Spiralling tensions and cross-border strikes which have killed more than 70 civilians in Lebanon have turned parts of south into ghost towns. Residents have fled, leaving their homes at risk of destruction. The BBC went on patrol with the UN’s peacekeeping force there to see what has happened.

The huge crater containing a mangled mattress buried under a pile of dust and stone is all that’s left of the building that stood on this spot just days ago.

“We call it ‘the pool’,” said a Lebanese army officer at Yarine – a border town on the front line of the one of the region’s most dangerous conflict zones.

Yarine is just 1km (0.6 miles) from the UN-designated Blue Line – the highly volatile, unofficial boundary between Israel and Lebanon.

In every town near the line, there are similar sights: buildings levelled or vanished into craters; next to them, buildings which have been damaged, then rows of houses intact – followed by more craters.

In Alma el Shaab, about 4km west of Yarine, stand the remains of what appears to have been a gated villa with parked cars – destroyed, apart from a fence now surrounding a pile of rubble. The windows of houses nearby were all smashed from the force of the explosions.

“We are paying the price of all of this,” lamented the 75-year-old owner of the villa, Nadim Sayyah.

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