“They planted death in Lebanon. We’re cleaning this death and we’re not afraid of it”. In a tranquil, sun-drenched Orange grove in South Lebanon, a determined group of people painstakingly search for bombs. Yet when an explosion rumbles in the distance, the team looks up in unison. A boy has been killed by an unexploded bomb in the village. “I saw the boy earlier, playing”, says one of the team with tears in his eyes, “if I could have got to that bomb…”.

“I won’t let them search the same territory”, says the Team Leader, reflecting upon the death that morning, “emotions can lead people to make mistakes”. 30% of the poorly-made cluster bombs failed to detonate during the war, so every mistake could be fatal. For Neamat, a pretty young woman, “this job is like an adventure” . Yet many question why a woman would do such work. “Don’t think you’re pretty”, sings one man to a female de-miner as they distract themselves from work, “your clothes are all smelly”.
For most, this is the only work they can find: “we’ve been saving to get married for three years”, laugh Marian and Ali. Yet before the war, these people worked as surgeons and businessmen. And there’s a greater incentive at work than money here. “When I find one, I feel like I saved a person, a child”, says one man, beaming. It’s this spirit of solidarity that unites the team.

“The Lebanese people are one. We have many religions but our name is Lebanon”. Muslims and Christians, Sunni and Shia, women and men: all work together in tranquil fields, shady orchards and ruined villages, telling jokes, laughing about the likeliness of their own deaths and putting a brave face on an incredibly instable situation. Many, like Neamat, hope to do this work permanently, but once the work is over, the future is uncertain. “I don’t know what I’ll do when it’s over…If I’m not dead”, laughs one woman, before rejoining her team. As the sun sets, they carry on searching in the twilight.