the city was almost emptied of its inhabitants.
Among the 24.5 thousand residents, about 3,500 remained there.
The city streets are empty, the businesses are closed and you hardly see people on the streets.
Every now and then a car passes by and the silence is broken by the sounds of firing from the cannon batteries in the vicinity.
Although few remain in the city, the bus lines continue to run and provide service.
Dekel Harmesh, manager of the "Egged" branch in the Upper Galilee, says that among the branch's 130 drivers, 70 continue to work there now.
Twenty drivers were drafted into the army by Order 8. A driver who moved south with his family can now work as a driver in another branch of the company.
Since the war broke out, the Upper Galilee branch has only stopped the travel of the lines that pass near the border.
The other lines, urban and intercity, continue to travel as usual.
Davidovich, 50 years old, married and father of four.
His family moved to a hotel in Tel Aviv and later to a rented apartment in Tel Aviv.
The first week he was with his family, but then he decided he was coming home, to Kiryat Shmona, and to the wheel of the bus.
"The family pressured me to stay at the center and work there, but then they understood my desire to work at my parent branch. This is my home and we see continuing to work in Kiryat Shmona as a mission."
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The Abandoned Line/Eli Ashkenazi
Tamir Davidovich (on the right) and next to him Dekel Harmash, manager of the Aged Upper Galil branch/Eli Ashkenazi
He was born and raised in Haifa and has been working as a driver for "Egged" for thirty years.
When Yoav-Natan, his youngest son, was born, now 15 years old, it became clear that he suffers from an extremely rare genetic disorder, one of the manifestations of which is various behavioral problems.
One of the main reasons for moving to Kiryat Shmona was the doctors' recommendation to live in an area with clean air.
Due to the daily meeting with the residents of the city, he knows many of the people of Kiryat Shmona.
"The city is like a big kibbutz, one knows the other and helps the other, it's one big family. It's a pleasure to raise children here, it's a quiet city with excellent education. They welcomed me here with love."
According to him, his son receives the shelter and support he needs in the city, but since they were forced to leave their home the situation has worsened.
"Now he doesn't have all the support here in Kiryat Shmona. He moved to a new school, where he doesn't have all the treatments he receives. We have to deal with it. I think about him a lot."
On the weekends he meets with the family and every two weeks Yoav-Natan comes to Kiryat Shmona and travels with him by bus.
Now it's almost 11:30 and line 5, driven by Tamir, is leaving its route for the third time since I got on the bus.
After the bus leaves the platform at the central station, it goes through 22 stops.
We have done three rounds already and not even one passenger has boarded the bus yet.
"It's very sad to see the city like this. Occasionally you see people, but the saddest thing is that you don't see children at all. I miss the passengers very much, I'm looking for them. In my opinion, it was a mistake to evacuate all the residents en masse, they never did that, even Not in the Second Lebanon War. But I can understand the people who left the city, I know my passengers moved to a safer and quieter place, but being away from home for such a long time is very difficult. The first two weeks in a hotel are fun, then being away from home, For school, for the workplace, for your company - it's hard."
Damage to a house in Kiryat Shmona during the war/Reuven Castro
"The only fear - an alarm during the shower"
While on normal days the journey time of line 5 takes about half an hour, now the journey lasts only twenty minutes.
On the way, Davidovich points out buildings and points on the roads that were hit by rockets.
On the way we also pass the building at 13 Yehuda Halevi Street. Exactly 50 years ago a terrorist squad infiltrated the city, entered several apartments in the building and murdered 16 residents.
Two soldiers were also killed in the exchange of fire.
A little later he passes by the square of the victims of the hostilities.
The city carries endless scars on its body.
Even the war of attrition that the Upper Galilee region is going through now, when they are far from their homes, will leave its mark on the city and its residents.
From the moment he returns to the central station until he leaves for the next round he has a seven minute break.
Davidovich goes to the smoking corner, where the drivers Ahsan Matans and Burhan Barik light another cigarette.
The three admit that since the war started they smoke more.
Along with the sense of mission that the drivers are proud of, they do not hide the tension they are under.
Matans and Barik say their parents tried to convince them not to work in Kiryat Shmona now.
"We've gotten used to working in this situation, but when there are falls it's scary," said Brick.
"Around two o'clock the falls start," says Davidovich.
"The instructions are to stop the bus and if there is time to open the doors and look for a protected place. Usually there is no time and then what you have to do is lie down under the window line. I have already gotten used to it and I am not afraid. My only fear is that there will be an alarm when I am in the shower," he said.
Until a year ago he still served as a fighter in the reserves.
This time his request to enlist was no longer accepted.
"My father's brother was killed on the Chinese farm. I was born bereaved. I know what it's like to grow up in a family that lost someone in a war or in an attack. I always wanted to be a fighter and I served in the reserves until the age of 49, including Lebanon, Gaza, territories. I wanted to even now, but they didn't let me, so I I feel like I'm making reserves on the bus, only without a helmet and without a helmet."
The central station in Kiryat Shmona/Eli Ashkenazi
The Davidovich family moved into their house in the new Yuval neighborhood in the north of the city only eight months ago.
Three months of which Tamir lives alone in an apartment in a neighborhood that is almost empty of people.
"I have already created my own routine. I do laundry, clean the house and rarely cook meals."
After a two-hour break, he returns at four to the offices in the central station and works as a work orderly until half past eight.
Sometimes he also mentors new drivers who come to the northern branch.
The lines stop running at 20:30, three hours earlier than on normal days.
At a quarter to six in the morning he will get up to work again.
We are already on the fourth round of the line, halfway back to the central station.
We probably won't meet passengers.
"There is someone at the station," Davidovich announces happily.
At the Yekotiel Adam/Yaakov Malol station, Noa Azoulai, a 12th grader who was evacuated with her family to a hotel in Moshav Ramot in the south of the Golan Heights, gets on the bus. "I came yesterday to visit a friend of mine who was staying in the city with her boyfriend," she said, admitting that her parents tried to convince her not to travel. "It's scary to be Here," she clarifies. "I was born after the Second Lebanon War and I have never experienced a situation like this, except for some light bombs that were fired sometimes.
"It's strange for me to travel on a bus that no one gets on, I'm used to there being passengers."
Route 5 in Kiryat Shmona/Eli Ashkenazi
At the next stop, Tatiana Dzhubov gets on.
She arrived in the city only about thirty-forty minutes ago and is in a hurry to get out of it.
"We are in a hotel in Tiberias and I came to get warm clothes for the children. I am in pain and sad. The city is empty. There are no people. It is also scary to hear these booms. I took winter clothes for the children and am already waiting to return to Tiberias," she said.
Individual passengers sit on the platforms of the intercity lines.
Davidovitch approaches Harmash's office and they talk about the rest of the day, proudly talking about the protected spaces that are in the station space, prepared and arranged.
Seven minutes pass and Davidovitch goes out again to round line 5. "We've been in this situation for three months now, I'm really looking forward to us returning to what it was three months ago, but I also know that it will be very difficult to return to the routine that existed before the war," he said.
More on the same topic:
Kiryat Shmona
Hezbollah
Gaza war
War of Iron Swords
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