Qana

Qana, also transliterated Qa’na or Kana, is a village in southern Lebanon. It is located in the Nabatieh Governorate, Bint Jbeil District, near the Litani River and close to the Israeli border. The name Qana is the Arabic form of Cana, a name that appears in biblical texts; identification of the biblical Cana with Qana is not established and remains conjectural.

The village has a predominantly Shia Muslim population and an economy based mainly on agriculture, including olives, fruit, and cereals, with some small-scale commerce and trades serving the local community. It sits in a rural landscape typical of the southern Lebanese countryside and has been affected by the broader regional conflict dynamics.

Qana has been the site of major military-related incidents. On 18 April 1996, during the Israeli-Lebanese conflict known as Grapes of Wrath, an Israeli airstrike hit a United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) compound in Qana, killing about 106 civilians who had sought shelter there. In July 2006, during the 2006 Lebanon War, another Israeli airstrike hit a building in Qana housing displaced residents, killing about 28 civilians, including many children, and drawing substantial international attention.

Today, Qana is representative of southern Lebanon’s ongoing demographic and humanitarian concerns, with residents continuing to balance agricultural livelihoods with the pressures and disruptions arising from regional conflict and displacement.