9 June 2024

Israelis using gardening tools to fight wildfires sparked by Hezbollah rockets

Lucy Williamson

Three rusty water-trucks stand at the edge of Kibbutz Malkiya, on Israel’s border with Lebanon; little bigger than a family car, they look like something out of an old cartoon.

A collection of industrial leaf-blowers is stacked nearby.

“This is all we have,” resident Dean Sweetland explains. “We have just these - and the leaf-blowers - to blow the fire back onto the dead areas.”

Dean, a Londoner who moved to the kibbutz eight years ago, is one of a dozen residents left to tackle recent bushfires in the area, sparked by Hezbollah rockets from Lebanon.

“We’re on our own,” he says. “The flames can be six metres tall. Sometimes you just can’t get near it.”

He gestures to the leaf-blowers standing in the sun.

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