THE bodies emerged into daylight one by one, all grey-skinned with dust; one was that of a small boy, his mouth stuffed with dirt, a stiffened arm pointing accusingly into the air. Wasps and flies buzzed around his face and blood-soaked hair.

“It’s Ali Shalhoub,” muttered an onlooker as the child was placed on a stretcher and carried away.

About 60 people from two extended families — including 37 children — were killed early yesterday morning when an Israeli jet dropped two bombs on the house where they were sheltering. Only eight people managed to survive and haul themselves from the debris. It was the bloodiest moment so far in Israel’s 19-day onslaught against Hezbollah guerrillas.

The three-storey house belonged to Abbas Hashem and lay at the end of a narrow lane that wound down a hillside flanked by olive groves.

The Hashem family and their neighbours, the Shalhoubs, had moved into the ground floor of the unfinished building ten days earlier, hoping that a large pile of dirt and sand for construction would help to protect them from the artillery bombardments and airstrikes in and around Qana.

Although most of the 12,000 residents had already fled to Tyre six miles way, or headed further north, the families had found themselves cut off.

“We couldn’t get out of our neighbourhood because there are only two roads leading out and the Israelis bombed them both several days ago,” said Muhammad Shalhoub, 41, who was recovering in Tyre’s hospital. Both families were asleep when the bombs dropped in rapid succession at 1am.

“I felt the blast throw me across the room. I was buried under the rubble along with the martyrs,” Mr Shalhoub said.

His wife, Rabab, hauled him clear and rescued their son, Hassan, 4, but Zeinab, his six-year-old daughter, died in the rubble.

Further airstrikes and artillery bombardments during the night, which destroyed at least four other houses, meant that it was another six hours before the rescue services arrived.

The Hashem house leaned at a perilous angle, threatening workers who climbed gingerly into the building to recover the dead. Two soldiers used spades to dig away at a pile of dirt under which most of the victims were buried.

“Where is the humanity? Why are these massacres being committed against civilians?” asked Naim Raqa, the head of the Lebanese civil defence unit in nearby Jawaya, who was helping the rescue.

Throughout the morning, rescue workers removed the bodies. Most of them were children under the age of 12, all coated in grey dust, some with mouths, eyes and ears clogged with dirt.

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